Verse VIII

  Jumilla's eyes were about adjusted to the murk beneath the great tent. It was not too different from a closed-off workshop on the spire of Valden, at least as far as lighting was concerned. The tastes on the weak currents of the city, especially the inescapable and irritating perfume of the tuli pods, conspired to fill the gills with a fug worse than a cave higgly's nest of slime, and that had colored her vision like an actual cloud of bubbles on the water. That sort of murk, no eyes could get used to.

  It was not until they slipped outside through one of the smaller slits in the great tent's outer wall that she realized just how much the stench of the place had affected her. Under the soft silver light of the early evening firmament, the sands of Almezzeb seemed like day.

  "Whew." She spat the word quietly through her gill slits.

  "Indeed," her sister answered. "I prefer the view outside as well."

  A tail's length ahead, Sera had an ear cocked and listening. "Kinda nice, right?" said the red mer. "Time I was little, used to love sneaking out past curfew, just to sit on the sands for a verse and watch the shimmer. Almost got ate by a sand trapper a few times," she added, her smile thinning out to nothing. "Let's all be careful, alright?"

  "Understood." Between them, Jumilla and Jumella supported the ailing Ardenne. The poor mer's face was almost a shade to match her hair, skin paled to a sickly green. Personally, Jumilla still blamed it on the taste of the tuli in the water. A whiff of the stuff in passing was enough to make her feel queasy, and back under there a mer couldn't really avoid it. She was feeling a mite green, herself.

  "Where shall we be staying, then?" asked the princess. Rhiela was swimming alongside them with Rook in tow. Browning ringlets shook in the dimming light. "Another night out in the open, with sand trappers -- whatever those may be -- and Goddess-knows-what else? And," she pressed, "with a sick mer on our hands?"

  "Rather go back in there?" Sera hooked a thumb at the big tent, now some distance behind them. "Night feeders are at least honest."

  Rook was trembling as she clung to the princess's arm. "Yer didn't get the guards called on yer, Rhia. And for no reason at all. Ain't a place for an honest mer."

  "I'm sure that if we explained what happened..."

  Jumilla had strong reservations about that, and she was not the only one. Ahead of them, Sera made a sudden stop in mid-stroke, spinning around to jab a finger at the princess's chest. "You, little chum," said the red mer, "have never had to deal with a mer with the authority to sink your entire life just because she doesn't like the cut of your hair. What d'you think you can do, just swim into the viceroy's private club office and ask for help?"

  "Well, I have met Lanita din Casima before, and she's not a bad mer, so..."

  Cool evening currents carried the sound of the slap well. Gold mer and red were equally dark shapes against the pale sands, but that sound left an image on the ear that was unmistakable. "Do not speak like you know her, chum," hissed Sera.

  "But I do know her!" Rhiela tried to return the slap, only the rogue flipped backwards before the royal hand could connect.

  "You've met her," Sera corrected. "Doesn't mean much at all, that. And perhaps forgetting your own little problem?" Whirling on a swift stroke, the red mer eeled around Rhiela to grab a hank of hair. "Would a mer believe you right now, brownie?"

  Oh, this was getting to be too much, thought Jumilla. Leaving the hunter to her twin's capable arms, she beat a fast stroke over to grab both gold mer and red by the shoulders and force them apart. "Okay, we do not have the time for this," she told them. "Your Highness, just believe me when I say that there was no good way out of that mess that would have us out of town in less than a month. And Sera..." She blew a sigh through her gills. "You're on edge. We're on edge. But you far more than us. Anything you need to say?"

  The red mer shrugged Jumilla's hand away. "No. Now, let's away. Shelter is a short current from here. Unless you prefer taking your chances outside?"

  "Not really..." The words were short, raspy, but they flowed from Ardenne's throat. "I'd... I would rather a place to lie down again, soon."

  The eyes of all were upon the hunter, who for her part did not try to cover or hide a thing. Might be she was too tired, thought Jumilla. The way the sealskin tunic hung on Ardenne's frame, the mer looked half-starved.

  "Come on," she said, taking Ardenne's left arm while her twin kept at the right. "We'll get you wherever it is we're going. Only, ah... hands off, okay?"

  "Jumilla..."

  "What? It's a valid thing to worry about! You get punched right in the front and then see if you're not shy about it."

  "S-said I was sorry..." muttered Ardenne.

