“You must be tired. Hungry, too,” Orfeo said. “Come, my servants have set a table for us.”
Astrid shook her head. “I’m not going anywhere until you tell me why you summoned me, why I’m here,” she said. She was pretty sure she knew, but she wanted to hear it from him.
Orfeo tilted his head again, regarding her. “They are one and the same—the reason I called you, the reason you came. Deep down, you know what that reason is. Deep down, we all know our heart’s truest desire.”
He offered her his hand. When she didn’t take it, he turned and walked away.
Astrid’s fear paralyzed her. She looked at Orfeo, walking away, then at the mirror that led back to Vadus.
“Who are you afraid of?” Orfeo called over his shoulder. “Me? Or yourself?”
With a last, desperate glance at the mirror, Astrid shored up her courage and swam after him.
NEELA, DISTURBED BY a noise in the barracks, opened her bleary eyes. A tail, pearly beige with patches of brown, was hanging in front of her face.
“Go to sleep, Becca,” she grumbled, swatting it away. “It’s not even light out yet!”
Becca was sitting on the bunk above her, getting dressed. “I can’t. There’s too much to do,” she whispered.
“The work crews won’t be up for another two hours. Go. Back. To. Bed.”
“I need to get a head start,” Becca said, swimming down from her bunk. “After we search the northwest quadrant for lava, I have to review plans for the new barracks and the school, and then inspect work on the infirmary. After that, the weapons need to be inventoried.”
As Becca spoke, she spied a small tail flopping over the side of a nearby bunk. It belonged to a little mermaid named Coco, who tended to toss in her sleep. Becca gently eased Coco’s tail back into her bed, then smoothed a strand of hair out of her face.
Neela blinked at Becca. “Why are you doing this all yourself? Why aren’t you delegating some of the work?”
“I am delegating. I’m just, uh, checking in.”
“Like every ten minutes. Which isn’t delegating. You’ve got to ease up, Becs, or you’ll work yourself to death.”
“Hey! Trying to sleep here!” Ling griped. She’d only gone to bed a few hours ago herself. Becca had woken briefly when Ling had come in. She could have sworn Ling was carrying Sycorax’s puzzle ball. Could that be?
“Sorry!” Becca whispered to Ling. “Later!” she mouthed to Neela.
As Neela burrowed into the seaweed of her bunk, Becca twisted her red hair up, then pushed a twig of polished coral through the twist to hold it in place. She buttoned her jacket around her neck. It was cold in the Kargjord. Then she picked up her clipboard, which she kept in a small cubby in the barracks’ rock wall, and quietly left.
The waters outside were dark, but Becca cast an illuminata songspell, and whirled some moonbeams together. The light did little to penetrate the murk, but at least it kept her from swimming into the boulders that dotted the Black Fins’ camp. She was on her way to the tool storehouse.
The lack of proper light only reinforced Becca’s determination to find a lava seam—as quickly as possible. Sera was spending a fortune on importing lava globes from Scaghaufen, the Meerteufel goblins’ capital city. If a seam could be located, that money could go toward buying more food or medical supplies. Lava was crucial to the functioning of the camp. It was needed for heating and cooking as well as lighting. Seams ran under the rest of the goblin realms, and Becca was certain they’d find one under the Karg, too.
As she approached the storehouse, a figure loomed out of the darkness—a goblin, armed and armored. Becca recognized her.
“Hey, Mulmig. How’d tonight’s patrol go?” she asked.
“We spotted some skavveners two leagues north of the camp. We gave chase, but they got away.”
“How many?” Becca asked, her brow creased with worry.
“A dozen. Really nasty-looking. They had a lot of loot with them, and what looked like somebody else’s hippokamps.”
“Two leagues is too close,” Becca said grimly.
Skavveners were bad news. Hunched, bony sea elves, they pillaged battlefields and disaster sites. Red-eyed and long-clawed, they wore their stringy hair loose and dressed in their victims’ stolen clothing, often not waiting until they were dead to yank it off them.
Becca knew Sera wouldn’t be happy when she heard about the skavveners. They stalked the feeble, sick, and injured. Sera wouldn’t want Vallerio’s spy to tell him that the elves had been seen near the Black Fins’ camp. He’d take it as a sign of weakness. Which it was.
“And what about you? Are you ending one day, or starting the next?” Mulmig asked.
Becca laughed and told Mulmig her plans for today.