But then I remembered Kona’s parents, lying dead beneath the surface, and knew that nothing was going to be okay again. Even Vernon, with his incredible organization skills and implacable manners, couldn’t make it so.
When no one came to answer the knock, Mahina reached forward and pushed the door open. I walked in, glanced around. The foyer looked exactly the same as it always did, nothing out of place, nothing broken, just like at Hailana’s. Zarek had said they’d done a cursory search of the place, but that didn’t mean anything. Kona and his brothers and sisters could be upstairs, injured. Unable to call for help.
I ran for the stairs, took them three at a time. Even as the logical side of my brain told me it was impossible, that Tiamat couldn’t make it up here, I didn’t stop. I had to check, had to know. I hit the fourth floor in thirty seconds flat and took off down the hall toward Kona’s room.
The door was closed and locked, but a quick shot of energy had it buckling in front of me. I burst into Kona’s sitting room, screaming for him, but he wasn’t there. I went through to the bedroom, the bathroom, even his huge walk-in closet. But there was no answer. He really wasn’t here. He really wasn’t—
I turned to tell Mahina, and as I did I caught sight of graffiti scrawled across Kona’s bedroom wall. Written in a red liquid so dark it was almost black were the three-feet-high words:
THE NEW SELKIE KING REQUESTS
YOUR PRESENCE AT THE SAHUL SHELF.
Eyes wide, heart hammering in my chest, I forced myself to cross the room. To get up close and personal with the message I was sure I would see in my nightmares for the rest of my life. Reaching out, I touched the letters, which were still a little wet, and came away with the viscous liquid on my fingertips. It was thick and a little clotted and smelled faintly of iron.
At the first whiff of it, the room started to spin around me and my knees gave. I hit the ground hard, but it barely registered. I was still wrapped up in the knowledge, in the horrified realization, that I was staring at a very large message written entirely in Kona’s blood.
PART FIVE
Overtopping
“There’s no secret to balance. You just have to feel the waves.”
—FRANK HERBERT
Chapter 29
“Where’s the Sahul Shelf?” I asked Mahina when I could reason again. It had taken a few minutes—for a while all I could think of was how much blood Kona had to have lost for them to be able to write those gigantic letters on the wall.
Who had done it? I wondered absently. Tiamat couldn’t leave the water, so had it been Sabyn? Or some other traitor to the mer and selkies that we didn’t yet know about?
I was lost in thought, devastated by the idea of Kona as Tiamat’s prisoner and desperately trying to figure out how to get him back, so it took me a while to realize Mahina hadn’t answered me. I turned to look at her, only to realize she was on the floor too, looking much paler than her Polynesian skin tone should allow.
“Is that blood?” she finally asked hoarsely.
“Yes.”
“Kona’s blood?”
“Yes.” After everything we had seen today, it surprised me a little that this was what had sent her over the edge. Then again, it had done a hell of a number on me as well.
“He really is dead, isn’t he, Tempest?”
“I don’t know.” I looked back at the message, read it for the hundredth time. “I hope not.”
There must have been something in my voice, because Mahina snapped her head around to look at me. “You aren’t actually planning on going there, are you? It’s a trap, Tempest.”
“I know it’s a trap, Mahina. I’m not stupid. But if he is alive, I can’t just leave him there. At her mercy.”
“She’ll kill you. That’s what this is all about—you know that. Take away every source of advice and knowledge you can turn to and then lure you in. She figures you’re going to be easy pickings, especially since Sabyn was your trainer and knows everything you can do.”
“Not everything,” I said grimly as I pushed myself to my feet. Never had I been so glad that I’d played my training sessions so close to the vest, not revealing to Sabyn what my newest powers were.
“What does that mean?” Mahina asked.
“Where is the Sahul Shelf?” I repeated.
“I won’t tell you. You can’t do this.”
“Then I’ll find it on my own.” I headed for the door.
“Tempest, wait!” Mahina trailed after me. “This is suicide!”
“It’s suicide not to do it,” I told her. “This is Tiamat’s big stand. She thinks she’s broken us, thinks she’ll be able to take me out the second I show up and then there will be nothing left of the prophecy to stand in her way.”
“Well, then, she’d be right. That’s exactly what’s going to happen if you do this.”
“Kona is king now. You realize that, right?”
“So?”
“So without him, what do you think is going to happen to his clan? We can’t just stand by and watch it go down. They’re our most powerful allies. Besides, Hailana as good as told me that she’s done as merQueen. Which means there will be a power vacuum with our clan.”
“Especially if you run off and let Tiamat kill you! We all know you’re supposed to be the next merQueen.”
Just hearing the words come out of her mouth made me nervous. Not about dying, because at this point, not going after Tiamat was as much of a death sentence as trying to stop her. She wasn’t going to be content with Kona, wasn’t going to be content with shattering our clans. She’d be back and, weak as we were, we wouldn’t be able to fight her.
Still, the idea that I would take over, that I was supposed to be queen … It certainly wasn’t the first time I’d heard it—Hailana had implied as much when I’d spoken to her earlier, and people had bandied the idea around almost as long as I’d been underwater. But the thought of it, the idea of becoming so completely mermaid, didn’t sit nearly as well with me now as it had all those months ago.
“At the moment, being queen is the last thing on my mind. It’s much more important for Kona to be king than it is for me to be merQueen. I will save him.”
“And die doing it.”
A shiver worked its way down my spine. “If that’s what it takes.”
“You’re insane,” Mahina protested even as she followed me out of the house and back toward the water.
“I don’t expect you to come with me,” I told her. “Believe me, I know exactly how dangerous this is.”
“Which is why you can’t do it alone. But I’m warning you, if you get me killed, I’m going to haunt you forever.” She looked across the inlet to the huge expanse of ocean. Then said with a sigh, “Australia’s that way.” She pointed to the right.
“Australia?” I asked.
“You wanted to know where the Sahul Shelf is. It stretches from the coast of Australia up to New Guinea.”
“All right, then.” I dived into the water, then waited for Mahina to do the same.
You don’t have to come, I told her one more time. You should stay here—
Shut up and let’s go before I change my mind. She started swimming. And where the hell else would your best friend be besides right here, risking her neck with you? Haven’t you ever read Harry Potter?