Waterfire Saga, Book One: Deep Blue (A Waterfire Saga Novel)

by Jennifer Donnelly

  Serafina couldn’t see the woman who’d shouted, but she knew who she was—Merrow, her ancestor. This was Merrow’s memory.

  Serafina heard the monster first. Its voice was that of a thousand voices, all shrieking at once. The sound was so harrowing, it flattened her against her chair. Then she saw the creature.

  It was a living darkness, glazed in dusky red. Shaped like a man, it had two legs, and many arms. Powerful muscles gave it strength and speed. Its sightless horned head whipped around, drawn by the sound of running feet, of cries and screams. Hideous hands with eyes sunk into their palms guided the creature. It slashed at the helpless people trying to escape. When it killed, it threw its head back, opened its lipless pit of a mouth, and roared.

  “Merrow!” a voice called out.

  A man appeared, stumbling through the devastated streets. He was slender and dark-skinned, with blind eyes. He wore a linen tunic, sandals, and a large ruby ring. He had Ava’s high cheekbones and her long black braids.

  “Nyx!” Merrow said, rushing to him. “Thank gods you’re all right! Where is he?”

  “He’s barricaded himself inside the Temple of Morsa.”

  “We have to get his talisman. And everyone else’s. If we can get them all, we can open the Carceron and force the monster inside.”

  “He’ll never surrender it. We’d have to kill him to get it.”

  “Then we will.”

  “Merrow, no. This is Orfeo.”

  “There’s no other way, Nyx! He’ll kill us. Find Navi. I’ll get Sycorax and Pyrrha. Meet us at the temple.”

  And then the bloodsong faded and the waters cleared and the six mermaids sat in their chairs, shaken and silent.

  Vrăja was the first to speak. “Nyx was killed by Abbadon before he could get to the temple, but he’d found Navi. She was badly injured, but she made it to the temple with Nyx’s talisman and her own. Merrow managed to corner Orfeo, kill him, and take his talisman. The surviving mages succeeded in driving Abbadon into the Carceron, but Navi and Pyrrha were killed in the struggle. As soon as the monster was locked away, Merrow took the talismans out of the lock, then led her people into the water. Sycorax, with the help of a thousand whales, dragged the Carceron to the Southern Sea and sank it under the ice. She died there. The whales sang her to her grave. And ever since, Abbadon has slept buried under the ice. Forgotten. Lost to time. But now it stirs. Now someone is trying to free it. And already it makes its evil presence felt. Realms wage war. Mer die. The waters turn red with blood. And now you must destroy it. You must gather the six talismans, use them to open the Carceron, then go inside and kill it.”

  “Baba Vrăja, why us?” Serafina asked. “Why have you summoned us, six teenage merls, to kill Abbadon? Why not emperors or admirals or commanders with their soldiers? Why not the waters’ most powerful mages?”

  Vrăja looked at them each in turn, then said, “You are the most powerful mages. There have been none as powerful in four thousand years. Not since the Six Who Ruled.”

  “Oooooo-kay. I thought you were nuts. Now I know you are,” Astrid said.

  “One of you knows this to be true. One of you sees it,” said Vrăja.

  The mermaids looked at each other. They all wore confused expressions except for Ava, who was nodding.

  “Do you see something, Ava?” Serafina asked. “What is it?”

  “I don’t know why I didn’t see it before,” Ava said.

  “See what?” Astrid said. “No one here’s a canta magus. This is crazy!”

  “No, it’s not,” Ava said. “It makes perfect sense. There were six. There are six. Six of them, six of us.”

  Becca’s eyebrows shot up. “Wait, you’re saying…no way, Ava. It can’t be.”

  “But it is,” Vrăja said. “You six are the direct descendants of the six greatest mages who ever lived. Heiresses to their powers. Merrow, Orfeo, Sycorax, Navi, Pyrrha, Nyx…The Six Who Ruled live on inside each of you.”

  ASTRID BLINKED.

  Ava’s jaw dropped.

  Becca and Ling shook their heads.

  Neela turned bright blue.

  Serafina spoke.

  “Baba Vrăja, how can we be heiresses to the powers of the greatest mages who ever lived? It doesn’t make sense. Astrid’s right—we’d all be canta magi with perfect voices.”

