As much as I hated to agree with her, I really should’ve run. That was my plan all along. But the escape had become less of a priority the longer I stayed. I reasoned I couldn’t swim across the whole damn ocean. For once in my life, I gave up. And now I was paying for that.
“Yet there you are, frolicking through Lyrei all evening, like you belong here. ” Dorelea continued in that snide tone she’d been using with me ever since I drank the milk laced with glacier saffron.“Well, at least tonight you’ll get a chance to finally be useful to our kingdom.”
The old hag squinted at me, assessing. “Are you sure he likes her enough, Your Highness?”
The doors opened again, and Arnon arrived, smoothly moving through water.
“He likes her enough to threaten me with naming her his queen,” the prince said with a derisive laugh.
“What? He lost his mind!” Dorelea made a face as if she was about to get sick. “Olathana will never have a human queen. We’re not some lawless gorgonians. He’s making a mockery of the crown. That’s all he’s ever done.”
“In the long run, it wouldn’t mean much even if he married her,” her husband assured her. “The king doesn’t rule and can’t perpetuate his bloodline. She’ll die soon, anyway. But just the idea of it...” His shoulders jerked in disgust. “A human queen of Olathana? Even if in name only, it’s preposterous.”
“Well, his affections have always been flitting,” his wife reasoned with a long calming sigh. “He’d likely tire of her before any announcements are even made. We’re lucky his interest in her has lasted as long as it has, probably because there is no one else to vie for his attention in that dreadful glass palace of his.”
They talked about their king without a shred of reverence for his position or respect for him as a person. As if he were an annoying neighbor whom they loathed. Or worse, a trespasser whom they wished to get off their property and out of their lives for good.
I’d told Kye to get some sleep instead of lurking around the islands. Now I wished he hadn’t listened to me and instead would be “lurking” right here, near this place, missing me and wanting to get me back.
Hope sparked inside me. What if he didn’t listen? What if he was lurking? What if he was close?
But even if he was, I couldn’t run out to him. I couldn’t warn him.
I could do nothing.
Hope fizzled out, leaving only a scorched, dead spot in its place in my chest.
Arnon turned to the old woman in the black cloak. “Do you have enough time to get her ready, Grandmother?”
Get me ready for what?
Anxiety buzzed through me, pounding inside my skull. But when I opened my mouth, the question wouldn’t come out.
“Should we proceed as soon as she’s ready?” Dorelea clarified. “Or do you insist on waiting until the darkest hour?”
The old woman raked a hand through the water we all stood in. The surface glowed in the wake of her fingers. I noticed the water in this room wasn’t the same as in the rest of the house. There were no ribbons of seaweed in here, no colorful fish or sparkling shimmer. Instead, it appeared glassy blue, emitting a neon glow when disturbed.
The hag watched the tendrils of blue light as they spread over the surface.
“Three hours past midnight is when the night is the darkest,” she said in a quiet, rustling voice. “When the sky is as dark asthe ocean, the Ancient Ones can ascend unimpeded either by Nanami or Celeste. It will give me enough time to prepare the human for her descent too.”
Descent where?
But this question wouldn’t come out, either, choking me with panic. I couldn’t ask anything, but I wasn’t voiceless.
“No!” I screamed instead, letting out all the fear and anguish that bubbled inside me with one short word.
“Argh.” Dorelea flinched, covering her ears with her hands. “Have I not ordered you to be quiet?”
She’d ordered me not to ask questions. But now, she snapped, “Stop yelling.”
My scream stuck in my throat. It wedged in it, hurting with every breath and swallow.
“Now climb onto the altar,” she ordered next.
Altar? What altar?
Oh God, were they really going to sacrifice me?
