The sergeant pushed the doors open. Sera was out of time. She reached into her bag, pulled out the vial, and secreted it in her hand.
A loud, raucous cheer went up as the sergeant entered the room, dragging her behind him. The soldiers applauded loudly. Sera forced herself to smile. The sergeant cleared a space for her by the bar, shooing all the mermen to the other side of the room. As they settled themselves, Sera folded her hands behind her back and worked the top of the vial off. She knew she had to act fast, before the noise died down.
“Help me,” she said quietly in Pesca to a stargazer swimming by. “Take this vial and pour it out in the waters above the soldiers’ heads.”
The fish fearfully darted away.
“Help me, please,” she said in Tortoisha to a loggerhead turtle carrying a bottle of wine on his back. “I’m not a siren. I need to escape before they find out.”
Far too slowly the turtle said, “If…I…help…you…they’ll…kill…me….I’m…a…prisoner…here.”
Serafina felt a soft touch on her hand. She risked a glance behind her. It was an octopus.
“I’ll help you,” the creature said in Molluska, “if you get us out, too. They took us from our homes and use us as slaves. I want to see my children again.”
“I will, I promise,” Serafina said.
The octopus took the vial and swam off.
The sergeant stopped speaking. He swept a hand toward Serafina. The soldiers started pounding on tables. “Sing! Sing! Sing! Sing!” they shouted.
Sera, a smile pasted on her face, held up a hand for silence. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw the octopus move along the floor, pass under some tables, then creep up a wall behind the soldiers, her color blending with her surroundings. The creature tipped the vial, then swam over the death riders’ heads, trailing a milky ribbon of potion behind her.
Sera desperately hoped that no one looked up. How long does it take for the Moses potion to work? she wondered.
“Whatcha waiting for, merlie? Sing!” someone shouted.
Sera tried not to show any of the panic rising up inside her. She bowed her head and slowly lifted it again—stalling for time.
“It will be my pleasure,” she said. “But first, I’d like to tell you a story about the very special song I’m going to sing for you….”
“Stuff the story, sister!” someone else yelled. “Sing!”
And then Sera saw one of the soldiers frown. He nudged his companion and pointed at a wanted poster on the wall. Sera didn’t have to look closely to know whose face was on it. The soldier shot out of his chair and pointed at her. Sera’s stomach tightened with terror. It was over. He would shout out her name now. She would be seized and taken to Traho.
But that didn’t happen.
Instead of shouting, the soldier yawned. His eyes fluttered shut. He swayed back and forth, then toppled back into his chair.
Another soldier fell over, and another, until almost every merman in the room was out cold. Only the sergeant was still upright.
“You…Youdidthis,” he said, slurring his words. He took a few strokes toward her, then crashed to the floor.
As Sera looked around the room, in a state of disbelief, she felt a heavy sleepiness steal over her.
That’s how the potion works! she thought.
She knew if she breathed much more of it, she would pass out, too—right here next to a hundred of her enemies. She ripped Filomena’s scarf out of her hair and tied it over her nose and mouth.
At that moment, the bartender, who’d gone to the basement to fetch more wine, came back into the room. He promptly dropped the bottles. “You crazy-wrasse merl! What have you done?” he shouted, looking at the motionless bodies. “I’m not going down for this. No way,” he said. He grabbed a rag off the bar, tied it over his nose and mouth as Sera had, and then started for the door.
In the blink of an eye, Serafina had the sleeping sergeant’s speargun out of its holster. “Not another stroke or I’ll shoot,” she said, training it on the barman.
He stopped short, only a foot or so from the door, and slowly turned around. As his eyes met hers, they widened in recognition.
“You’re her. The principessa.”
“Back away from the door,” Sera said. “Now.”
The merman didn’t move.
Serafina raised the speargun so it was level with his head. “You can’t spend the bounty money if you’re dead,” she said, moving closer to him.
It was a total bluff. She had no idea how to shoot the thing. But it worked. The merman backed away.
“Sit down,” Sera said, motioning to a nearby chair. “Put your arms at your sides.”
The merman did so.
There was a string of tiny, twinkling lava lights behind the bar. Sera sang a vortex spell and wound the string around him, binding him to the chair.
“I can’t let you sell me to Traho,” she said.