“I know. We’ll find something soon. A little—”
He looked down, staring at the surface.
“What?” I said.
Without a word, he submerged. I glanced longingly at the occupied ice around me, and followed.
“Crap,” said Spio.
“What is it?”
“We’ve got a situation thirty-seven here. Military line.”
I followed his gaze into the distance. An army of mermen—a hundred, at least—stirred faintly.
My blood ran cold. “Adaro’s?”
“It’s most likely.”
“Which way do we go?”
Spio checked each direction before saying, “There. We should be able to go around.”
We continued northeast, picking up our pace. The net weighed more painfully than ever. I hoped Spio knew what he was doing. I tried to feel the current, to pick out an identity and determine if this actually was Adaro’s army, or something else.
I stopped. “Wait.”
Spio turned, mouth open to argue. Then his expression slackened, and he spun back towards the army.
He felt it too. Lysi. Her presence was on the current.
My excitement turned to horror.
“Spio, who is she with?”
He grimaced. “I hate to say it, buddy, but it doesn’t feel like our friend is in particularly good company.”
“They captured her? What are they planning to do with her?”
We needed to save her. She was alive—but for how long? Could we smuggle her away?
Spio looked down at the net in our hands, and then into the distance, and then back to me. A smile spread across his face.
And then he said something I was sure instilled fear in the hearts of merpeople everywhere.
“I have a plan.”
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN - Lysi
Murder in the Diomedes
I hadn’t seen this level of security since the trained great white shark on the southern battlefront. I felt an odd surge of pride that six mermen felt they needed to go to this extreme to keep me tame.
They had broken away from the other soldiers to bring me to the Bering. I was suspended between them by rope, bound at the wrists, neck, and waist.
“I’ll send the message when we get there,” said Thetis.
“Why should you get the reward?” said Nestor.
