The Deepest Blue

by Sarah Beth Durst

  “Everything Lanei has done has been to end the test. What about Queen Asana? What has she ever done to save any of us? She’s sat by while spirit sisters died. Everyone in the last group of spirit sisters died, and she did nothing. Just sent more of us to die. I can’t risk that happening to my child.”

  “Why blame Queen Asana? You heard Roe! It’s the Families who are to blame. Lord Maarte and those like him! They took Queen Asana’s family, threatened their safety.”

  “And Queen Asana wasn’t willing to sacrifice them for the good of Belene,” Palia said stubbornly and sadly. Mayara remembered how she’d seen Lanei whispering to Palia—she hadn’t imagined this is what she’d been saying or that Palia would be so weak and fearful as to listen. “Lanei will sacrifice anyone and everything. She’ll end the test permanently. Queen Asana couldn’t do that. Look at her and Roe. Queen Asana would sacrifice us all for her.”

  From across the sand, by the prone body, there was shouting. She felt Kelo’s arms close protectively around her, pulling her back from Palia. The soldiers had reached the sand. And we’re with a dying queen.

  ASANA KNEW WHAT IT FELT LIKE TO BE SUBMERGED IN WATER, HELD down until your lungs burned and your thoughts fractured. This felt like that. She tried to focus on her daughter’s face, but it blurred in front of her. Roe’s voice sounded distant, wobbly.

  She heard others talking about a woman who wasn’t an heir who was to become queen, if she understood correctly. That’s not possible. There’s always a trained heir in the grove, ready in case the queen falls. She tried to sift through their words, to think like a queen and handle her responsibilities. But Roe was weeping. . . .

  “Mother, I just found you,” Roe was saying. “Don’t leave me again.”

  “Oh, my sweet girl,” Asana whispered. “I never left. My heart was with you, always.” She tried to think of what she could say, wise and true, that Roe would be able to treasure. Something to fix this. There had to be words she could find.

  She’d never been a great orator. Every speech she’d ever given was written by one of her chancellors or a representative of the Families. Her audiences had cheered because of the crown she wore, not because of what she said or who she was.

  Lady Garnah was beside her, swearing colorfully, which made Asana smile. And then she coughed, which hurt. “You’re going to die,” Garnah said bluntly. “My potions can clean a thousand poisons from your blood, but this . . . I can’t heal you, Your Majesty. You’d better say what you want to say.”

  What do I want to say?

  I want to be sure Roe lives. And if the leviathans wake . . .

  She could suffer through the pain a little longer to tell them what they’d need to know to live.

  “I wasn’t a very good queen,” Asana said. “But I kept the leviathans asleep. The next queen must be a trained heir, or the leviathans will wake. They’re restless already, and they’ll feel my death. When the spirits on Belene are released with my death . . . the leviathans will wake with them. The new queen must send her thoughts to the Deepest Blue. This woman, the non-heir—she won’t know how to do that. The Deepest Blue . . . She must send her mind to the Deepest Blue.”

  “We’ll tell her,” another woman promised—Asana didn’t know who she was, but this must be Kelo’s wife. He was clinging to her like a barnacle. At least I brought someone joy. That was nice. He was a nice boy.

  “Where is the Deepest Blue?” Roe asked.

  “To find it . . . follow the dreams.”

  “Mother, that doesn’t make sense. Please . . . don’t . . .” She choked on her last word.

  “Die.” That’s the word my Roe won’t say. Asana wanted to tell her that it would be all right. She’d gotten to see Roe, and that was a wonderful gift. Her Roe, all grown and beautiful and strong and clever and kind. She’d escaped the island and come here—Asana wanted to tell her how proud she was and how sorry.

  She felt a prick in her side. Energy rushed through her, and her muscles tensed and twitched, her legs spasming.

  “What did you do to her?” Roe cried.

  Ignoring Roe, Garnah said to Asana, “This won’t fix you, but you should feel more awake. Talk fast.”

