“Eh, it’s a terrible color on me,” I answered.
Nixie snickered. “Maybe keep that part to yourself. You’re meant to offer something of value to you.”
Sirens dressed in long white tunics, eyes swiped with black from temple to temple, wove through the crowd with trays of slender, long-stemmed chalices. Nixie declined, but I took the last drink from the tray of a lavender-colored siren.
“What about you?” I returned the question as I took a sip of the drink. The bubbles sizzled on my tongue like champagne, but with a faint bitter taste.
“Before you arrived, my hair was very long. Down past my waist. I cut it to be my offering.”
The line shifted forward as the sirens stood atop the perch above the swallow and dropped their offerings into the pit, each declaring the gift and its meaning.
“Why?” The question flew from my mouth unexpectedly, like the drink had bubbled it out.
“Well, it was bothersome when I would train.” She shook her head, her pink curls coiling. “But also to show the great Mother that I understand it is not what makes me feminine. It is my heart. My soul. My feminine strength gifted to me by the Nymphaea herself that does so. With or without my hair, or my beauty, or myfertility.” A rose-colored smile blossomed on her face. “I am as strong as she is.”
For some strange reason, my hand clasped around hers. “I hope to be as strong as you one day.” The words suddenly popped from my lips again.
“Thank you, Elowyn,” Nixie answered, a bit bewildered but also genuinely grateful for the compliment.
We were next in line when another thought shadowed my mind. “Hylos should not start a war against Oakhaven.” The words flew from my lips entirely against my will.
“Elowyn, I know that’s how you feel, but now is not really the time for that conversation. Not here,” Nixie said under her breath, her mauve eyes searching me.
“You may die and I don’t want you to die at my dreadful father’s hands. I don’t want anyone to.”
“What did the terra girl say?” a dark-green siren said with a scowl.
I tried to keep my lips sealed, but my mind could only focus on the truth, swirling round and round like the swallow itself.
“You all would be fools to go against Oakhaven,” I said loudly. “Even if you are all strong, the war would not be won without a fight.” I clasped a hand over my mouth, desperate to stop the words from flying out.
“Elowyn, be quiet,” Nixie said in a tight-lipped whisper.
“Today is a time of offering,” I heard Calypstra say at Hylos’s side. They stood atop the platform watching the offerings of his people. “Why not offer the truth, terra?”
Something was wrong.
Despite how hard I tried, I could not stop the words in my mind from brimming over, the truth from spilling out. It was there, on the edge of my thoughts. But I couldn’t touch it. No, I could not say—“I will never agree to fight with Hylos, no matter how muchhe tries to persuade me. No matter how beautiful this place and you people are.” The words belted from me.
Hylos appeared wounded. “Elowyn, please make your offering and leave. We can discuss this at another time.”
“Your eyes are like a memory,” I said to him, because every thought became words instantly. “They are sad and empty, but proud. The only thing about you I trust.”
“What are you talking about?” Hylos asked, this time concerned. Then I realized, before my mind could trace the words, where they headed next. My hand slammed over my mouth again. My lips moved with the thoughts in my mind. That no, I was not okay. I wanted to leave Naiadon desperately and plotted to do so with Arlo. I would find a way out of here. And I would never stop. Never be content.
My hand was shaking. It seemed to have a mind of its own too, and fought to pry from my lips, threatening to expose the truth behind it that would not stop rushing out of me.
I prodded at a familiar wound, right when my palm flew back to my side. “I am nothing to my father, and no use to you in a war. I have no power. No title. I am a terrible ally to you in this foolish war that will end in only bloodshed and death.”
Hylos’s finned blue hand covered my mouth now. He sniffed at me. “You smell of eelgrass.” He cut a hard look at Nixie. “Did she ingest anything strange?”
“Only a glass of champagne given to her by a servant.”
The deep void below swirled and swirled below, pulling me, calling me, swallowing my soul.
“Elowyn, someone has poisoned you,” Hylos said carefully. A gasp shuddered through the crowd as murmurs spread like a brushfire. “The effects start with truth telling.”
Calypstra watched beside him, her black eyes swirling like the dark pool below.