  "Yeah, I know you are, but..." Jumilla shrugged. "I need to vent sometimes. That's all."

  Sera cleared her throat, sending a loud flurry of bubbles over her gills. "If we are ready?"

  "I know I am," said Rhiela. With Rook in tow, the brown-gold mer pushed off with her flukes to swim where Sera now pointed into the distance. "Well?" she called back to them. "Aren't you coming?"

  Holding the green mer steady, Jumella and Jumilla launched themselves forward. The pale sands of the Almezzeb swept beneath them, with only the occasional puff of dust as a sign that anything was alive in there. A strange, lonely place this was, Jumilla had decided. Vast amounts of nothing in between little bits of something. A place that existed to be passed through. She had to wonder why any mer would choose to live there.

  Looking ahead to the red-tinged shadow of Sera on the currents ahead, she wondered what it took for a mer to come back.

  *

  Song in the night. Squeaks and clicks, shooting through the waters, finding food, echoing back. Not much food. Not big food. Open waters, too open. No grass, no kelp, no place for food to live. Bad place for a pod.

  The little pink delphin had no name as a mer might know it, and the string of song used to call her was dense and difficult. The rorqual who was Song-Under-Firmament had named her as guide and friend to mer-green-hair and mer-red-hair, but if she were to be called anything, it was Watch-with-Clicks. That was what she did most of the time.

  She had tried to follow more closely behind those strange ones, those mers who were to be called not-enemy, but the noise they made was uncomfortable to her. Mer-brown-hair and mers-who-look-alike did not act welcome or friendly. Mer-orange-hair was the sound of fear, when sounds she made.

  Not good, not good. Song-Under-Firmament had sung the commandment, and Watch-with-Clicks obeyed. Watch mers. Help mers. Strength-of-Waves, to return. Gentleness-of-Tides, to be happy. All to be happy. But with no help, no success. No following, no help. No friendship-with-mers, no following.

  Watch-with-Clicks sang the song of annoyance-when-alone. First, eat tasty fish. Second, find friend-mers. Third, help. Good plan. Right plan.

  The little pink delphin swam off into the night, with silvered firmament above and pale sand below.

  Verse IX

  At this point, Rhiela was not sure what she might expect of Sera's promised shelter. The nights since her birthday had been spent outside more often than in, for a totality of her experience in open waters. Her flukes were constantly fatigued from the swimming. Her hands and eyes ached from the study of those rune-marked shells which Rook's teacher had left to them. Her scales were dulled from lack of polishing sand. And, worst of all...

  She hated to even think about the state of her hair, which meant that it was as often on her mind as it was on her head.

  So, what was this shelter to be? A hole in the sand? A pile of rocks? Another tent, like Mezzegheb? Rhiela could not say which would be worse, and in the dimming light of the hour she could not see far enough to tell. When the red mer called a halt to their strokes, she had to trust the mer that there was anything around to see.

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  "This way." And Sera was off again, dipping towards a dark body of rock that arose from the sands. If there was anything anchored to the promontory, Rhiela could not distinguish it from the rest.

  "Er, be yer coming, Yer Highness?" In private, Rook still sometimes used her title of address, and she adored the little orange mer for that courtesy. If she had taken nothing else with her from the palace, she at least had her dignity.

  "Haul tail, brownie!"

  It was thankfully not a fragile thing. Rhiela let off a string of annoyed bubbles, then took the orange mer by the hand and dipped to follow.

  The promontory was larger than it had looked from a distance. A lack of anything else around meant that it was hard to compare, but the rock rose many tail-lengths in height above the sands, and was even larger around. Closer in, Rhiela could make out the clumps of coral, kelp, and sargo which sprouted across its surface to form a miniature reef in the midst of the expanse.

  "Don't dawdle," said the red mer. "Ain't likely anyone's watching the open water at this hour, but don't chance the wrong sort of attention right now."

  "Which is?" All things considered, Rhiela was not sure what the right sort of attention would even be.

  The red mer did not bother to answer that, much to her annoyance, but rather tugged at a patch of kelp. The entire mess of green-black foliage pulled away to reveal an opening. Sera motioned them to enter. Rhiela peered in. It was not quite so dark as the rear passages of the palace, back in Bryndoon, but she did not have a glow-lamp with her this time. "You first," she said to the rogue.