  Vrăja smiled. “You forget the canta magi are mer, and merpeople’s powers are in their voices. The goddess Neria made it so when she transformed the Atlanteans. She strengthened our voices so they would carry in water. But Merrow and her fellow mages—your ancestors—were born human. Human magic takes different forms. Some of your powers may, too. The abilities you demonstrated while fighting Abbadon certainly suggest they do. Neela and Becca cast songspells against Abbadon. Ling chanted. But you didn’t sing, Serafina. Neither did Astrid or Ava. Your powers may be a mix of your mage ancestors’ human magic and your own sea magic.”

  “Who’s descended from whom?” Ava asked. “Serafina’s descended from Merrow, of course, but what about the rest of us?”

  “A very good question,” Vrăja said. “Never before have six direct descendants been of the same age at the same time—just as the original six were.” She walked toward Serafina and put her hands on her shoulders. “As you said, Ava, Serafina is the daughter of Merrow. She was a great leader—brave and just. And a very powerful mage. Her greatest power, however, was love.”

  “Love?” Astrid scoffed. “How is that a power?”

  “Nothing is more powerful than love,” Vrăja said.

  “Oh, no? How about a JK-67 lava-bomb launcher?”

  “You have much to learn,” Vrăja said to Astrid. “Even your lava-bomb launcher could not have saved us today. Only Serafina’s quick thinking could. She would have sacrificed herself for all of you. A willingness to lay down one’s life for others is born of love.”

  “Or stupidity,” Astrid said.

  It was Neela’s turn next.

  “One who holds the light,” Vrăja said to her. “You are the daughter of Navi. She was a wealthy woman who had come to Atlantis from the land we now call India. Kind and good-hearted, she used her riches to build hospitals, orphanages, and homes for the poor. It was said she could hold light in her hands, as well as her heart. She could pull down light from the moon and stars, and like them, she gave her people hope in their darkest hours.”

  Neela looked doubtful. “Baba Vrăja, I don’t know how much of Navi’s power I’ve inherited. I mean, sometimes I can cast a decent frag, other times I can barely get a bunch of moon jellies to light up.”

  “There’s an explanation for that. I believe that your powers—and those of your friends—strengthen when you’re in proximity to one another,” Vrăja said. “How do you think you and Serafina managed to flee into the looking glass at the duca’s palazzo? There are canta magi who can’t do that.”

  “You may be right,” Neela said. “My songspells are always better when I’m around Sera.”

  Vrăja raised an eyebrow. “I may be right?” she said. “Try to do again what you did in the Incantarium.”

  Neela looked around self-consciously. She took a deep breath and sang a fragor lux spell. This time, the light bomb she whirled across the room took a chunk out of the wall.

  “Whoa,” she whispered, wide-eyed. “How did that…how did I…”

  “Magic begets magic,” Vrăja said.

  Becca was next.

  “One with spirit sure and strong. Just like your ancestor Pyrrha,” Vrăja said to her. “She was a brilliant military commander—one of the greatest. She came from the shores of Atlantica. You are like her.”

  “That can’t be right,” Becca said. “I’m just a student. With an after-school job at Baudel’s. I plan to major in business when I go to college so I can open my own shop one day. I have a lot of ideas for songpearls, but I don’t know a thing about soldiering.”

  “Pyrrha started out as an artisan, too—a blacksmith. She could bid fire. She had a forg
e on Atlantis, as you have at Baudel’s,” Vrăja explained. “One day, she saw enemy ships coming and sent a boy on horseback to the capital, to alert them. Calling up the fire in her forge, she quickly transformed farm tools into weapons and armed everyone in her village. As the invaders marched through it, the villagers ambushed them and held them until troops from Elysia arrived. Pyrrha helped save Atlantis with her quick thinking. As you helped save us today, with your ability to call waterfire.”

  “I never knew I had that ability,” said Becca. “Not until today.”

  Vrăja then swam to Ava. “You are a daughter of Nyx. He came from the shores of a great river now known as the Mississippi. Like you, he was blind. And like you, he felt the things he could not see. Just as a bat does on land, or a shark in the water. Magic strengthened his gift, so that he could not only see what it is, but what will be. It will do the same for you.”

  After Vrăja finished with Ava, there were two mermaids left—Ling and Astrid.

