Waterfire Saga, Book One: Deep Blue (A Waterfire Saga Novel)

by Jennifer Donnelly

  “Aceasta le vede! Consolidarea foc! Ṭine-lînapoi!” Vrăja ordered. It sees them! Strengthen the fire! Hold it back!

  The witches’ voices rose. One, summoning the last of her strength, closed her eyes and leaned forward. Closer to the waterfire. Closer to the rippling image. It was a mistake.

  The monster opened its lipless mouth in a snarl. As Sera watched in horror, a sinewy black arm, streaked with red, shot through the bars of the gate, through the waterfire, and into the Incantarium. The monster grabbed the witch by her throat. She screamed in pain as its nails dug into her flesh. It jerked her forward, breaking her grip on the incanti at either side of her. The waterfire went out.

  “E a rupt prin! Condu-l înapoi! Închide cercul înainte să ne omoare pe toṭi!” Vrăja shouted. It has broken through! Drive it back! Close the circle before it kills us all!

  There were more screams. There was blood in the water, terrror and chaos in the room. Serafina was right in the midst of it, yet somehow, she was suddenly above it. Her hearing sharpened; her vision focused. She could see the monster’s next move, and the one after that, as if watching pieces sweep across a chess board. And she could see how to block them.

  “Becca!” she shouted. “We need a deflecto spell!”

  “I’m on it!” Becca shouted, then started to songcast a protective shield.

  “Ling! Take the witch’s place!”

  Ling joined the incanti, crossing her wrists so she could grip hands with them despite her sling. She grimaced in pain as one of the witches took hold of her bad hand, then started to chant. As she did, slender fingers of waterfire rose from the ground in front of the prison. Serafina knew the blue fire took time to conjure. She would have to draw the monster off.

  “Hey!” Serafina shouted, clapping her hands loudly. “Over here!”

  The monster whirled around. More hands came through the bars. In the center of each palm was a lidless eye.

  “Come on! Right here, sea scum! Let’s go!” Serafina shouted.

  The monster released the incanta and struck at Serafina. It was fast and powerful, but Becca’s deflecto, well-sung and solid, protected her.

  While Serafina distracted the creature, Becca tried to pull the wounded incanta clear of the waterfire. The monster saw her.

  “No!” Serafina shouted. Without thinking, she swam around the deflecto and slapped the water noisily with her tail.

  The monster turned from Becca and rushed at her again. She shot backward, but not fast enough. Its claws caught her tail, opening three long gashes in it.

  Serafina bit back the pain. “Ava, talk to me!” she shouted. “Can you see anything? What’s it afraid of?”

  “Light, Sera! It hates light!”

  “Neela, frag it!”

  Neela bound the lava’s light tightly, then hurled it through the bars of the gates. It hit the floor and exploded, forcing the monster back. Only seconds later, though, the creature was reaching through the gate again, seemingly unharmed and fueled by a new fury. The bronze bars groaned as it shook them. One started to bend. The waterfire was rising, filling the room with blue light, but it was still weak. Becca, cradling the wounded witch, added her voice to the incanti’s and the waterfire flared higher.

  “It’s going to get out!” Neela yelled. “The flames aren’t strong enough!”

  Suddenly, a blur of black and white flashed past them. It was Astrid, moving with the deadly speed of an orca. “Not if I can help it,” she growled.

  “Astrid, no! You’re too close!” Serafina shouted.

  But Astrid didn’t listen. With a warrior’s roar, she swung her sword at the monster, the muscles in her strong arms rippling. The blade came down on one of its outstretched arms and cut off a hand.

  The monster shrieked in pain and fled into the depths of the prison. Its severed hand scrabbled in the silt. Astrid drove the point of her saber through it. The fingers clutched at the blade, then curled into the palm, like the legs of a dying spider.

  Becca, eyes closed, songcast with all her might. As her voice rose, the flames of the waterfire leapt. Astrid backed away from it.

  “Of all the stupid moves!” Serafina shouted at her. “You could’ve been killed!”

  “It worked, didn’t it?” Astrid shouted back.

  “Songspells do, too. Ever hear of those?”

  Astrid didn’t reply. She swam to a wall and leaned against it, panting. She had a deep cut across one forearm. Her left temple was bleeding.

