Atlantia (16 page)

“Anyone who sees you swim,” True says, “will remember it forever.”

What he says echoes what I thought earlier, that I will not forget what True has done for me. And he speaks with sincerity, with that warmth that radiates all through him, and I wish it were all around me. I wish he would put his hands on my face and warm me all the way through.

It's a wild thought, but I'm cold and crazy with relief and exhaustion. It's hard to wait for a moment to let it all settle before I speak again.

“Anyone who sees what you can make will do the same,” I say. “This is going to work. Perfectly. I'll tell Aldo to set the date. Three days from now.” It will be a spectacle. No. It will be more than that.

It will be a celebration.

True starts laughing. It's the kind of laughing people do when they're children, the kind I've always been envious of, where you can't seem to stop, something is
that
bright and funny. The sound is beautiful and his eyes crinkle almost shut.

“What is it?” I ask. “What did I say?”

“In that bucket of leaves that you gave me,” True says, “there was a tiger head. From one of the gods. Did you put it in there on purpose?”

“No,” I say, shocked. I'm surprised I didn't notice such a thing, even in the dark. But it makes sense, the way the gods were always coming apart. “Where is it? What did you do with it?”

“I melted it down with the rest,” True says. “It's one of the fish now. The one with the key.”

And now I cover my mouth with both hands, whether in horror or mirth, I'm not certain. The word I manage to say is
“Blasphemy,”
in a whisper, and True puts his arm around me like we're old friends, which in some ways we are. In some ways, he is the oldest friend I have. I feel his body, still shaking with laughter, against mine.

“Don't you believe in the gods?” I ask.

“Of course,” he says. “I believe in them so much that I don't think they need statues everywhere to be powerful. None of that makes any difference.”

He waits for me outside the changing room, and as I put on my other clothes I find myself laughing, too, without a sound. I feel almost happy. And I feel terrible, because I have learned many things—about sirens, and the nature of them, and the ancient past of Atlantia, and about myself—and I can't tell True any of it. He has been a good friend the past few weeks, and I have kept so much from him.

There is one discovery, however, that I
have
to share with True. I can't go to the Above without letting him know the truth about Nevio. “I have a secret,” I say, when I come back outside.

“What is it?” True asks. He doesn't seem surprised but interested and eager. His expression almost seems to say
I know
and
At last!
which gives me pause for a second. What does he think I'm about to tell him?

I'm about to tell True that our Minister is a siren. This is not something that's easy to say without any emotion or accusation in your voice. I've got to hold back.

This also isn't something anyone else should hear.

So I lean in closer to True.

He moves in, too, and ducks his head a bit so I can whisper in his ear. To an outsider we might look normal, a girl and a boy sharing secrets in the deepmarket.

“Nevio the Minister,”
I whisper,
“is a siren.”

True doesn't pull away, but when he whispers back, he sounds stunned. Whatever he thought I was going to say, it wasn't this.
“How do you know?”

Does he believe me? “Nevio lied,” I say. “And I knew it because I'd seen the truth. Otherwise I might have gone on believing him. But once he lied, I knew, and then I could feel it when he was speaking. He is a siren. I'm sure.”

“This means he's been hiding his ability,” True says. “He must be extremely powerful to manage that.”

“I know,” I say. This is the most frightening part of all. Nevio knows how to sound like everyone else, and he can put just the right amount of power into his voice to give effective sermons and exhortations without the people suspecting anything more. It must take an uncanny amount of self-control.

Nevio is very,
very
strong.

“Do you think your mother knew that Nevio is a siren?” True asks.

I've wondered the same thing. I don't think she did. My mother didn't tell me everything—she kept her own counsel. I'm painfully aware of this. But so much of what she did was to protect me. I can't imagine her bringing me to live at the temple school or urging me to take up a temple vocation if she thought Nevio was dangerous or knew that he was a siren. And if she'd discovered such a thing, she would have removed Bay and me immediately.

Was
that
what she was coming to tell Maire the night she died? Had my mother found out Nevio's secret?

If she knew his secret, it would be a very good reason for him to kill her.

The expression on True's face makes me think that his thoughts are similar to mine.

