“Not so fast, bella,” he said. “I feel like hearing a siren’s song tonight.”
A siren? Serafina thought, horrified. She’d obviously overdone it with the makeup and the cleavage. Sirens sang for currensea—and this walrus-faced lump thought she was one. What am I going to do? She decided to go along with him. She had no choice. She couldn’t afford to make a scene and draw attention.
“What have you caught there, Sergeant?” one of his friends shouted.
Serafina panicked. If he pulled her into the midst of his group, she was dead. She might deceive one drunken fool, but the rest of the sergeant’s companions might not be so far gone. Instead of bringing her over to the others, though, the sergeant led her into the glow of a streetlamp. There was a poster of her attached to it.
Oh, no, Serafina thought. This is even worse.
“What’s your name, cara?” he asked. His breath stank. His jacket was unbuttoned and his large gut spilled out of it.
“Lisabetta,” Serafina said, trying to lead him away from the lamppost.
“Ah, a shy one, are you? Let me see you,” he said, pulling her back toward the light. His eyes crawled over her. “Oh, yes. You’ll do. If your voice is half as pretty as your face, you’ll do very nicely,” he said.
Serafina prayed he wouldn’t see the wanted sign, but the gods weren’t listening. His eyes suddenly flickered from her face to the sign and back again.
“You look a little bit like the outlaw princess,” he said, lifting her chin with his finger.
“Must be because I always give my audience the royal treatment,” Serafina purred.
“How much?”
Serafina had no idea. “Ten trochii,” she said.
“That’s an outrageous amount!”
Oh, thank goodness, she thought. He doesn’t have the money.
“Maybe another time,” she said, trying to move off.
“Here,” the sergeant said, handing her ten gold coins. “And it had better be worth every cowrie.” Still holding her wrist, he pulled her toward the nightclub. “Come on. Me and my mermen want a song.”
Sera had to think fast, but she was so scared, she couldn’t think at all. She had to get away. She couldn’t go through with this. The soldiers would know she wasn’t a siren as soon as she opened her mouth.
Sera’s voice was strong and pretty and it carried magic well, but a siren’s voice had a very particular magic. Their voices, and the songs they sang, were so achingly beautiful that listeners forgot everything: their disappointments and heartaches, their lost loves and broken dreams. Some became so deeply enchanted they forgot their own names.
What would they do when they found out who she really was? They’d put her in irons and deliver her to Traho.
The sergeant pulled her down a dimly lit hallway. There were a few sputtering lava torches on the wall. I could grab one and hit him over the head with it, she thought. But what if I miss? Or what if I manage to hit him, but don’t knock him out? He’ll shout and more death riders will come. Her fear was yammering so loudly now, it threatened to overwhelm her.
Then she heard a different voice in her head.
Think, Serafina, think. Ruling is like playing chess. Danger comes from many directions, from a pawn as well as a queen. You must play the board, not the piece.
Those were her mother’s words. Isabella had said them to her on the morning of her Dokimí.
Play the board, Sera, she repeated silently to herself. Think.
She and the sergeant were approaching a set of double doors at the end of the hallway. Loud voices and laughter were coming from behind them. She tried to slow down, to stall for time, but the sergeant yanked her hard. As he did, her bag banged against her side. Something inside it rattled.
Vr?ja’s gifts! The witch had given her and the other four mermaids magical items right before they fled the caves: transparensea pebbles, ink bombs, and vials of potion.
Sera knew a transparensea pebble wouldn’t help her. The death riders would see her cast it. They could simply block her exit until the spell of invisibility wore off. She doubted the ink bomb would help, either. Soldiers who dealt with dragons and lava bombs wouldn’t even blink at an ink bomb.
That left the vial of potion. It’s Moses potion, from the Moses sole in the Red Sea. Sharks hate it. Maybe death riders do, too, Vr?ja had said.
Why did sharks hate it? What did it do? Sera wondered. There hadn’t been time to ask. She would have to release it inside the nightclub and hope it spread quickly through the water to each and every death rider. But she would be in the water too. How could she protect herself from the potion’s effects?