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“Lower your voice, Percival,” said Bianca, her tone unusually sharp.
Percival looked mutinous, but Heath agreed with Bianca. He was becoming more and more convinced that this whole process had arisen from Percival’s words that day, before the tournament. This was no time for him to be overheard calling the king a liar.
“Well, this is taking things in a bit of a new direction, isn’t it?” Brody said thoughtfully.
“It’s good, isn’t it?” Jasmine interjected hesitantly. “I didn’t much like the idea of being registered, so surely it’s a good thing the king isn’t doing that after all?”
“He didn’t say he wasn’t doing it,” Percival corrected her. “He said it’s being ‘put to one side for the time being’. There’s no way the others are going to stop pushing for it, having come so close to success. It might take another decade, but it will happen eventually.”
“Unless we can find a way to bring everyone together,” said Heath absently, deep in thought. Percival just shrugged one shoulder, still moody.
“It’s interesting that he called just those of us between eighteen and twenty-one,” mused Brody.
“And interesting that they waited until well after the dragons’ attendance at the ceremony,” muttered Percival. “I suppose they didn’t want to risk them being offended.”
Brody ignored the comment, continuing on his train of thought. “It didn’t seem that he really wanted our opinion on the matter, did it?” Percival snorted, but again Brody ignored him, pushing on. “Clearly he’d already made up his mind.”
Heath remained silent. Brody was undoubtedly right. It had been clear from what he could read of the scribe’s notes that the other group—their non-magic peers—had been given substantially more opportunity to have input into the matter. But he didn’t think it would be helpful to share that information. Not with the storm still hovering over Percival’s brow.
For a moment Heath was distracted, the thought of storms reminding him of the island, and the day when he and Merletta had been caught in a tropical downpour. She’d taught him to float under the surface, face up so as to watch the incredible sight of rain hitting the water from below. What was she thinking about his continued absence? He hadn’t intended to be gone this long, and he hated the thought of her arriving each week in the expectation of seeing him, only to be disappointed.
He shook the thought off. He had more immediate problems to worry about.
“Clearly it’s our generation the crown is worried about,” Brody was continuing. He cast a surreptitious glance at Percival. “I didn’t hear any talk of our parents having to swear loyalty.”
“Perhaps he feels they’ve already demonstrated their loyalty, through their service,” Jasmine interjected timidly. Her eyes were also on Percival, and when he noticed it, he sent her a glower which made her instantly look away, her face turning pink.
Heath gave his brother a reproving look before smiling encouragingly at Jasmine. “I’m sure you’re right,” he said. “And with a little time, everyone will see that our generation is equally loyal.”
“It’s an insult,” Percival said forcefully. “We’re all loyal, and we’ve never given anyone any reason to think otherwise. Making us declare it in some public ceremony is not only humiliating, but it suggests we weren’t loyal before. Or at the very least, that we can’t be trusted to be loyal without being forced into it.”
Heath was silent, exchanging a thoughtful look with Brody. It was predictable that Percival would be angriest about it, but he wasn’t entirely wrong. The fact that as the oldest of their generation—other than their married sister, Laura—Percival would be the first to go through this ceremony, wasn’t going to help.
Heath sighed, banishing all thoughts of Vazula and Merletta even further from his mind. His brother was going to need all the help Heath could give him to get through this. Hopefully, without being accused of—or actually committing—treason.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
Merletta sighed, tossing the leaf up with a flourish, and watching it drift back down to the stone bench in front of her. It was impossible to focus on her own study when she knew that Sage was taking her test right now. She glanced up through one of the many long openings in the ceiling of the records hall. The light in the distant sky was waning. Sage had been at it for most of the day. It was certainly a grueling assessment.
Merletta had been projecting confidence for the sake of the other mermaid, but the truth was she was nervous for her friend. Oliver really had looked ill when he’d emerged from his test.
At least Ileana had stopped trying to scare poor Sage. Apparently the third year mermaid had passed her guard test with a brilliant result, and she’d been making smug remarks for weeks about what an ordeal the test could be for more timid trainees. It had made Merletta want to punch her in the face—she knew perfectly well that Ileana’s increasingly disdainful attitude toward Sage was a direct result of the growing friendship between her and Merletta.
The thought of Ileana made Merletta’s hands ball into fists. She had plenty of reasons to want to punch the older trainee in the face. It was almost impossible to believe that such a short time ago, Ileana had tried to kill her, and now things were just back to normal.
That is, if she really had tried to kill her. Merletta had been so sure when she surged into Instructor Wivell’s office. But the very normality of Ileana’s behavior toward her since then had made her doubt herself. Could the other mermaid really have tried to kill her one minute, then gone back to cold silences and petty insults the next? Agner had refrained from mentioning the incident again, and Merletta had the impression he was trying to be gracious and not embarrass her for her disproportionate display of anger.
Just an instance of emotions running wild after a brutal bout between two bitter rivals.
Easy for him to think that way, when he wasn’t the one who had to sleep in the same room as Ileana every night. But the other mermaid had shown no sign of aggression toward Merletta since then, and over time, things had almost begun to feel the same as before. After all, short of dropping out and swimming away back to Tilssted, Merletta didn’t see what more she could do about her suspicions.
Except watch her back, of course.
Merletta winced as she shifted in her seat. Most of her injuries had healed now, but a couple of places were still stiff, and sometimes she felt a phantom pressure on her throat.
She hadn’t even told Sage the full details of how she acquired the particularly vicious bruises. Sage hadn’t taken either of the previous pranks seriously, and Merletta couldn’t bear to hear her friend tentatively offering the same explanations that Wivell had. She also didn’t want to put Sage in the position of choosing sides between Merletta and the instructors. She was afraid of what the other trainee’s choice might be.
Plus Sage had needed to focus on her upcoming test. And now Ileana’s test was less than a month away, so she had her own problems to worry about. And one way or another, Sage would be past the ordeal soon. Merletta knew there were no second chances to take any of the tests. You passed, or you failed, that was it.
