Bianca stopped at the top of the stairs as the rotters lurched down it. “Look at them all,” she whispered, fearfully eyeing the shipwreck ghosts. “We’ll never get through.”
“Stay here if you like,” Lucia said. She’d inserted herself into the middle of the rotters for safety, and Bianca had no choice but to do the same.
The ghosts sensed the mermaids immediately. The music stopped playing. The revelers stopped dancing. Lucia knew it was the ghosts’ energy that kept the ship alive and the ballroom looking exactly as it had.
As the two mermaids crossed the dance floor, the ghosts strained toward them. Only the rotters, growling and swatting, kept them away. Lucia could feel the ghosts’ hunger. They were greedy for the life that surged in her veins.
The mermaids exited the ballroom and moved down paneled hallways, past lounges with silk wall coverings and electric lamps, through a pair of swinging doors and into the ship’s enormous kitchens, where chefs brandished gleaming cleavers and waiters walked with trays on their shoulders. A ma?tre d’ with a pencil-thin mustache eyed them ravenously.
“How much farther?” Bianca asked weakly as they left the kitchen and swam down another long hallway.
“Just through here,” Lucia replied, pointing ahead.
The rotters pushed open a pair of tall wooden doors and the mermaids emerged in the ship’s theater. Passengers had come here for concerts, plays, and silent movies.
Gold-fringed red velvet curtains hung across an elevated stage. On them had been painted an image of Morsa. The goddess had a skull for a face, a woman’s torso, and the lower body of a serpent. A crown of black scorpions, tails poised to strike, adorned her head. Waterfire burned in bronze cauldrons, set on either side of the goddess. In front of her, a mermaid wearing crimson sea-silk robes was chanting. When she finished, she turned around, as if she’d known Lucia and Bianca had entered the room.
Lucia dipped her head. “Greetings, Priestess,” she said.
Kharis, kohl-eyed, her hair moving around her head like dozens of black sea snakes, returned Lucia’s bow. “Your Grace,” she said. “I am honored by your visit. Have you come to admire my work?”
“I have. And to further it,” Lucia replied.
She opened the bag she’d brought with her and pulled out its contents one by one.
“A lock of Mahdi’s hair,” she said, handing Kharis a glossy black twist she’d clipped from his head before leaving the Depth Charge. Next came a small crystal scent bottle filled with a dark crimson liquid. “A vial of his blood,” she said. She’d also thought to capture a bloodsong she’d pulled at the nightclub, knowing well the sort of ingredients Kharis’s magic required. “And finally, a possession of Serafina’s—her jacket.”
“Well done!” Kharis said, taking the objects. “Would you like to see my creation?”
Lucia nodded.
Kharis sang a strange songspell in a minor key that Lucia had never heard before. An instant later, the red curtains parted and a merman swam into the center of the stage.
Lucia caught her breath.
Bianca shook her head. She looked at the figure as if her eyes were playing tricks on her. “Mahdi?” she said uncertainly. “How did you get here?”
LUCIA SWAM AROUND Kharis’s creation. “He’s perfect,” she purred, her eyes sparkling darkly. “Absolutely perfect!”
“Of course he is.” Kharis sniffed. “I made him and the goddess blessed him.”
“Mahdi? Mahdi?” Bianca said, swimming up to the stage.
“It’s not the real Mahdi. It’s a maligno, my dear,” Kharis said.
Bianca turned to her. “A what?”
“A clay merman. Animated by blood magic and Lucia’s to command as she pleases.”
Bianca’s eyes widened. She backed away from the creature. “To command? Command how?” She looked at her friend. “What are you going to do, Lucia?”
“Kill Serafina,” Lucia replied, her gaze still on the maligno. She shifted it to Kharis. “Why is he still here? Why hasn’t he gone after her?”
“Ah, Your Grace,” Kharis said, her voice low and silky, “the darkest of songspells carries a very high price.”
Lucia spun around. Her eyes hardened. “I’ve given you a great deal of gold already, Kharis,” she said coldly. “What more do you want?”
“It is not what I want, Your Grace, but what the goddess demands,” Kharis said, gesturing to the image of Morsa. “The price of death is death.”
Lucia had visited Kharis many times, and had never felt afraid—until now. She knew what Kharis was asking, but how could she do it? That’s what others were for—Traho and his soldiers, Baco Goga, her father’s assassins.
Bianca understood what Kharis was asking, too. Her horror was written on her face. She hurried to Lucia.
“Luce, no,” she said, desperation in her voice. “You can’t. It’s murder. The goddess will take her victim’s life, and then she’ll take your soul. We need to get out of here. Please!”