Unless my sister gets him first. I held on to that hope like a solitary lifeboat to stop the despair from dragging me under. Davin might succeed in raising Atlantis, but that didn’t mean he’d win. No, if the djinn had warned my sister, there’d be a whole damn army waiting to put him firmly back in his place, to stop him from doing… whatever it was he planned to do.
A lifetime later, the dish sloshed with a city’s worth of blood. The last crate came in, and the guards duly set to pouring out the liquid, only for Davin to stride over and take the last two bottles himself.
“Let’s add the final drops of Atlantean blood ourselves, darling,” he said, eyes glinting with excitement.
Kaya took the offered bottle and removed the stopper. “It would be my pleasure.” Giggling like she’d just been given a bottle of perfume, she tipped her vial into the dish, adding it to the vile mass inside. Davin leaned over her shoulder to pour his in, planting a gentle kiss on Kaya’s head to make her go all goo-goo eyed. Honestly, Davin was bad enough without having to witness his mating rituals all over again.
“Now, my love, how about you ask him how many dissenters we had?” Davin addressed Kaya before turning to the meek official.
Kaya smiled drunkenly. “Yes, how many dissenters did we have?”
The official cleared his anxious throat. “Four thousand.”
“I trust they have been suitably dealt with?” Davin brushed his fingertip around the edge of the dish.
The official hesitated. “Many have gone into hiding, and the rest… uh… We did not know what to do with them, but I am certain they can be dealt with as Her Majesty wishes.”
Davin’s lips curled, and I watched him struggle to keep a cool façade. He wasn’t any kind of Majesty yet. Forcing a love spell down Kaya’s throat didn’t automatically make them man and wife, which he clearly realized at that moment.
“We can contend with that later, can’t we?” Davin nudged Kaya gently. “Although, we must be sure to offer them some sort of opportunity to show repentance if we are to start as we mean to go on. We should not kill our own, even if they disagree with us.”
Eh? Repentance? That was a new word in Davin’s vocabulary. It certainly muddled my idea of what his plans might be. Or perhaps he only cared about the survival of the Atlanteans because he knew he needed them.
She nodded. “Of course, we need not trouble ourselves with them now, when we have such important tasks to pursue.” She smiled at the official. “You may leave us now. We have vital business to attend to.”
The official bowed. “Of course, Your Majesty.” He backed out of the room, eyeing the dish with a look of fear that reflected the expression on every one of our faces.
“Four thousand drops.” Davin left Kaya and went to the pile of clothes that’d once been Faustus. Davin had kicked them behind the throne, likely for the same reason he’d hidden Ovid away: so no one else would know what’d really taken place here. He rummaged around for a moment before producing a handful of vials. No awards for guessing whose blood was inside. Nash might not have been a Sanguine anymore, but the blood in those vials still held the power of one.
I looked down the line at him. His eyes burned with fury. This was precisely why he’d given up the Sanguine life, so he’d never have to be someone’s ingredient again. Unfortunately, we’d gone to Gaia too late to do anything about this batch.
Davin cast us all a pleased glance, brandishing the vials like shots at a club. “This may take a while, but I promise you, it’ll be worth it when the show starts.”
Returning to the dish, he took up a pipette and started the long process of dropping four thousand beads of blood into the viscous mass. All we could do was wait and try not to yawn. Nash couldn’t even look. He turned away, a vein throbbing in his temple.
“I promise, my love, when this is done, I will grant you all the extra years you could ever want.” Davin smiled at Kaya between drops. A dangerous move, on his part. If he missed a single one, his whole plan would fall apart. “You needn’t worry about the spell stripping you of your long lifespan. You have me now, and I can give you eternity—a gift we’ll both enjoy.”
Ugh, spare me.
“There… the last one.” Davin set down a half-full vial a good while later and peered into the visceral soup. “Now we can begin. Kaya, would you do the honors?”
“Do we have everything we need?” Kaya went to a table that had been set up nearby. An array of ingredients sat on top, gathered by a contingent of guards while the rest had been on pouring duty. She traced her fingertips across the collection and named each one. “Scale of Leviathan. A kraken’s bill. Sand from the surface world. Essence of naiad. Powdered emerald and powdered sapphire. A gold coin. Hellebore petals and the bells of ten snowdrops. Six fronds of Atlantean heather. A vial of quicksilver, a vial of Kelpie’s blood, and a vial of Ganymede’s blood. Yes… it is all here.”