  Pain came with being awake. She wanted to sink into it, make it stop. “The monsters dream of the beginning of the world. They must be convinced those dreams are real. Only then will they sleep and not destroy everyone and everything. You must tell the new queen that. She must trick them into believing that time hasn’t moved on, the Great Mother never died, and humans were never born. Or everything . . . everyone . . .”

  She heard shouting. Guards?

  With a piece of her mind, Asana summoned air spirits—they whipped across the sand, creating a wall of wind that kept Lord Maarte’s soldiers at bay. She also summoned water spirits to keep the Silent Ones from reaching the shore. “Promise me you’ll tell her. I need to know I’ll leave you okay. You must be okay. Promise me!”

  Roe whispered, “I promise, Mother.”

  Good. That was good. She felt a little of the tension leave her limbs. It didn’t hurt quite so much. Each stab of pain felt more like a bubble bursting inside her. Asana touched Roe’s cheek, and left a smear of red on her daughter’s skin. “I’ve missed you. I am sorry I was too afraid to save you. But after they had your father killed, I lost heart. And hope.”

  “Father is . . . dead?” Roe’s voice broke, and Asana’s heart broke with it.

  “I am so very sorry, my sweet.” She wished there were time for more words of comfort. She wanted to tell her so many things and to listen to everything Roe wanted to say and to learn what she was like now that she was nearly grown. But there wasn’t any time left. “You must go now.”

  “Now? But . . .”

  “Go now. Go, or Lord Maarte and his men will take you again. I couldn’t bear that. Did you know he tried to have me poisoned? Garnah’s foresight saved me from that. You can trust Garnah. Do not trust Maarte. He is not a good man. Promise me you will never let him have power over you.”

  “I promise,” Roe choked out.

  “Good girl. Now leave me. I will distract them. Kelo . . .”

  “Yes, Your Majesty?”

  “Take my mother and father to your lovely little village. Give them new lives.”

  “I will, Your Majesty,” he promised.

  That was very good.

  “Garnah?”

  “Yes?”

  “I want it to hurt less.”

  “I can do that,” Garnah said.

  “Roe, I love you,” Asana said.

  Roe was crying. “I love you too, Mother.”

  As Garnah lifted a vial to her lips, Asana swallowed. She felt warmth spread down her throat and then through her body. Her skin tingled, but the pain began to fade. So did any feeling in her legs and arms. She didn’t think she could move. But that was all right. She smiled up at her parents, who were clutching each other and crying. She wanted to tell them that she didn’t hurt and that they’d be okay. Kelo would take them to his village, where they’d live out their lives in safety and obscurity. She thought she had enough strength to summon a spirit to take them. As for Roe, she had too long a journey to trust a spirit—Asana couldn’t guarantee that she could hold on to life for the length of her trip. She’d have to travel by ship. Conveniently, Lord Maarte had plenty of those. Asana could generate enough confusion on the dock with her spirits to cover her escape. “Take a ship,” Asana told Roe. The words felt like marbles in her mouth. She rolled them around her tongue, tasting each of them. “Sail as fast as you can to Yena. Find this non-heir and warn her. Save yourself and the islands.”

  There. She’d done all she could.

  Asana’s eyes landed on the woman who had stabbed her.

  “Would you like me to kill her?” Garnah offered.

  “No. Let her take the blame,” Asana said. “She deserves that.” The Silent Ones from Akena Island would be here as soon as Asana’s power failed, and they’d find a de
ad queen and a woman with a bloody knife. They’d know what had occurred. They would arrest her murderer, try her, and then give her to the spirits.

  Her fate was sealed. And so is mine.

  But it’s up to me to make sure Roe is free to claim hers.

  Her murderer had fallen to her knees and was weeping, but Asana couldn’t feel pity for her. Through the eyes of her spirits, she saw Lord Maarte’s soldiers trying to force their way through the wall of wind her spirits had created. They wouldn’t cross until she let them. Or until she died.

  “Let me be queen one last time.” Or perhaps for the first time.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Kelo clasped Mayara’s hands. He had his instructions from Queen Asana. Take her mother and father to safety. Take them home. He knew the other villagers would hide them. They’d be safe, in case the Families wanted any kind of retaliation.

