“She doesn’t get a lawyer?” Bex says, seemingly as bewildered as me.
Terrance shakes his head and winces. “I know, but that’s how it works. No one accused of a crime against the empire is given a defender. She will argue for her life, so she needs to be fierce. After everyone has made their arguments, each speaking member of the ten remaining tribes will vote on her guilt, and then the prime will choose a punishment that pleases him.”
“Like a jury?” Bex asks.
“Yes, but they will make their decisions in the open, in front of us all, and quite frequently, they become part of the trial themselves. Now, when they find her guilty—”
“When?”
“Lyric, I don’t want to give you false hope. There is very little chance that she will be found innocent. She did what they are accusing her of.”
“She did it for me,” I cry.
“Which does not concern the high accuser. She was an agent of the prime. There’s an old Alpha saying that the prime’s wishes come before the beating of a heart.”
“And what will the punishment be?” I can barely get the question past the dread rising up my throat.
“Like I said, I have talked to many who have the prime’s ear, and I’ve urged them to suggest banishment for her. He can, however, call for her execution.”
Suddenly the air is filled with shouts and warnings. Alpha run along the shore. They point out at the horizon, where a huge silver ship sails toward Coney Island. The American flag flutters on its deck. It’s as big as a city, imposing and fear-some.
“What is that?” Bex cries.
“The U.S. Navy is here,” Terrance says.
“Are they going to attack?” Bex worries.
I look back at the wall of trash behind us. There’s no place to run if that ship fires on us. We’ll die on this filthy beach.
“One crisis at a time,” Terrance says. “Come. Your mother’s trial is about to start.”
The entire nation is gathered in the massive arena I saw on the day I first came to the camp. I remember Foster telling me they rebuild it every day after the tide destroys it in the night. Now I know the gloves Ghost, Luna, and Arcade wear make it happen. Their power is startling.
Terrance pushes us through the crowd and barks something at a Selkie guard, and the hulk shoves people out of the way indiscriminately so that we can descend flights of steps made from hard, coarse sand. When we get to the bottom, we walk onto the arena floor, a wide-open circle as big as a basketball arena. Standing in the center is the priestess. She’s dressed in her gown of sealskins and carries a long staff carved from what looks like whalebone.
“That’s the high minister,” Terrance explains, “and your best asset in this trial. She used to look after your mother when she was a child. She speaks for the Great Abyss.”
“The what?” Bex asks.
“It’s their god,” I try to explain. It’s embarrassing how many bizarre things I’m going to have to explain to her about my life.
“The Great Abyss is both a god and a place, Lyric. Your mother never taught you about her religion? Oh, never mind. The high minister is the Great Abyss’s priestess and the deliverer of its words,” he says. “All verdicts must be sanctioned by her, the divine speaker.”
“So she can keep my mother alive?”
“Theoretically, but a high minister hasn’t challenged a prime’s sentence in four hundred years. Now, about your role in the trial—”
“Huh?”
“Lyric, please just listen. You can sway the verdict. Do you see the Alpha standing on the edges of the circle? That’s the Council of Ten, representatives of the ten speaking clans. Pay a lot of attention to them, especially the Selkie. He’s Surf’s father, Nor.”
I scan the council and spot Nor right away. He’s the same Selkie I saw fighting Fathom on the beach. He’s wearing an eye patch today, and the jagged wound on his chest is open to the air.
“He’s the one who tried to kill Fathom?”