“Then raise us to greatness, darling, so we can both be the heroes that the world has been waiting for,” Davin encouraged. Another baffling sentiment. What the hell did he intend to do up there? Kill folks with kindness? Nah, that wasn’t his flavor.
She beamed at him, then started a steady to-and-fro with the ingredients. There appeared to be an order to her work, which she must’ve memorized from the scroll she’d showed me while I’d been under the love spell. It didn’t take her long to put everything into the dish, but it made for an ugly display. A scarlet broth with bits of this and that floating on the surface like macabre croutons. Then again, it didn’t have to be pretty to be powerful.
This is it… The atmosphere stilled. All eyes turned to Kaya.
Carefully, she approached the dish and slid her hands right into the sickening mix, pulling one hand out so she could streak her cheeks and forehead with red. She put a cross over her heart, right above the neckline of her gown, before sinking her hands back into the dish.
Lifting her head to the ceiling, she began to chant in a language that was only recently familiar to me. “Sillafu a ysgrifennwyd ers talwm. Efaill o un sydd wedi'i ffugio eisoes. Hynafol fel y ddaear ei hun. Lle ysgrifennwyd un i guddio'r byd hwn, nawr gofynnaf am y gwrthwyneb. Gadewch i'r byd hwn godi i fyny, fel ffenics y lludw, i fynd yn ôl â'i le haeddiannol. Cymerwch o'r gwaed hwn. Defnyddiwch gryfder y gwaed hwn i'n hanfon ni i fyny. Mae pawb yn gytûn. Meddu ar ffydd yn y ddinas hon, oherwydd maen nhw'n gweld yr haul ar eu hwynebau eto. Gadewch i'r ddinas hon godi i fyny a'n cysylltu â'n hen gartref. Mae'r amser wedi dod. Ni allwn orffwys yn y cysgod mwyach. Mae'n bryd inni ddod i'r amlwg. Dyma'r foment a addawyd. Gadewch i'r byd hwn godi. Ni fyddwn byth yn dychwelyd eto.”
“What language is that?” Luke whispered, getting a jab in the shoulder for his troubles.
“Welsh,” I replied before Melody could. “The first language of magic, spoken by Merlin himself.”
She looked at me in surprise. “How do you know that?”
“A little birdie told me.” Where that birdie of Darkness had disappeared to was anyone’s guess.
The guards shushed us with their spears, giving us no choice but to watch the spell unfold. We were too late to stop it. I guessed this was our punishment. These cards had been played before my love spell had even broken. Atlantis would rise, just as the legend said—fulfilling the prophecy of a promised stranger from the surface who’d bring Atlantis above the water again. It wasn’t just a story anymore. Only, Davin had twisted it around to make himself the stranger. He’d made a perfect trick shot; there was no denying that.
Kaya repeated the chant, and the surface of the blood started to froth. Swirls of silver and black spun across the liquid. A high-pitched wail rose from the scarlet goop, as if Kaya had licked her finger and brushed it around the edge of the dish until it sang like a wine glass. The blood rippled to the sound of that wail, small spikes shooting upward, before plummeting back down.
Kaya stopped and looked back at us. “The next stage is the most important. There can be no distractions, nor do I wish to ha
ve traitors in the city once it rises.” Her eyes narrowed. White sparks of Chaos flitted up from her body, but I wasn’t sure if they were part of the spell or not. “You have been a terrible disappointment to me, Finch. Almost as much as my father. Apollo, Thebian, you have been loyal to me in the past. I believe you have had your minds warped by these… agitators. As such, I will relent and forgive you if you swear fealty to me now.”
Come on, boys, grow some balls! I took a breath and looked down the line to where Apollo and Thebian stood. They adored her, sure, but surely they wouldn’t bow to her now, with her head all messed up by Davin… would they?
Apollo went down first, Thebian a moment later. Damn it!
“I pledge my unyielding allegiance to you, Your Majesty.” Apollo might as well have groveled. All his resolve vanished before her. The stupidity of blind love, I supposed.