  They’d be able to build new lives.

  “Mayara . . .”

  “I know. You have to go.”

  “Come with me! The queen’s daughter will deliver the message. You and I can go home, with the queen’s parents. Keep them safe.” But he knew as he said the words that she was going to say no. And this time, he was going to respect her choice and let her go.

  She shook her head. “Roe needs me. She can’t face the woman responsible for her mother’s . . . for what happened . . . on her own. And I . . . Kelo, I’m the one who introduced Lanei to Roe and Palia. If it weren’t for me . . . I have to help fix this.”

  But when she was done doing what she had to do, and when he was done fulfilling the queen’s request, they’d be together again. He believed that. He knew now the lengths he would go to for her. “I understand. But when it’s over, come back to me, if you can. Or I’ll come find you. I’ll always come find you.”

  “We’ll be together again,” Mayara told him, and kissed him.

  Then there was no more time. He had a thousand things he wanted to say, but he thought she knew them all. She knew that he would come after her and wanted to save her and that he didn’t want to be parted from her. He’d go with her, if he could. But Queen Asana had asked him to save her parents, and he couldn’t defy a dying queen.

  He shepherded the queen’s father and mother toward the whale spirit. They splashed through the eerily calm water. Boosting the queen’s mother onto the whale’s back, he looked back at the beach. Only a few yards away, a wall of wind tore through the sand, obscuring everything beyond it, buying them all time. He had to hope that Queen Asana lived until they reached the village. They’d all die if she lost control of the spirits too soon.

  So they had to be quick.

  He climbed onto the back of the whale, trying not to think, trying not to doubt, trying not to mourn, trying not to fear. He braced Asana’s parents. “Ready?”

  “I don’t want to leave her,” her mother said. “I need to be with her!”

  “She wants to know you’re safe,” Kelo said. “That’s what she needs.”

  “But she—”

  Kelo cut her off. “You can give her this gift. Ease her sorrow.” His words sank in, and he saw the queen’s mother deflate. Her father cradled his wife’s shoulders. A moment later, it didn’t matter what they felt or thought or wanted, because the whale was shooting through the water.

  Kelo felt spray in his face, tasted the sea. It tasted like tears.

  He never dreamed he would leave Mayara so soon after he found her. But he’d also never imagined he’d be complicit in torture or that he’d be willing to drug children. If he didn’t help save the queen’s family after all he’d done, then he wasn’t worthy of being with Mayara.

  This, then, is the line I won’t cross.

  Clinging to the back of the whale spirit, he rode with the queen’s parents along the shore of Olaku toward his village, while the night darkened and the wind howled as if it knew what was coming. Maybe it does. The spirits must be able to sense the queen’s impending death—they were linked in a way he couldn’t begin to comprehend. Once she died, they’d be free of all commands, free to kill the hated humans, free to behave like wild spirits with no one to stop their destruction, until the new queen took control.

  Almost there, he thought.

  He saw his village up ahead. The beach with the boats, the white houses nestled into the cove. . . . He felt the whale spirit buck beneath them. The queen was losing control.

  “Swim,” he ordered.

  He helped Asana’s parents slide off the whale spirit. Pacing them, he shouted encouragement as they swam through the churning sea. When Asana’s father slowed, Kelo doubled back and hooked a hand under his armpit. He kicked sideways, pulling her father through the water.

  Waves broke over them, and he sucked in air. He kept his eyes focused on the shore ahead. Around him, he heard shrieking cries, spirits calling to spirits. Something smooth brushed past his leg.

  And then his knee scraped against the pebbly shore. He pulled Asana’s father to his feet. Her mother was already crawling out of the surf.

  Bells were ringing in the village, and he saw his friends and neighbors running for the caves. Drawing Asana’s parents with him, he urged them onward. “Quickly!”

  They clung to him as they stumbled away from the shore. Behind them, Kelo heard the waves crash like thunder, and cold water slapped his back. He didn’t turn around.