  She saved our lives. All of us, Serafina thought. Even me. It wasn’t what she expected from the daughter of the man who’d invaded Cerulea and it made her feel off-balance and unsettled.

  Becca was sitting on the floor with Vrăja, who was cradling the wounded river witch.

  Serafina turned her attention to them. “How is she?”

  Becca shook her head. The incanta’s eyes were half closed. Blood pulsed from a deep gash in her neck. She was trying to say something. Serafina bent low to listen.

  “…so many…in blood and fire….I heard them, felt them….Lost, all lost….He’s coming….Stop him….”

  And then her lips stopped moving and Serafina saw the light go out of her eyes.

  Vrăja raised her head; the grief in her heart was etched on her face. “Odihneṣte-te acum, curajos,” she said. Rest now, brave one. Sera’s own heart filled with sorrow.

  More Iele, drawn by the creature’s roars, hurried into the Incantarium. Vrăja asked two of them to carry their sister’s body away and prepare it for burial, and for another to take Ling’s place in the circle and keep the chant going. And then she rose wearily. Becca helped her.

  “It has been growing stronger, but I had no idea how strong until just now,” Vrăja said.

  “Was that—” Serafina started to say.

  “Abbadon? Yes,” Vrăja said.

  “It’s here? In the Incantarium?” Becca asked.

  Vrăja laughed mirthlessly. “It’s not supposed to be,” she said. “Only its image. We watch over the monster with an ochi—a powerful spying spell. Abbadon broke through the ochi just now, and the waterfire, too. That is bad enough. But it also manifested physically in this room, which is far worse. Such a thing is called an arăta. Until now, it was a theoretical spell only. Though many have tried, no one—not even an Iele—has ever been able to cast an arăta. The monster’s was weak, thank the gods. Had it been stronger, we would all be dead, not just our poor Antanasia.”

  “I knew I should have stayed outside,” Neela said.

  “Oh, no, bright one,” Vrăja said. “If you had, I never would have seen it.”

  “Seen what?” Neela asked.

  “How magnificent you are together,” Vrăja said. “It is just as I’d hoped. It’s more than I’d hoped. Each one of you is strong, yes, but together…oh, together your powers will become even greater. Just as theirs did.”

  “Excuse me?” Ling said. “Magnificent? One of your witches just died. The rest of us almost did. That thing nearly got out. If it wasn’t for Astrid, it would have. We weren’t magnificent. We were lucky.”

  “Luck has nothing to do with it. Abbadon grows strong, yes. But you will, too—now that you are united,” Vrăja said.

  “I don’t understand,” Serafina said.

  “Did you not feel what happened? Did you not feel your strength? You, Serafina, marshalled your troops as cleverly as your great-grandmother, Regina Isolda, did during the War of Reykjanes Ridge. And you,” she pointed at Ling, “you chanted as if you’d been born an incanta. Neela threw light as well as I do. Becca’s deflecto didn’t so much as crack under Abbadon’s blows. Ava saw what it fears, when we, the Iele, have not been able to. And Astrid attacked with the force of ten warriors.”

  Serafina looked at the others. From the expressions on their faces, she could see that they had felt something, just as she had. A clarity. A knowing. A new and sudden strength. It had felt so strange to feel so powerful. Disorienting. And a little bit scary. How had it
happened? she wondered.

  “You will do even more. We will teach you,” Vrăja said, swimming toward the door. “Come! There is much to do. We will go back to my chambers now. We will—”

  “No,” Astrid said, putting her sword back in its scabbard. “I’m not going anywhere. Not until you tell us why you brought us here.”

  Vrăja stopped. She turned, fixing Astrid with her bright black eyes. “To finish what you just began,” she said.

  “Finish what? I don’t get it. You want me to cut off more of the monster’s hands?”

  “No, child,” she said.

  “Good,” Astrid said, looking relieved. “Because that was really tough.”

  “I want you to cut off its head.”

  ASTRID’S LAUGHTER rang out above the witches’ chanting.

  “Cut off its head! That’s a good one, Baba Vrăja. I mean, did you see that thing? It’s really strong and really mad. If it could have, it would’ve cut off our heads. So really, why did you summon us here?” she asked.

