He had to tell the guests the truth. Some of them might be loyal to Sera. They might help her.
“Serafina’s alive! The true regina of Miromara is alive!” he shouted. “Vallerio killed her parents, but he didn’t kill her! Lucia imprisoned her. Find her! Save her!”
Some of the wedding guests gasped. Other’s pressed hands to their chests. “Is this true?” a merman demanded.
“Serafina’s alive? Where is she?” a mermaid cried.
“Mahdi, please!” Lucia begged. “You’re ruining everything. I can’t save you, we can’t be married, if you don’t stop saying these things.”
Mahdi shook his head. He couldn’t keep up the charade any longer. “Don’t you get it? I’d rather die than marry you.”
Lucia’s face changed in an instant. Hatred darkened her features. “Then you will!” she hissed.
“Lucia, what in the gods’ names is going on?” Vallerio shouted, approaching the altar.
Lucia backed away from Mahdi. She pointed an accusatory finger at him. “He’s a traitor!” she shouted loudly. “He’s spying for the Black Fins! Seize him!”
Traho fumbled for his gun. Mahdi grabbed for his own weapon. Traho aimed first. Mahdi braced for the shot, for the searing pain of a spear ripping into his flesh, but it never came.
Instead, there was a blinding flash of light, and then a deafening explosion. Mahdi clapped his hands over his ears. The walls of the ancient temple shook. The windows imploded. There was a roar from above, the sound of something heavy giving way. Mahdi looked up.
The last thing he saw were the beams of the ancient temple’s roof, plummeting toward him.
SERA AND FOSSEGRIM were preparing to follow Alítheia out of her lair and through a tunnel when it hit.
There was a deep boom, and then a shock wave so strong that it shook the walls and knocked Sera down. Her head smacked against the floor. Dazed, she pushed herself up and looked around.
Fossegrim had also been knocked down. Alítheia was on her back, legs clawing at the air.
With much clanking and pounding, she righted herself, then scurried to the iron grille that covered the entrance to her den. Sera helped Fossegrim up, and they both followed her.
“What was that?” Sera asked. “What’s happening?”
“I wish I knew, child,” Fossegrim replied weakly.
The three looked out of the grille. Almost immediately, Alítheia drew back. “There isss much light,” she said fearfully. “Which meansss much lava.”
As Fossegrim, still dazed from the explosion, sank back down to the den’s floor, Sera hooked her fingers through the bars of the grille and angled her body this way and that, trying to get a better view. She saw more bursts of light. Heard more explosions, as well as screams and shouts, bellowed orders, the neighing of hippokamps, the blood-curdling roar of dragons.
Her head was still swimming. The noise, the light—none of it made any sense.
And then it did.
“Great Neria,” she whispered, stunned. “It’s them.”
“Sera, what do you see?” Fossegrim called up to her.
She released the iron bars and swam down. “Fossegrim, we’ve got to get out here.”
“Do you know what’s happening?” he asked, reaching for her hand.
Sera nodded. “I do,” she said, helping the old merman up. “The battle for Cerulea has begun.”
“THIS IS NOT WISE, Serafina,” Fossegrim cautioned breathlessly. “You should stay in the spider’s den. At least wait to see how the Black Fins fare before you venture into the fray. What happens if Vallerio bests them and you’re taken?”
“I can’t do that, Fossegrim,” Sera said. “This is my fight. I need to be with my Black Fins, win or lose.”
Sera and Fossegrim were hurrying down a tunnel that led from Alítheia’s lair to the palace’s dungeons. The spider was leading the way, her bronze feet crunching the bones that littered the floor.
“Alítheia, if there’s an exit, why haven’t you ever used it?” Sera asked.
“Because the tunnel narrowsss asss it getsss clossse to the palace,” the spider had explained. “Alítheia isss too big. Ssshe hasss tried to fit through. Many timesss.”
Even though she was frantic to join her fighters, Sera heard the sadness in the spider’s voice, and her heart hurt at the thought of the lonely creature futilely trying to squeeze through the tapering tunnel.
As the three continued down the passage, Fossegrim asked, “What happens when we arrive at the dungeons? How will we evade the guards?”
“That shouldn’t be too much of a problem,” Sera replied. “With Cerulea under attack, most of the guards won’t be at their posts.”
“How do you know that?”
Sera smiled grimly. “I know my uncle. I know how he thinks. He’ll have ordered most of the guards to leave the dungeon to defend the palace. Fossegrim, you said you were in the dungeons for quite some time. Who was with you?”
“Political prisoners.”
“Criminals, too?”