  “Now for the big fat question: Who is Orfeo’s descendant?” Astrid said. “Let me guess…it’s not Ling.”

  “Sycorax is Ling’s ancestor,” Vrăja said. “She came from eastern China, on the shores of Qin. She was born an omnivoxa, and her magical powers strengthened her gift. She could speak not just many languages, but every language. And not only human tongues, but those of animals, birds, creatures of the sea, trees, and flowers. She was Atlantis’s supreme justice. She solved disputes between citizens and negotiated treaties between realms. She was very wise.”

  Ling smiled, but it was tinged with bitterness. “When I was little, people said I was a liar because I told them I could hear anemones talking. Plankton. Even kelp. I don’t have to study a language to know it. I only have to hear it. I’ve never known why. Now I do,” she said.

  Astrid sat glaring the whole time Ling was speaking. “So I’m Orfeo’s descendant. That’s just perfect. So, like, I’m the bad guy, right?” she asked angrily, after Ling had finished.

  “Orfeo was a healer. His people loved him. He was a musician, too, and played the lyre to soothe the sick and suffering. He came from Greenland. Of the six mages who ruled Atlantis, Orfeo was the greatest. His powers were unsurpassed. As yours may be, child.”

  Astrid laughed harshly. “You’re wrong, Vrăja. So wrong. It’s not true. Orfeo’s not my ancestor. The whole idea is totally ridiculous. I mean, if you only knew…”

  “Knew what?” Vrăja asked.

  “Never mind. Just forget it,” Astrid said. “I can’t be part of this nutty little playdate any longer. The realms are on the verge of war, in case you haven’t noticed. I’m going home to make myself useful.”

  “You can’t leave,” Serafina said, in spite of the distrust she felt for Astrid. “We’re supposed to be six, just like the Six Who Ruled—not five. Vrăja said our powers put together would be extraordinary. There’s no hope of defeating the monster without all of us.”

  “I have news for you. There’s no hope of defeating it with all of us. We’re six kids! The only ones dreaming are them.” She hooked her thumb in Vrăja’s direction. “They need to stop their bogus chanting, raise an army, and go after this thing.”

  “One who does not yet believe,” Vrăja said.

  “You’re right about that,” Astrid said. “I don’t believe. I don’t believe I came here. I don’t believe I wasted my time on this. I don’t believe I’m listening to this nonsense—”

  “Excuse me.” It was Becca. Her voice, unlike Sera’s and Astrid’s, was calm and unruffled. “This isn’t helping us make any progress. Where, exactly, is the Carceron?” she asked, taking a piece of kelp parchment and a squid ink pen out of her traveling case.

  “All we know is that it’s somewhere in the Southern Sea,” Vrăja replied.

  “Well, that narrows it down,” Astrid said.

  Becca jotted down a few notes, then asked, “What are the talismans?”

  “We don’t know,” Vrăja said. “Merrow did not reveal them to us. We believe she hid them so no one could ever use them to free Abbadon.”

  “If she was so worried about the possibility, why didn’t she destroy them?”

  “Because they are indestructible. They were given by the gods.”

  “Any ideas where she hid them?”

  “No,” Vrăja said.

  “Of course not!” Astrid said. “Why do you keep asking questions, Becca? You’re not getting any answers! Don’t you ever give up?”

  Becca’s glasses had slipped down her nose. She pushed them back up. “No, Astrid, I don’t.” She turned back to Vrăja. “And Abbadon—any ideas what it might be made of?” Becca asked.

  “It looked like it was made of darkness, but how could that be?” Ling asked.

  “Only Orfeo has the answer to your questions, and he’s been dead for four thousand years. Not even the five mages who fought Abbadon knew. That’s why they couldn’t kill him,” Vrăja replied.

  “The most powerful magi of all time couldn’t kill Abbadon, but we’re supposed to?” Astrid said.

  “Ever hear of positive thinking, mina?” Ava asked testily.

  “Ever hear of rational thinking? How are we supposed to kill it? Sneak up on it? It has like, a dozen hands! With eyes in them! We’ll never even get close to it,” Astrid said.

  “So what should we do? Just go home? Go shoaling, go shopping? Pretend none of this ever happened?” Ling asked heatedly.

  “Yes!” Astrid shouted.

