“There are reports of a another raid.”
Isabella’s hands clenched into fists. “Tell your lord I’ll be there momentarily.”
The page bowed and left the room.
Serafina started toward her mother. “I’ll go with you,” she said.
Isabella shook her head. “Ready yourself for tonight,” she said tersely. “It must go well. We desperately need this alliance with Matali. Now more than ever.”
“Mom, please….”
But it was too late. Isabella had already swum out of Sera’s bedchamber.
She was gone.
Tears threatened as the doors closed behind Isabella, but Serafina held them back.
Nearly every conversation with her mother ended in an awkward silence or heated words. She was used to it. But still, it hurt.
A slender tentacle brushed Sera’s shoulder. Another curled around her neck. A third wound around her arm. Sylvestre, finely tuned to his mistress’s every mood, had turned blue with worry. She leaned her head against his.
“I’m so nervous about the Dokimí, Sylvestre,” she said. “My mother doesn’t want to hear about it, but maybe Neela will. I’ve got to talk to somebody. What if Alítheia tears my head off? What if I mess up my songspell? What if Mahdi doesn’t…”
Serafina couldn’t bear to voice that last thought. It scared her even more than the ordeal that lay ahead.
“Serafina! Child, where are you? Your hairdresser is here!”
It was Tavia, her nurse, calling from her antechamber. Sylvestre shot off at the sound of her voice. There was no more time to fret. Sera had to go. She was expected—by Tavia, by the canta magus, by her entire court.
“Coming!” she called back.
She started toward the doors, then halted. As soon as she opened them, she was no longer Serafina. She was Your Grace, or Your Majesty, or Most Serene Principessa. She was theirs.
She hated the hot-spring atmosphere of her court. She hated the whispers, the glances, the toadying smiles. At court, she must dress just so. Always swim gracefully. Never raise her voice. Smile and nod and talk about the tides, when she’d much rather be riding Clio or exploring the ruins of the reggia, Merrow’s ancient palace. She hated the suffocating weight of expectation, the constant pressure to be perfect—and the pointed looks and barbed comments when she was not.
“Two minutes,” she whispered.
With a flick of her tail, she rushed to the opposite end of her bedroom. She pushed open a pair of glass doors and swam onto her balcony, startling two small sea robins resting on its rail. Beyond the balcony was the royal city.
Cerulea, broad and sprawling, had grown through the centuries from the first mer settlement into the center of mer culture that it was today. Ancient and magnificent, it had been built from blue quartz mined deep under the seabed. At this time of day, the sun’s rays penetrated the Devil’s Tail, a protective thorn thicket that floated above it, and struck the rooftops, making them sparkle.
The original palace had been built in the center of Cerulea. Its roof had collapsed several centuries ago and a new palace had been built high on a seamount—a baroque construction of coral, quartz, and mother-of-pearl—for the royal family and its court. The ruins of the reggia still lay preserved within the city, a reminder of the past.
Serafina’s eyes traveled over Cerulea’s winding streets to the spires of the Kolegio—with its black-robed professors and enormous Ostrokon, to the Golden Fathom—where tall town houses, fashionable restaurants, and expensive shops were located. And then farther still, out past the city walls to the Kolisseo, where the royal flag of Miromara—a branch of red coral against a white background, and that of Matali—a dragon rampant holding a silver-blue egg were flying. The Kolisseo was where, in just a few hours, Sera would undergo her Dokimí in front of the court, the Matali royals, the mer of Miromara…
…and Mahdi.
Two years had passed since she’d last seen him. She closed her eyes now and pictured his face: his dark eyes, his shy smile, his serious expression. When they were older, they would marry each other. Tonight, they would be betrothed. It was a ridiculous custom, but Serafina was glad he’d be the one. She could still hear the last words he’d spoken to her, right before he’d returned to Matali.
“My choice,” he’d whispered, taking her hand. “Mine. Not theirs.”