Deep Blue (Waterfire Saga, #1)(75)

“So are you, child.”

“No, I’m not!” Serafina said. “I stayed, Baba Vr?ja. Right here with the others. We’re making our plans. Trying to figure this all out. Ling’s on her way to listen to Abbadon, to try to decipher more of its words. Becca’s asking the witch who brought our breakfast how to cast an ochi. Neela’s practicing her light bombs—”

Vr?ja cut her off. “And you?”

“I’m plotting a route to the Kobolds’ waters. To see if the rumors are true and my uncle is there. And to find out whatever I can about my mother and brother. With their help, maybe I can get back to Cerulea. And the Ostrokon. So I can listen to conchs on Merrow’s Progress. We think she hid the talismans during that journey. The conchs might give us clues as to where.”

“Merrow’s Progress…excellent thinking,” Vr?ja said. “But tell me, why go north first?”

“I did tell you. Because my uncle’s there.”

“And your people? Are they in the north? Or in Miromara?”

“In Miromara, but—”

Vr?ja nodded. “Precisely. You are fleeing too, child. From that which scares you most.”

“That’s not true! Cerulea is occupied. I can’t go back to it without my uncle’s help.”

Vr?ja gave her a long look. “You treat rumors as certainties. Your mother was badly wounded. Your uncle and brother are missing. Yet you speak of all three as if they are alive and well and just waiting for you to find them at any second. How will you face that which is Abbadon if you cannot first face your own truth?”

Serafina looked at the floor. Vr?ja’s words angered her. But more than that, they cut her. Deeply. Because they were true.

“You fear you will fail at the very thing you were born for,” Vr?ja said. “And your fear torments you, so you try to swim away from it. Instead of shunning your fear, you must let it speak and listen carefully to what it’s trying to tell you. It will give you good counsel.”

Serafina picked her head up. “But all I do is make mistakes, Baba Vr?ja. I couldn’t help my father. I couldn’t save my mother. I trusted people I shouldn’t have. I went shoaling and got Ling caught in a trawler’s net. I couldn’t even convince Astrid to stay.” Serafina blinked back tears, then said, “My mother wouldn’t have made any of those mistakes. She’s better than that. I’m not like her. I’m not like you.”

Vr?ja laughed. “Not like me? I should hope not! Let me tell you about me, child. About two hundred years ago, the old obar?ie was dying. The elders came to fetch me so she could tell me all the things I needed to know. I was so scared it took the elders an hour to coax me out of my room. One is not born knowing how to lead; one learns.”

“But Baba Vr?ja, I don’t have time to learn,” Serafina said. “What’s happening in the waters—right now—is life or death. My people, my friends…they deserve the best leader they can get. Not me.”

Vr?ja threw her hands up. “If you wish to be the best leader, I cannot help you, for there is no such thing. We all make our mistakes and we all must live with them. If you wish to be a good leader, perhaps I can. Listen to me, child, Astrid swam away because she does not believe.”

“In Abbadon? How can she not? She saw him. Fought him. We all did.”

“No, in herself. Help the others believe, Serafina. Help Ling believe she can break through the silences. Help Neela believe her greatest power comes from within, not without. Help Becca believe the warmest fire is the one that’s shared. Help Ava believe the gods did know what they were doing. That’s what a leader does—she inspires others to believe in themselves.”

“But how, Baba Vr?ja?” Serafina said helplessly. “Teach me how.”

“Serafina, can’t you see?” Vr?ja said. She reached across her desk and took her hand. “By first believing in yourself.”





THE RIVER WITCH Magdalena looked at the spidery crack Neela had just put into the cave’s wall and shook her head.

“You’re dead. You missed him by a mile,” she said. “And then it was his turn. And he didn’t miss.”

Neela wiped a drop of blood from her nose.

“Try again.”

“She’s bleeding,” Serafina said. “She needs a rest.”

Serafina was sitting on the floor of an empty cave the Iele used for spell practice, recovering. Neela, Ava, and Becca were with her. Ling was with Abbadon, where she’d spent most of the last four days.

Before Neela’s turn, Magdalena had made Serafina cast an ap? piatr?, an old Romanian protection songspell in which she had to raise a wall of water ten feet high, then make it as hard as stone in order to shield herself from an attack. She’d held it up for a full two minutes, but the effort had left her with a blinding headache.

“Here,” Magdalena said now, handing Neela a cloth for her nose.

“You’re pushing her too hard,” Serafina protested, worried about her friend.

“Abbadon will push her even harder,” said Magdalena.

“It’s okay, Sera, I’m good. Let’s do it,” Neela said, stuffing the bloody cloth in her pocket.

Magdalena swam a few feet to the right of the crack. She picked up a rock and scratched a hulking figure with horns and a big ugly face on the wall, then drew an X in the middle of its forehead. “Right there,” she said, tapping the X. “Focus.”