"We don't have time to wait!" I argue, my voice cracking with desperation. "The magical draught she used on you could last for days. It could last forever. We need answersnow."
Kael releases my arm, ignoring my frantic anger. He turns his attention to the leather pouch I dropped in the white sand. His scarred fingers search through the contents I had scattered.
He pulls out a jagged piece of wax.
The broken fragment smells of rotting meat and dark, forbidden magic.
He holds the wax up to the green light of the engine. Bolt shifts his coils in the copper cage, his electric eyes narrowing at the sight of the object.
"That's a witch's mark," the eel says, his voice a low, dangerous hum that vibrates through the water. "It seals the darkest poisons in the Silt District."
"Explain the mark," I demand, my eyes fixed on the wax fragment.
"The wax," Bolt continues, "indicates a heavy pact. A broken seal requires a sacrifice. Only one hag uses that specific wax."
Bolt flares a bright, blinding blue, his coils tightening around the copper piston. "Oona."
The name hangs in the water like a death sentence. Oona.
Mira's rigid body betrays her. A violent tremor ripples through her paralyzed form, a single, desperate shudder of pure terror. Her wide pupils dilate, the black expanding to swallow the irises completely before contracting back to their unnatural size. The movement lasts less than a second, but I see it. I see the raw fear flash through her eyes before the draught freezes it in place.
"Oona," I repeat, savoring the sound of her terror. "You actually found her, didn't you?"
I don't need an answer. The lingering terror in her unblinking eyes is confession enough. The witch who deals in dark magic. The witch who trades in suffering. The witch who holds the antidote.
I push away from her rigid form, my tail fin stirring the white sand into a small cloud. My heart hammers against my ribs, a frantic, desperate rhythm that drowns out the engine's steady hum.
"We have to go back," I say.
The words strike the water with the force of a physical blow. The silence that follows is heavy.
Kael freezes mid-motion, his scarred hands hovering over the leather pouch. Bolt's electric hum dies completely, his yellow light dimming to a faint glow.
"Go back?" The eel's voice crackles with disbelief, his coils tightening around the copper piston. "Soryn is not a warrior, Red. He is a politician. And politicians do not kill the things that annoy them. They silence them. They lock them in the dark and siphon their energy until there is nothing left but a ghost. That is exactly what he will do to you."
"The Council believes I'm dead," I say, my voice firm despite the tremor in my hands. "They will not hunt a ghost."
"They will hunthim," Bolt points a sparking tail directly at Kael. "He is the terrifying monster who devoured the beloved Prince. If he shows his gray fin within a single mile of the city boundary, the Guard will turn his flesh into soup."
"We'll avoid the upper boundary," I say, my tactical mind already racing through the possibilities. "We will navigate the lower Silt District. We will use the forgotten maintenance tunnels. It is the realm of the outcasts. I'm sure we'll find the witch there."
I turn to Kael, searching his face for any sign of objection. He watches me with an intense, quiet focus, his dark eyesunreadable in the dim blue light. He's weighing the immense risk, his body still as a statue carved from abyssal stone.
"We can fix this," I tell him, my voice trembling with rising hope. "We can steal your voice back from the dark. You can speak my name again. You can tell me to shut my mouth."
A small, silent smile moves through Kael's lips.
His dark eyes shift from the wicked glass dart in my hand to the polished mirror lying face down in the white sand. It's the same mirror he used to reveal his tragic silence to me. He retrieves the heavy glass, his scarred fingers wrapping around the frame. He places it in my hands, the metal cool and solid against my palm.
You lead,he signs. He turns his heavy head away, presenting me with the harsh profile of his jaw.
He is self-conscious of the jagged new scars the battle left there. I reach out, pressing my palm flat against his sandpaper skin. Kael goes rigid, his heart thumping a frantic rhythm against his dense ribs as he expects me to recoil from the sharp texture. Instead, I trace the raised edge of the silver scar with my thumb. A ragged exhale escapes him, and he leans into my touch. The quiet surrender shatters the remaining walls between us.
My breath catches in my throat.
Despite the Council's betrayal, the horrific injury, and his brutal exile into the Wastes, he is trusting a Reef Prince to guide the ship back into the waiting jaws of the enemy. He is trusting me.
I grip the edges of the mirror, my knuckles white. I study my reflection in the silver glass. I look fierce. I look like a survivor.