“And you have mine,” Thebian added, casting a small, apologetic glance at us.
Well, so much for doing the right thing. Their support had lasted all of two seconds, and though I should’ve known they’d bow, I couldn’t help feeling betrayed. We’d broken them out of prison. They wouldn’t even be in this room if it wasn’t for us. Then Kaya says “Jump,” and they’re back to saying, “How high?”
“I am pleased to hear it.” Kaya smiled. “I am your queen, and I have been since the day my father died. His resurrection changes nothing. And Davin is not merely my prince consort. He is my king, and he will be the king of Atlantis, at my side.”
A guard came forward, holding the crown that Ovid had snatched from Kaya’s head. Davin grinned as the guard placed it on his head, cementing Kaya’s words into reality. I wasn’t sure how the rest of Atlantis would take this unorthodox change in the order of things, but that wasn’t exactly my problem.
“As I mentioned, this next stage of the spell is vitally important. You are not welcome to watch.” The white sparks that drifted around Kaya suddenly shot toward us, pulling up seconds from our faces and soaring skyward. “It is time you left us, as Atlantis and its rulers have no further need of you. Davin shall be my envoy to the magical world now. And so, I bid you all farewell. But know this: if you are fortunate enough to keep your wits about you during what is about to happen, and we should meet again on the surface, you should not expect any leniency from me. This is the last kindness I will ever offer you—a chance of survival, nothing more.”
The white sparks swirled faster and faster over our heads, mesmerizing and terrifying. With a loud crack that sent shockwaves through the throne room, the sparks exploded, tearing a hole in the fabric of space and time. A hissing, spitting tear thrummed above, spewing out searing white light instead of a black void. Like a portal, and yet not. Well, not like any portal I’d ever seen. The guards behind us hurriedly stepped back, leaving us exposed to whatever came next.
What the—? A weird, magnetic pull tugged at my body. Next thing I knew, I was being dragged right through that fizzing white void, to who knew where.
Thirty-Two
Finch
“Oh… and I suggest you hold your breath.” I barely registered the last words out of Kaya’s lips as my body got sucked into the pulsing white tear. I heard Melody scream—though it might’ve been Luke—as the rest of my new Muppet Babies were dragged with me through the strange portal.
Hold our breath? What do you mean, hold—Ask a stupid question, get a stupid answer. Freezing cold water rushed up my nostrils and battled to get into my mouth as the portal chucked us into the depths of the Antarctic Ocean. I froze in terror, unable to move against the shock of the water. The others floated and flailed in a cluster around me, bubbles rising in a furious flurry from their mouths, the same panic in their eyes. Not that I could see a whole lot with the cold, salty liquid blurring my vision, and only a dim light keeping the pitch black of the deep ocean at bay.
My hands fumbled for my neck, but the Cuff was gone. The portal must’ve disintegrated them, or Kaya had taken them away before the portal shot us out. Either way, we weren’t totally screwed. Just mostly.
An idea jolted into my head. I clamped my hand over my mouth and urged a thin strand of Air out of my palm. I took in a whole lot of water with it, but the Air slipped into my lungs regardless. A small dose of oxygen to keep me going, though I couldn’t do anything about the intense pressure weighing down on me. I had no idea how many fathoms deep we were, to use the old naval term, but humans definitely weren’t supposed to be this far down. Turning in the water, feeling like I was wading through syrup, I spotted the source of the dim light which allowed us to just about see one another—a faint twinkle of light in the distance. Atlantis.
A sound rippled from that distant glow, shivering through the eerie darkness of the ocean. A deep growl, as if they’d unleashed a ravenous kraken from the Bestiary, letting us all know that Atlantis was on the rise. A second later, a shockwave barreled into me, sending me flying back through the water. It hit all of us, dispersing us in different directions—the worst possible thing that could’ve happened, since not everyone had Air at their disposal. I tried to grab Huntress as her white blur flew past but missed her by inches.
CRAP! Why couldn’t she have sent Davin packing like this after he tried to kill her? I knew it wasn’t really her fault—not this part, anyway—but still, she should’ve had the foresight to listen to us and kick that wretch out on his ass, instead of leaving him hanging around in prison where he’d managed to unravel everyone’s plans like a kitten with its claws in the yarn.