“I don't know if she found out,” I say. “I can't be certain. If she did, she didn't have time to tell me.”

“Do you think any of the priests know what he is?”

“I don't think so,” I say, “at least, not if they believe as my mother did, that the church and temple can best help if the people come to them without being persuaded. A siren changes that dynamic automatically.” But there could be priests who don't believe as my mother did, or ones who feel loyal to Nevio. “Do you think the Council knows?” I ask True. “Should we tell them?”

“I'm not sure,” True says. “Maybe they do know. Maybe that's
why
they wanted Nevio to be the Minister.” He shakes his head. “The more we find out, the more confusing it all becomes.”

“But you believe me?”

“Yes,” True says. “I do.” His eyes narrow; his lips press together. For the first time since I've known him, I have to look hard to see the kindness in his face. For a moment his expression is different—closed-down, cool, and still.

We're both quiet as we walk out into the deepmarket. I listen to the people laugh and talk, and I try to catch the sound of Atlantia breathing in the gaps.

The two of us pass Cara's stall. A new cluster of people has gathered around my mother's ring.

“We'll get it back,” True says. “Don't worry.”

I feel another needle of guilt. He doesn't even know that I'm not trying to buy the ring, that I'm saving for an air tank instead.

He doesn't even know that I'm going to leave him.

A woman has bought the chance for her child to touch my mother's ring. This makes me nervous. What if the child drops it? What if the mother is a crook and has another ring like it to palm and trade back?

But then I see the girl touch the ring, reverence in her expression.

“Maybe it's not so bad that the ring is here for now,” I say to True. “It's a way for the people to remember her.”

As I say this to True, I realize that this might have been exactly what Bay intended.

Maybe she had Fen sell the ring to keep my mother's memory alive in a way that our having the ring could never do.

Or
was
she trying to help me by leaving me the money?

Or both?

Tears of relief rush to my eyes. I still know Bay. Not perfectly, but in some ways.

“While we're telling secrets,” True says, “I have one, too.”

“You do?”

“I'm immune to sirens,” he says. “And not many people know it. My father and Fen. And now, you.”

I should have realized. There is something unmovable about True, in spite of all the laughter on his face and the gentleness in his eyes. Something at his core that can't be taken away or changed.

I have a very strange and interesting thought—could True resist
me
, if I used my real voice?

“So you could be the Minister someday,” I say. My attempts at humor usually fall as flat as my voice, but True smiles.

“There's more to being the Minister than that,” he says. “Isn't there?”

“Of course,” I say. “But that's an important step.”

“If you're immune, you're supposed to declare it to the Council, but I never have.”

“Why not?” I ask.

“My mother thought we should keep it to ourselves,” he said. “My father went along with her wishes because he loved her. And after she died, it was too late to tell anyone. They'd wonder why we'd been keeping it secret for so long.”

There are so many secrets in Atlantia. And maybe this is part of why I'm drawn to True. He's been keeping a secret, too. Not one as dangerous as mine. But he knows what it's like to hide at least some of what you are.

“My father doesn't care anyway,” True says. “I don't live with him anymore—not since I started working full-time on the gondolas.”

“I'm sorry,” I say. I wish I could say it better.

“It's hard,” True says. “He hasn't taken much interest in anything except his work since my mother died.” Before I can ask how—though I don't know if I would have dared—True tells me.

“Water-lung,” he says. “I know not many people get it, but she did.”

“My father died of it, too,” I say.

“The Council would never let you and I marry,” True says thoughtfully. “Because the illness was so recent in both of our families.”

I must look surprised, because he hurries to clarify. “I was thinking out loud,” he says. “I was thinking
that
might be a reason for Bay and Fen to go up, if they both had the illness in their lines. But there's no water-lung in Fen's recent family history. I'm sure of it. His parents and grandparents are all still alive, and his brother is fine.”

“Do
you
have any brothers or sisters?” I ask True.

“No.”

“I see,” I say, and I feel sorry for him, not only because he doesn't have a sibling, although it's always seemed to me like a terrible thing to grow up alone. He can never go Above. He would never have had the choice.

“So you've always known you couldn't go,” I say.

He nods. “And you always dreamed you would.”

I look at him in surprise. How did he know?