  Vrăja was not laughing.

  “Wait, you’re not…You can’t be serious.”

  “I’ve never been more serious. You must go to the Southern Sea, where the monster lies imprisoned. Another seeks it for dark purposes. This other has woken it. You must find the monster and kill it before this other can free it. If you do not, the seas, and all in them, will fall to Abbadon.”

  Serafina was speechless. They all were. The six mermaids looked at each other in wide-eyed disbelief, then all started talking at once.

  “Go to the Southern Sea?” Ling said.

  “We’ll freeze to death!” Becca said.

  “Kill Abbadon?” Ava said.

  “How would we even find him? The Southern Sea is huge!” Neela said.

  “This is totally insane,” Astrid said. “I’m out of here.”

  As Serafina watched Astrid swim toward the door, lines from her nightmare suddenly came back to her.

  Gather now from seas and rivers,

  Become one mind, one heart, one bond

  Before the waters, and all creatures in them,

  Are laid to waste by Abbadon!

  And suddenly she knew what she had to do. Just as she had moments ago, when the monster attacked them. She had to keep the group together, no matter what. One mind, one heart, one bond. She couldn’t let anyone leave.

  “Astrid, wait,” she said.

  Astrid snorted. “Later,” she said.

  “You’re afraid,” Serafina said, sensing that the only way to stop her was to challenge her.

  She was right. Astrid stopped dead, then turned around, eyes blazing.

  “What did you say?”

  “I said, you’re afraid. You’re afraid of the story. That’s why you want to leave.”

  “Afraid of what story? What are you talking about? You’re as crazy as she is,” Astrid said, nodding at Vrăja.

  Serafina turned to the river witch. “Baba Vrăja, before you opened the door to this room, you said that what’s inside it had a story,” she said. “And that it would tell us who we are. We need to hear that story. Now.”

  THREE EYEBALLS, set in three amber rings, twisted around in their settings and stared at Serafina.

  Serafina stared back uneasily.

  “You like them?” Vrăja asked, as she handed her a cup and saucer.

  “They’re very, um, unusual,” Sera replied.

  Vrăja had led the mermaids back to her study. She’d invited them all to sit down, and had sent a servant for a pot of tea.

  “They’re terragogg eyes,” she said now.

  “Did they drown or something?” Neela asked.

  “Or something,” Vrăja said. She smiled and Serafina noticed, for the first time, that her teeth were very sharp. “One dumped oil into my river. Another killed an otter. The third bulldozed trees where osprey nested. They live still—or rather, exist—as cadavru. I use them as sentries.”

  “That rotter by the mouth of the Olt, is he one?” Neela asked.

  “Yes. He has his right eye and I have his left. What he sees, I see. Very handy when death riders are about.”

  She finished pouring the tea and sat on the edge of her desk. She’d poured a cup for herself, but didn’t drink it. Instead she picked up a piece of smooth, flat stone that was lying next to the teapot and turned it over in her hands. Symbols were carved into its surface.

  “The songspell to make a cadavru is called a trezi. A Romanian spell. Very old,” she said. “I have many such spells. Passed down from obârşie to obârşie. These spells are how we, the Order of the Iele, have endured as long as we have. Merrow created us four thousand years ago, and we have carried out the duties she entrusted to us ever since, in order to protect the merfolk.”

  “From what?” Ling asked.

  Vrăja smiled. “Ourselves.”

  She held the stone out so that Sera, Neela, Astrid, Becca, and Ling could see it, then handed it to Ava, so she could feel it. Baby, dozing in his mistress’s lap, growled in his sleep.

  “Did you know that this writing is nearly forty centuries old?” Vrăja asked. “It came from a Minoan temple. It’s one of the few surviving records of Atlantis. It—like Plato’s accounts, and those of other ancients—Posidonius, Hellanicus, Philo—tells us that the island sank because of natural causes.” She looked at the mermaids, then said, “It lies.”

  “Why?” Ava asked.

  “Because that’s what Merrow wanted the world to know about Atlantis—lies. Stories have great power. Stories endure. Merrow knew that, so she had everything that told the true story of Atlantis expunged.”