Dragging my arms through the water to slow my spinning, I caught another glimpse of the drowned city. An entire forest of bubbles drifted upward, like strands of kelp, glinting faintly from the dim light of Atlantis. It was our only light source. Another growl, louder than before, reverberated through the gloom and Atlantis budged ever so slightly. A subtle movement that could’ve been my eyes playing tricks, but I knew better. The blood spell had taken effect.
What do I do? What do I do? I tried to blink away the relentless water to find my friends and the woman I loved. I spotted her first, but not out of luck. No, it was impossible not to notice her, the way her body was pulsing with white light. I swam for her, feeding Air into my lungs, only to watch in horror as the light wisped out of her. It floated upward, following the path of the bubbles. Lux was leaving.
No, no, no, no! I grabbed Ryann’s hand at the exact second that the light vanished. Of all the moments for Lux to go, she couldn’t have picked a worse one if she’d tried. She was supposed to be doing better as a Child of Chaos. She was supposed to be protecting Ryann and protecting us! What happened to all that “You’re a Merlin, you’re special” crap? Apparently, none of us were special enough to save, besides herself. And if this meant her father threw her headfirst back into the Chaos stream, I was only sorry that I wouldn’t be there to see it.
Holding tight to Ryann, I put my arm around her and pressed my palm to her mouth. Feeding some of my Air out, I passed it through her lips. Her chest heaved against my arm, and her hands gripped me. Thank Chaos, the oxygen had reached her. But the same couldn’t be said for the others. I wasn’t an octopus; I only had the two hands, and the rest of my friends were out of my reach. Telekinesis might’ve worked, but it was hard to focus on their positions with my eyes fuzzed by the ocean.
Frantically, I tried to get a good look at them. What was that survival fact? Right, that was it—a person could live for three minutes without air, three days without water, three weeks without food. We were getting close to the three-minute mark.
I spotted Luke swimming desperately toward Melody on my right. She didn’t appear to be moving, just floating in the water. It didn’t look good. She’d been closest to the shockwave when it struck us. It must’ve knocked her out, or she’d already run out of air.
Panicking, I aimed a lasso of Telekinesis in her direction. It connected. I yanked on the lasso and dragged her closer to Luke. He wrapped his arms around her and pulled her in, giving her underwate
r mouth-to-mouth in a vain attempt to help her. The poor guy would’ve given his last breath for her, and my chest clenched, petrified that it might actually happen.
Nash—where the hell are you? I tried to find him in the darkness. My head whipped this way and that, until a flash of white gave him away. Huntress doggy-paddled through the bitter water toward a shadowed figure hanging suspended in the ocean. Her fangs took hold of his sleeve, her forelegs pawing the water frantically as she tried to pull him upward. A futile effort, since we couldn’t even see the sun this far down, let alone the surface.
I had to think fast, or everyone would die. Lack of oxygen would strike first, and the cold would sweep in straight after. Already, my teeth chattered in my head, and I couldn’t feel a single one of my extremities.
Sending out two more lassoes of Telekinesis, with all the energy I could muster, I managed to get hold of Huntress and Luke, who were easier to fix on. I hauled them toward me, while they held on to their counterparts. Beneath the fuzzy white that marked out Huntress, the glowing city continued to shake as it broke away from its shackles.
With the others now within my reach, I pushed Air into their lungs. I started with Melody and Nash, hoping it’d wake them up. But their eyes stayed closed, their blurry features pale and… heartbreakingly still. Trying not to let dread overwhelm me, I pushed some Air into Luke—his eyes were bulging, his lips trembling with the desire to breathe. The oxygen roused him for a moment, but I couldn’t keep doing this forever. My fingers were locking from the chill, and everything seemed to be slowing down.
Stay with me, okay? All of you… just hang on. They couldn’t hear me, but it helped to think it. I reached for Huntress and urged Air into her lungs, which proved tricky since she refused to let go of Nash. But her paws kept churning through the water, and her eyes stayed open. I hoped that meant she was in a slightly better state than her soulmate.
Harley Merlin 16: Finch Merlin and the Blood Tie Page 28