“Baudel’s?” Neela squealed. “I know Baudel’s! I love their stuff. My family orders tons of their songpearls—decorating spells, party spells, hairstyling spells, makeup spells. What’s coming out for the new season?”
Serafina could hear the worry in their voices under the chattery excitement. They were talking about anything—anything at all—to take their minds off their fears. The goggs had a good expression for it: whistling in the dark.
“Well,” Becca said, “I’m really excited about the new Whirlpearl Glitterbomb. It’s part of our Cast-to-Last line.”
“I love it!” Neela said. “What is it?”
“We take a pink pearl and we pack it with glitter spells in ten different colorways. When you cast it, your hair, eyelids, lips, and fins will sparkle silver, blue, green—whatever you choose—for two weeks. No dulling, no fading. Guaranteed.” She smiled shyly, then added, “It was my idea. The first one I ever pitched.”
Neela pressed a hand to her chest. “Darling, when can I get them?”
“Um, merls?” Ling said, stopping short.
“They’re coming out this winter,” Becca said.
“Do they come in fuchsia, mina?” Ava asked. “Everyone tells me that’s my color.”
“Ladies? Hel-lo!” Ling said. “I think we’ve arrived.”
She pointed ahead—at the biggest crayfish any of them had ever seen. The chatter stopped. There were two of them. They were dark brown with shiny black eyes, and powerfully built. As the mermaids watched, they rose up and pressed their claws against a large rock. It rolled a few feet through the river mud, revealing a passageway. A freshwater mermaid, her body stippled in a hundred shades of brown and gray, swam out of it. Her face was pale; her hair was dark and flowing. She wore a necklace of fox teeth and a fitted gown of gray herons. Snake skeletons twined around each arm.
Serafina recognized her. She was one of the witches who’d chanted in her dream. One of the Iele. At last.
They’d made it. With the help of the others. They were finally here. Soon they would learn why they had been summoned.
The witch spoke briefly with the crayfish. Their bristly mandibles opened and closed rapidly. Their long antennae waved. The witch nodded, then turned to the mermaids.
“I am Magdalena, of the Iele. The Malacostraca tell me that they sense enemies half a league south and moving fast,” she said. “This way, please. Hurry.”
Serafina, Ava, Ling, and Becca swam inside. Neela followed them, but at the very last second, shied. “I can’t,” she said. “Once I go in, there’s no way out again. This is real. You’re real. All this time, a part of me was hoping you were only a dream.”
The witch cocked her head. “Only a dream?” she said mockingly. “Long ago, a great mage dreamed of stealing the gods’ powers. Abbadon was born of that dream. Atlantis died because of it. Now, because of a new dreamer, all the waters of the world may fall. There is nothing more real than a dream.” She nodded at the waters behind Neela. Silt was rising in the distance, a great deal of it. “The merman Traho knows this. He’s coming. If you do not believe me, perhaps he can convince you.”
Neela, paralyzed by fear, stayed where she was, eyes squeezed shut. The sound of beating fins was growing louder. The death riders were closing in.
Serafina pushed past the witch and swam back out of the tunnel. She took Neela’s hand. “We go in together, Neels,” she said. “Together, or not at all.”
Ava joined them. “Together,” she said, placing her hand over Neela’s and Sera’s. Ling and Becca did the same.
Neela opened her eyes and Sera saw that the fear was gone. It had been replaced by something else: faith. Faith in her. Faith in the others. Faith in the bond between them, however new and fragile.
“Together,” Neela said.
She swam into the tunnel. The others followed. As soon as they were all inside, the Malacostraca moved the rock back into place and used their tail fins to sweep away the tracks it had made in the mud. When they finished, the creatures hid themselves—one under a submerged tree trunk, one under a blanket of rotting leaves.
Half a minute later, Traho and fifty death riders thun-dered by.
AS THE MALACOSTRACA rolled the heavy stone back across the entrance to the Iele’s caves, blocking off the light from above, Serafina felt like she was being sealed inside a tomb.
“I will take you to the obar?ie now, our leader,” Magdalena said.
She led them down a murky passageway. It was lit by sputtering lava globes and spiraled downward, branching into a network of tunnels carved into the rock by the river. As her eyes adjusted to the gloomy waters, Serafina saw that many guards—tall, golden-eyed frogs—flanked the passageway. They held long, steel-tipped spears at an angle from their bodies, creating an X between them. As the witch approached, they snapped their spears back smartly, allowing her to pass. Serafina and the others hurried along behind her. It was quiet in the passageway.