  “But why would she do that?” Neela asked.

  “The truth was too dangerous,” Vrăja said. “Merrow had seen her people—men and women, little children—swallowed by fire and water. You see, it wasn’t an earthquake or a volcano that doomed Atlantis, as you undoubtedly have been taught. Those were only the mechanisms of its ruin. It was one of the island’s own who destroyed it.”

  “Baba Vrăja, how do you know this?” Serafina asked. She was mesmerized by the witch’s words. Ancient Atlantean history was her passion. All her life, she had hungered to know more about the lost island, but there were so few conchs from the period, so little information to be had.

  “We know from Merrow herself. She gave the truth to the first obârşie in a bloodsong. The obârşie kept it in her heart. On her deathbed, she passed it to her successor, and so on. We are forbidden to speak of it unless the monster rises. For four thousand years, we have been silent.”

  “Until now,” Ling said.

  “Yes,” Vrăja said. “Until now. But I have begun at the end, and beginnings are much better places to start. Whatever you do or dream you can do—begin it. Boldness has genius and power and magic in it. A terragogg wrote that. Some say it was the poet Goethe. He could have been writing about Atlantis for that was Atlantis—a boldness. A place made of genius and magic. Ah, such magic!” she said, smiling. “Nothing could compare to it. Athens? A backwater. Rome? A dusty hill town. Thebes? A watering hole. Mines of copper, tin, silver, and gold made Atlantis wealthy. Fertile soil made it fruitful. Bountiful waters fed its people. This island paradise was governed by mages—”

  “The Six Who Ruled,” Becca said.

  “Yes. Orfeo, Merrow, Sycorax, Navi, Pyrrha, and Nyx. Their great magic came from the gods, who had given each of them a powerful talisman. They were very close, the greatest of friends, and their powers were never stronger than when they were together. They ruled Atlantis wisely and well, and were revered for it. No decision involving the welfare of the people was made without the agreement of all six. No judgment or sentence was passed. There was a prison on the island—the Carceron. It was built of huge, interlocking stone blocks and had heavy bronze gates fitted with an ingenious lock. The gates could not be opened to admit a prisoner, or free one, unless the talismans of all six mages had been fitted into the lock’s six keyholes.”

  Vrăja pause
d to take a sip of her tea. “No society is perfect,” she continued, setting the cup back into its saucer, “but Atlantis was just and peaceful. At the time, it was thought that this island civilization would last forever.”

  “What happened? Why didn’t it?” Serafina asked, listening raptly to Vrăja’s every word.

  “We do not know entirely. Merrow would not tell the first obârşie. All she would say is that Orfeo had been lost to them, that he’d turned his back on his duties and his people to create Abbadon, a monster whose powers rivaled the gods’. How he made it and of what, she would not say. The other five mages tried to stop him and a battle ensued. Orfeo unleashed his monster and Atlantis was destroyed. Abbadon shook the earth until it cracked open. Lava poured forth, the seas churned, and the dying island sank beneath the waves.”

  Serafina sat back in her chair, silently shaking her head.

  “You don’t believe me, child?” Vrăja asked.

  “I don’t know what to believe,” she replied. “How could Abbadon shake the earth? How could it churn the seas? How could anything be that powerful?”

  Vrăja took a deep breath. She touched her fingers to her chest and drew a bloodsong, groaning in pain as she did, for it wasn’t a skein of blood that came from her heart, but a torrent. It whirled through the room with malevolent force, tearing conchs off the shelves, smashing stone jars, turning the waters as dark as night.

  Sound and color spun together violently and then the mermaids saw it—the ruin of Atlantis. People ran shrieking through the streets of Elysia, the capital, as the ground trembled and buildings fell all around them. Bodies were everywhere. Smoke and ash filled the air. Lava flowed down a flight of stone steps. A child, too small to walk, sat at the bottom of them, screaming in terror, her mother dead beside her. A man ran to the girl and snatched her up. Seconds later, the cobblestones upon which she’d sat were submerged by molten rock.

  “Run!” a woman’s voice shouted. “Get into the water! Hurry! It’s coming this way.” Scores of people ran toward the sea. “Help them, please…oh, great Neria, stop this bloodshed!”