  Crack.

  A tree crashed across the path that led up to the caves. Asana’s mother screamed as debris struck them.

  He risked a look back at the sea.

  The spirits looked as if they were fighting themselves, writhing and churning in the water. She’s fighting them for control, he thought.

  They had, at most, minutes.

  There wasn’t time to find a way around the tree.

  Instead he led them up another path, one he knew so well he could have done it blindfolded. They climbed the path up above the village to his studio. It was still draped in charms, exactly as he’d left it when he’d begun his journey.

  He pushed through the door and shepherded Asana’s parents inside. He secured the door behind them with a stone that he rolled in front of it. Running to the windows, he slammed the shutters closed. They were still damaged from the last spirit storm, but he thought maybe they’d hold one more time.

  Gathering up charms that still lay scattered around the floor, he began draping them around the interior perimeter of his studio. Without speaking, Asana’s parents joined him, stuffing charms into cracks and hanging them over the shuttered windows.

  Outside, the spirits of Belene went wild as the queen died.

  MAYARA WATCHED KELO DISAPPEAR ACROSS THE WAVES AND HAD the terrible feeling that she wasn’t going to see him again. He came to save me. With the queen, somehow. That felt as wondrous as a sunrise after a storm. She wished she could have asked him how he’d left home, how her parents were, how he felt about her choice. She wanted to tell him about Elorna and the Island of Testing and everything she’d felt and done and seen. . . .

  But he was lost in the frothing blueness of the churning sea.

  I should have gone with him.

  But the choice was made.

  Kelo would be safe, but Roe needed her.

  We need to be apart now, so we can have a chance to someday be together.

  Spirits were dancing within waterspouts, swooping over the cliffs, and tearing up the sand all around them. Their shrieks mingled with the crash of the waves and the roar of the wind to encase them in a steady cyclone of noise.

  Queen Asana was instructing the lady in ruffles. “Garnah, swear to me you will keep my daughter safe.” Her words came out as a harsh whisper, and her breath had a whistle to it, as if she’d swallowed the wind and it was now tearing her up from within. It was a terrible sound that Mayara wished she’d never had to hear.

  This must be a thousand times worse for Roe.

  Roe was crying in heaving gulps. “I don’t want to be ‘safe’! I want to be with you
! I never chose to be safe. I never wanted you to sacrifice anything for me.”

  The woman in ruffles, Garnah, said, as if she were trying to be helpful, “No one will be safe when the queen dies.”

  Roe let out a sound like a wounded gull.

  “Promise me!” the queen rasped to Garnah. “See that Roe reaches the new queen and delivers my message unharmed. Protect her by any means necessary! She will need you, before this is through.”

  Garnah’s eyes shifted to Palia. “‘Any means’ is my specialty. You have my word.”

  Mayara felt a shift in the spirits—they knew the queen was weakening. She felt their eagerness and their hunger. It made her feel as if claws were tearing at her skin from the inside out. She stretched her own mind out, trying to soothe them, but it was like shouting when everyone else was already screaming.

  “Mother!” Roe cried.

  She must feel it too.

  The queen won’t last much longer.

  “You must go, my little Roe,” the queen said. “Go now, while I can still help you.”

  With a gentle hand on her shoulder, Mayara tried to draw Roe away, but Roe pushed her off and collapsed across her mother. “You can’t die!” she cried. “You can’t! I just found you, and I can’t lose you!”

  Mayara felt the spirits’ hunger soar—if the queen died before they left this beach, they’d all be torn apart. Lowering her voice, she asked Garnah, “How much time does she have?”

  “Not enough,” Garnah said grimly. “Can you do something about the girl, or do I need to? We can’t stay here. Also, do you know how to sail one of those ships?”

  “A small sailboat, yes. A big sailing ship, no.” She’d been out on the village fishing boats, and she could maneuver a small craft around the harbor like any islander could, but the trading ships . . . They were as different from the village boats as a whale to a minnow.

  “Then we’ll need a sailor.”