  “Wait, calm down, everyone. Let’s take a deep breath and look at what we know,” Becca said.

  “Which is, umm, hold on, let me see…nothing!” Astrid said. “We don’t know what the talismans are. Or where they are. We don’t know exactly where the monster is or what it is.”

  “We do know—” Becca began.

  “That we’re going to get our wrasses kicked!” Astrid said. “Abbadon killed thousands of people! He sank an entire island!”

  “I would appreciate it if you would stop interrupting me,” Becca said.

  “And I would appreciate it if you would stop being mental.”

  “You’re unbelievably rude.”

  “You’re clueless.”

  “Stop arguing, please,” Serafina said, trying to hold the group together. “It’s not helping.”

  “You’re right, it’s not,” Astrid said. “So, hey, let’s just poison everybody. Problem solved. Isn’t that how they do things in your neck of the water?”

  “Whoa!” Ling said. “Time out!”

  “Astrid, you are totally out of line!” Ava said.

  But Astrid didn’t listen. And Serafina, infuriated, started tossing insults back at her. And everyone else just talked louder. A few minutes later, they were all arguing, shouting, and flipping their tail fins at one another.

  “I grow tired. I shall leave you now,” Vrăja suddenly said, the sound of defeat in her voice. “The novices have prepared food for you, and beds.” She turned to go.

  “Thank you, Baba Vrăja, but I won’t need a bed. I’m heading out,” Astrid said.

  Vrăja spun around. Her eyes bored into Astrid. “Orfeo had great powers, child. The greatest the world has ever seen. He had to choose how to use them. He chose evil. Magic is what you make it.”

  Astrid’s angry expression cracked. It fell from her face like ice off a glacier, revealing raw fear. “But Baba Vrăja, you don’t understand! I can’t choose!” she said.

  It was too late. Vrăja was gone. The doors closed behind her.

  The six mermaids were by themselves.

  SERAFINA LOOKED AT ASTRID. “What was that about?” she asked.

  “Nothing,” Astrid said brusquely. “It’s been real, merls. Good luck with it all.”

  She tried to swim out of Vrăja’s study, but two armed frogs blocked her. They waited until she stopped shouting, then one of them spoke.

  “Can you tell me what he said?” Astrid asked Ling.

  “So sorry. I don’t speak Tĭngjŭ.”
/>   “Tĭngjŭ? What does that mean? The guards don’t speak Tĭngjŭ. They speak Amphobos.”

  Ling smiled tightly. “Tĭngjŭ means jerk. And I wasn’t talking about the guards.”

  “Sorry,” Astrid said stiffly. “Can you please tell me what he said?”

  “He said, ‘You will stay, as Baba Vrăja instructed. There is danger in the darkness. You will be safe here.’”

  “Safe…yeah, sure,” Astrid muttered, looking pointedly at Serafina. “As long as I don’t eat anything.”

  Serafina said nothing, but her fins flared.

  A young river witch appeared and led the mermaids to a suite of rooms. One contained a round stone dining table and chairs, another beds. Two more witches brought food and the six mermaids sat down to eat a late supper. The food was simple, but fresh and delicious—salted frogs’ eggs, pickled water spiders, plump leeches in algae sauce, and a salad of marsh grass topped with crunchy water beetles.

  Sera was quiet during the meal, overwhelmed the enormity of what she’d learned in Vrăja’s study, and what she’d witnessed in the Incantarium.

  As she ate, she realized that everything she’d been taught about the origins of her people was a lie. Merrow had sought to protect the mer by wiping out all traces of the truth of their beginnings, but instead she’d left them dangerously vulnerable to the very evil she’d tried to defeat.

  Merrow, the first regina, a mermaid so revered that in the minds of the mer that she was seen as infallible, had made a mistake. A big one. And now it was up to herself and five other teenagers to put it right.

  Sera remembered the towering statue of her ancestor that had stood in the grounds of the palace. She saw herself, as she had been only weeks ago, looking up at Merrow. Looking up to Merrow. That merl, dressed in a beautiful silk gown, surrounded by Janiçari, protected from the cruelties of the world by her powerful mother, seemed so innocent and naive to her now, a child—one who’d lived in a world made for her, not by her. By decisions made for her. Under Merrow’s many decrees.