  "What, brownie, don't trust me?"

  "Not enough to dive blindly down a hole which you know better." She turned away from the opening to glare. In the dusk under the firmament, it was likely Sera did not even notice.

  "Brownie's got herself cold flukes."

  "That's not what... and stop calling me that!"

  "Oh, sorry, little chum. Hurt your widdle feelings?" Sera brought her face in close enough to see clearly in the low light. Her blue eyes were wide and hard.

  Somewhere behind the princess, Rook spoke up: "Um, Red? Rhia? Yer think this be a right time?"

  "No, because it's time a certain mer got her overblown bubbles down the hole!"

  "Not until you slough the mud and come clean about what's down there!"

  "What's it matter if'n it's soft? All need to hurry, so hurry!"

  The orange mer wasn't finished. "Only, I think someone's coming..." she said.

  All conversation stopped; the waters went quiet and still. Through the last echoing ripples or Rhiela and Sera's argument cut a new voice, coolly amused. "Why, Seraffine. What a long while it has been. Please, do your friends the courtesy of showing them the front portal, if you would."

  *

  A long sigh flushed over Sera's gills. Of all the mers who might have spotted them, spotted her, in the Mere Almezzeb, this one was far from the worst. It did not make the interruption any more welcome. "Matron. Only meant to bide a time in the old rooms," she said quickly. "Nothing more 'n that."

  The mer now gliding down the evening currents with a glow-lamp in hand was elderly only in appearance. Nothing in the way she moved betrayed any of the years she held, and Sera knew just where to look. Enough of her own youth had been spent trying and failing to outmaneuver the mer. No, the fur across Matron Mihayela's face and form may have gone grizzled, but nothing else had.

  "Well then, come along," the old leondra told them. "If we were to await the moment wherein Seraffine recalls her manners and makes proper introductions, then we might greet the dawn over the firmament first. Mihayela, prestra skola and first matron of this crèche." The lady took a bow. "And yourselves?"

  The twins gave a formal nod. "Greetings, matron," said the slightly older-acting one. "My name is Jumella, and this is my sister Jumilla."

  "From Valden," the second twin added.

  Sera stifled a growly groan. Now was not... never was there a good time to volunteer the little details!

  Between the twins, the green mer stirred enough to speak up: "Ardenne, from Sangolia. Ah, my apologies, but I have been feeling not so well as of late."

  "You poor thing." Matron Mihayela reached down to stroke Ardenne's head. A string of syllables flowed from her mouth, delicate pearls of sound arranged into what Sera recognized as a variation of a soothing song. "I hope that this should do you some good, whatever the malady upsetting you now."

  "My thanks, messra."

  That was absolutely the wrong title of address. Sera knew it. The Matron knew it. Depths take it, even Brownie min Front-Bubbles knew it, and the others could probably guess. In other waters, with other leondra, this would be a problem. She would need to have a long chat with the green-haired mer again, and soon.

  But there were two more introductions to worry about first. Rook was her usual, bubble-headed self, talking up a swift current without much thought to the words she set upon it. Little of the orange mer's past was problematic, not as yet, but Sera had to tug a fin to keep her from starting in on the tale of their day in Mezzegheb.

  Depths, that was a story she would need to tell the matron later, herself, once she'd figured out the best whirl to put on its flow. But right here, right now, it was not the stuff of good first impressions.

  The worst was last to come. How many times had she impressed upon the royal pain in the flukes that it was best they go incognito? Too many to count, and probably not often enough. Half the seas were likely searching for the errant princess by this point, and the only current flowing in their favor was that the royal chum didn't look quite like herself. But if that secret slipped just once...

  "Rhia min Anni," said the princess, bowing politely with her hands impeccably poised in the signs of respect. "Lately of Bryndoon. We are graced by your hospitality, matron."

  Would wonders never cease... Sera released the water from her gills before she could choke. At least one of them had listened!

  "What manners," noted Matron Mihayela. "I might hope that some of this may rub off on you, Seraffine."

  "I dare say we have much to learn from each other," Rhiela said. The rogue could hear the quirk of a smile in that voice. "I know that I have learned many things already."

  She could be thankful to the firmament above that the matron did not ask for details right then, because the only things Sera could say for certain that the princess had learned were how best to lie and make herself look less suspicious. And cusswords. Plenty of cusswords, if Brownie had paid proper attention.

