“The Opafago eat their victims alive, you know,” said Astrid. “While their heart’s still beating and their blood’s still pumping. The flesh is juicier that way.”
“What a ray of light you are,” Ling said. She got up from the table. “We can’t get to Atlantis, but we can observe Abbadon. And I’m going to do just that. First thing tomorrow. Ava saw that it hates light. I need to find out if it has other weaknesses. I got something out of it today. Deceiver. It’s not much. It’s not a talisman. But like Sera said, it’s a start.”
She yawned and told the others she was turning in. Becca, Neela, and Ava were right behind her. Sera didn’t join them. She wasn’t tired. She was busy thinking.
Astrid had gone back to bouncing her caballabong ball. “How are you going to do all this, Serafina? How are you going to get into your Ostrokon to listen to conchs when Cerulea’s occupied? How are you going to get into Atlantis? How are you going to kill Abbadon?”
“I don’t know yet, but maybe I can get help. If I can find my uncle, and my brother, they may have ideas. If my mother’s still alive—”
Astrid cut her off. “If, if, if,” she said. “This isn’t a start. It’s an end. You’re going to get yourself killed.” She glanced in the direction of the bedroom. “And you’re going to get them killed too. This whole thing’s a joke.” She threw her ball harder. “And here’s another one…me being a descendant of Orfeo’s, the greatest mage who ever lived.”
Astrid said those last words to herself, but Serafina heard them. Why can’t she accept that Orfeo’s her ancestor? Is it because of what he did? Or is there more to it? she wondered.
“Hey, Astrid…Baba Vr?ja’s right, you know. Magic is what you make it. Just because Orfeo was evil doesn’t mean you are. Evil isn’t inherited. Like eye color or something.”
Astrid stopped bouncing her ball. She looked at Serafina. “It’s not that. I mean, having Orfeo in your family coral branch is totally lowtide, but…”
“But what?”
Astrid shook her head.
“Astrid, what is it?”
“Nothing. Really. Forget it.”
“Okay. Forgotten.”
Serafina, frustrated by Astrid’s unwillingness to talk, scooped the tiles Ling had left on the table into their bag. She picked up the stray cups and put them on a tray.
Astrid bounced her ball harder.
“It wasn’t us,” she said suddenly. She whirled around to face Serafina. The ball went flying across the room. “I want you to know that. Ondalina didn’t invade Miromara. We didn’t attack Cerulea. We didn’t send an assassin. My father would never do such a thing. He would never hurt Isabella or Bastiaan or the Matalis. He values them, and the peace between our realms, too highly. His own sister lives in Miromara. In Tsarno, as you know. He wouldn’t risk her life.”
Serafina weighed Astrid’s words, then she said, “He broke the permutavi, though. It’s been honored by both kingdoms for a hundred years. You were supposed to come to Miromara and Desiderio was supposed to go to Ondalina. Just like your aunt Sigurlin and my uncle Ludovico did at the last permutavi. Why did he break it?”
Astrid sat down across from Serafina. “There are reasons,” she said. “If you knew…if I could tell you…” Her hands, resting on top of the table, knotted into fists. Her long blond hair, pale as moonlight, swirled around her shoulders. Her ice-blue eyes sought Serafina’s. In them, Serafina could see a yearning to talk, to share what was troubling her.
“Astrid, seriously, Abbadon’s the enemy, you know? Not me. Not Miromara,” Serafina said, surprised by her own sudden desire to talk to this difficult merl. “We didn’t send any assassins either. The last thing my mother wants is war. Not for her people, not for yours. You said there were reasons why Ondalina broke the permutavi—what are they? Tell me.”
Serafina held Astrid’s gaze. For a few seconds, she was certain Astrid would confide in her. But instead of talking, Astrid brusquely pushed back her chair and rose.
“I can’t,” she said helplessly. “I just can’t.” She swam toward the bedroom. When she got to the door, she turned back to Serafina. “I’m sorry,” she said. And then she was gone.
Serafina looked at the empty space of the doorway. “Yeah,” she said softly. “Me too.”
“SHE’S GONE,” Serafina said angrily.
She’d just swum into Vr?ja’s study. It was early the next morning.
“Are you surprised?” Vr?ja asked. She was sitting in her chair of bones and antlers, wearing a dress the color of oxblood. Its high neckline was trimmed with tiny bird skulls, its bodice beaded with hawk talons, wolves’ teeth, and polished bits of turtle shell.
“You knew?”
“I heard her leave early this morning.”
“Why didn’t you stop her?”
“How? Should I have taken her prisoner? There was no stopping her,” Vr?ja said. “She does not wish to be here. Sit down, child.”
Serafina sat in the chair opposite her. “We’re supposed to be the Six,” she said.
“It looks like you are now the Five,” Vr?ja said.