Sea Spell (Waterfire Saga #4)(8)
The three sisters took their leave, talking all the while about which young noblemer or death rider officer they intended to enchant at dinner.
Lucia closed the door behind them, leaned against it, and exhaled. Her cousins loved to gossip. By the end of the week, the entire palace would know that she and Mahdi were so much in love, they’d moved up their wedding date. Everyone would be consumed by the news. Even her father would have to turn his attention away from matters of state for a while and focus on her wedding.
Which was exactly what Lucia wanted.
Vallerio had discovered that the Black Fin resistance had placed a spy in the palace. His own spy, embedded in the Black Fins’ camp, had told him so but hadn’t been able to find out who it was. Vallerio had informed Lucia—just last night—that he was closing in on the traitor.
Lucia already knew who it was: Mahdi.
If her father discovered what Mahdi was doing, and that he’d Promised himself to Serafina right before he’d Promised himself to her, Lucia, he’d kill Mahdi on the spot. He wouldn’t even give Lucia the chance to explain that Mahdi had only done these things because Sera had enchanted him.
Lucia had learned the truth by drugging Mahdi and pulling bloodsongs from his heart. In them she’d seen his Promising ceremony with Sera. Lucia knew that a Promised merman couldn’t marry someone else. The magic wouldn’t work. The notes of the marriage songspell would fall flat.
Sera must have used darksong on Mahdi, Lucia had concluded. There was no other way to explain his actions. No merman could possibly prefer Sera to her.
“But I’ve outdone her,” Lucia whispered now, smiling as she thought of her beautiful maligno. She wondered if the deadly creature had made it to the Darktide Shallows yet.
Lucia had gone to Kharis, a priestess of the death goddess Morsa, and asked her to make the creature. The maligno was formed of clay and blood magic, and paid for with gold and death. He was the perfect double of Mahdi, and Lucia knew he would succeed with his mission: to capture Sera and bring her here. Lucia would take care of the rest.
Only then could she marry Mahdi.
Only then would she have the power she craved, the power to put her beyond the merfolks’ mockery.
Only then would the voices in her head be still, the ones that echoed down the dark halls of her memory.
They whispered about her. Poor Lucia. Such a pretty little thing. How sad for her to have no father.
They whispered about her mother. There goes the widowed duchessa….She was lucky she found anyone to marry her. Tainted blood, don’t you know. Lucia will have to marry beneath her, too. These things aren’t forgotten.
When Lucia was a child, her cheeks had burned red with shame at the words the voices uttered; now her heart burned black with hatred.
Her parents had been in love, but the reigning regina had forbid them to marry because there were traitors in Portia’s bloodline. So, Lucia had been raised without a father. Only when she’d come of age had Vallerio, the realm’s fearsome high commander, revealed to her that he was her father.
One day all the water realms, and everyone in them, will know that you are my daughter, he’d promised her. Until then, keep our secret safe. Our lives depend upon it.
When she became Mahdi’s wife, Lucia would no longer be a mere regina, but an empress. Her father had gained Miromara’s throne for her, and he’d also taken Matali and Ondalina. Qin would follow, then the Freshwaters and Atlantica. Vallerio would conquer them all for her, and she and Mahdi would rule the entire mer world.
“They won’t whisper about me then,” Lucia said aloud, her voice full of malice. “They won’t dare. Not if they want to keep their heads on top of their necks.”
She was close, so close, to seeing her hopes fulfilled. Her father had not been able to capture Sera, so Lucia had taken it upon herself. Success now depended entirely on the maligno—and the sea scorpion that had gone with it, to deliver the fake message. Would they make it the long distance to the Black Fins’ stronghold? Would the conch get to Sera? Would Sera believe the voice inside it was Mahdi’s?
“Great Morsa make it so,” Lucia prayed, knowing she would have no peace until her prayer was answered.
Until the maligno returned from the Darktide Shallows.
Until Serafina was finally dead.
SERA SAT ALONE at the broad stone table in the cave that served as the Black Fins’ headquarters, wincing as she rubbed her temples. The headaches had become sharper and more frequent ever since her meeting with the N?kki. Tonight’s was a killer.
Dozens of kelp parchments were strewn across the table: requisitions, intelligence reports, inventories. Message conchs were scattered among them. At the opposite end, a huge map of the mer realms lay open. Cowrie shells, representing her uncle’s troops, covered far too much of it.
Earlier, she, Desiderio, and Yazeed had argued over the biggest question the resistance now faced: where to attack first. Cerulea, Vallerio’s seat of power? Or the Southern Sea, where Abbadon was imprisoned? They’d failed to come up with an answer. Desiderio had argued for Cerulea; Yazeed for the Southern Sea. Given the Black Fins’ current lack of weapons and food, either choice felt like a suicide mission to Sera.
A long, trailing sigh escaped her. She felt hopeless tonight. Alone. Defeated before the battles had even begun. Plans, strategies, campaigns…it didn’t matter how carefully thought-out and executed they were, Vallerio always seemed to be one stroke ahead—cutting off supply lines, sabotaging alliances, thwarting her at every turn. Weeks had passed since she’d heard from Ava or Astrid. Had Vallerio taken them? And then there was Sophia, one of her best fighters, and an excellent shot. Sera had just sent her and Totschl?ger, a goblin commander, to rendezvous with the N?kki. Would Sophia get the Black Fins’ weapons safely back to camp? Or would the death riders ambush her and her troops?