  "Come along, then," said Mihayela. "It is well past dark out, no matter how the firmament shines tonight. So let us away. The little ones are likely bouncing off the walls without me in there. You remember how it flows, Seraffine." Her nod was hidden by the darkness, but the matron assumed rightly that it was there. "Oh, how happy they shall be to have you home, if only for a short while. She never does stay long," the leondra mock-complained to her guests as they swam. "In and out, all the time, when she isn't missing for months on end. I do hope you have some good tales to tell the little ones this time, Seraffine."

  "Yes, matron..."

  *

  It was a pretty long way around that rock. Probably, as Rook figgered it, anything what could stick itself out of the sands for any length of time had to be bigger than most, or else the flow of the currents would pull the pale grit right back over it, faster than flash. With the sand all pale and pretty around it, the rock was a black shape in the scenery with details a mer could sort of see if she squinted right. nothing on it or around it to look like a shelter, though. The profile was all rugged and natural as could be.

  Rounding one bulge in the rocky mass, her eyes caught on a glimmer of light. A solitary glow-lamp, a runework one, drifted upon its tether. By its flicker, the face of the nearby cliff was drawn with thick bars of darkness. Between them, the outline of a door was barely visible.

  "My apologies for the lamp," said the leondra lady. "It has been acting up as of late."

  "Mind if'n I get a gander at it?" Rook held back a nervous giggle as the matron gave her own gander at her. "Only, I been learning and working with runes half my life, it feels like, and seen a few lamps like this before." More to the point, and not something she'd ever tell, but one time she'd broken Baba Rill's lamp so it went all flickery and sputtery like this one, and old Baba had made her sit down and practice the fixing of it till she could about do it blind. Without giving the leondra lady a beat to reply, Rook swam over and tapped the lamp lightly.

  It was an old one, this lamp, and well made. It'd have to be, to last so long out here. A carved bit of stone anchored the runes from within a cage of coral, and the glow kind of danced across its surface instead of coming up from it. She sang a short string of syllables, the general call for inspection, and hit the end of the litany with the emphatic clicky-cough that set the magic to work.

  The light hovered for a beat, then expanded outwards, forming itself into runic shapes in a wide ring around the anchorage stone. Here and there, Rook could see what she'd expected to find: blurred strokes of light, places where the shapes had smeared or frayed, until the rune was so bent out of shape that it was a miracle that the power still pulsed through it.

  She'd fixed busted lamps before, but she'd never built one from the bones up. That was about what she had to do here, though.

  The waters stirred beside her. Rhia was there, all of a sudden, and the mostly-brown hair still had a bit of the old gold to it by the lamplight. "Marai always had me watch when she tinkered with things," Her Highness said in a low voice. "Now I'm wishing I'd paid more attention."

  "Got'cher feeling straight there, Rhia." Rook teased the ring of light around. "Gonna have to doubly-double the check on all my runes for this one."

  "But you can fix it?" asked the leondra lady.

  Her eyes were busy committing the string of runes to memory, but her mouth said, "Might be we can, matron, but might be it's easier to make a new one." Her mouth paused to yawn, flushing water across gills. "Might be it's better to try it on the morrow."

  "If you can, then we would certainly be in your debt." The leondra lady wagged a finger at Red. "And we could certainly forgive and forget any little shenanigans involving the rear rooms."

  "Yes, matron..." Wow. Rook hadn't ever thought to hear that kind of tone out of Red's mouth.

  "So, um, what kinda place yer gots here?" she asked. "Kinda off the fast current and all..."

  "Didn't Seraffine mention where you were going to stay?" The leondra lady had a hand to her lips as a chorus of nays and nopes arrived to embarrass Red some more. "Ah. Then welcome be you all to the Wayward Drift, crèche for the motherless."

  "The unwanted." Red turned her face away to frown into the darkness. "This was a mistake."

  The leondra lady stroked over to the doorway and tugged it open. "I doubt that. While I know that it has never been much to your liking, Seraffine, if the city of tents were safer for you, then that is where you would now be. I may only hope that you don't bring too much trouble in your wake this time."

  "Never mean to..." Red stopped herself. "Another time to talk, matron."

  "Yes." With a graceful sweep of her arm, Matron Mihayela ushered them inside. "For this evening, be welcome. We shall worry about the rest on the morrow."