“I can just tell,” he says simply.

There are many things I could like about him if I weren't so ruined.

“Well,” I say. “We don't always get what we want.”

“No,” True says. “We don't.”

T
here's one more thing I need for my Oceana costume, and I don't see why I shouldn't have it.

I need the insignia. The waves that turn into trees.

Nevio never takes it off, but I also know that the Minister has two insignia. One to wear and one kept in a safe in the Minister's office as a backup. The Minister is the only one who has a key to both office and safe.

But that is no longer a problem for me.

I take a piece of soap from the temple and hurry down the hallways while the Minister and the priests are at dinner. I should have plenty of time. All I have to do is press the insignia into the soap, to make an imprint that I can use as a template. I'll make my own insignia, with melted-down silver from the trees and a stolen torch from the temple workroom.

“Unlock,”
I whisper to the door.

It doesn't open.

Could it be that I have to be underwater?

You
are
underwater,
I imagine Maire saying.
Everything in this city is underwater.

I envision all the weight of the ocean above Atlantia pressing down. I can't control the water, but something about it seems to be a conduit for the sirens, a channel for our power. “Unlock,” I say again.

This time it works.

I close the office door silently behind me.

For a moment I have a childish desire to vandalize everything that is Nevio's—his books, his trinkets, the painting he's hung on the wall to replace the one my mother had. I'd tear out pages, rip up the canvas, smash things, write all over his notes, read his journals, and leave everything that belonged to my mother untouched.

But I can't. I have to stay focused.

The safe is behind the painting he's hung, one that shows a man kneeling in prayer. When I get closer, I realize something about the image that I hadn't seen before.

The man is Nevio. He's in shadow, turned away so that it won't be obvious to the casual viewer, but when you come close there's no mistaking it.

He's hung his own image on the wall.

I wish True were here to see this.

I take down the painting and wonder what became of the one my mother used to display there. It was a simple painting: water and light.

Water.

“Unlock,” I say to the safe, and I hear a
click
and pull it open.

There's the box. I open it up and take out the second insignia. I press the soap against it and take the print, deep. It's perfect.

A sound in the hall. At the door?

They can't be finished eating yet.

I rub the insignia with my sleeve to make sure that I leave no trace of soap, and then I close the box quickly and put it back inside the safe. As I do my fingers brush something else, and in spite of the sound in the hall, I pull out the item to take a look.

My skin knows exactly what it is even before my eyes register the sight.

A shell.

The kind Maire gave to me, but this one is pure white.

Another sound in the hall. I put the shell back, close the safe, hang the painting on the wall, and wait.

I hear speaking. Two people, neither of them Nevio.

They move on, and I slip back out the door and up to my room in the temple. I sit down on the bed, the soap melting in my hand, almost forgotten.

There was no time to ask a question into the shell, but I know who would answer.

Maire.

My aunt is in contact with Nevio.

“We haven't spoken in some time,” I say, careful to keep my voice even. I hold the black, spiny shell with shaking fingers. “Where are you?”

Back in prison,
Maire says.
And seems that this is where I'll stay, at least for the time being.

“But you can make things move,” I say. “Why don't you unlock the doors and walk free?”

I've chosen not to reveal that particular talent to the Council,
Maire says,
because it's helpful for them to believe they can control me. And I discovered long ago that some of the best voices can be heard in the prison walls. More recently, it was a way for me to keep myself away from you, to put another barrier between us. You have no idea how difficult it has been not to try to mold you, to experiment with your voice. That's why I gave you the shell—so you could control your own learning.

“Do you,” I ask into the shell, “communicate with Nevio the Minister?”

Of course.
There's no hesitation. She doesn't sound ashamed. She doesn't explain. And that makes me sick. Nevio took my mother's place. He stole and read her personal papers. And Maire still speaks with him. Does she know he's a siren? Does she care?

I'm not going to get caught up or bogged down in all of this. I don't want to let her keep me from getting to the surface, don't want to allow her voice in my head when everything is about to come together. But I can't help myself. There are two final things I
want
to know.

“Did you kill my mother?”

No.

“Do you know who did?”

Yes.

She knows. But she doesn't want to tell me anything more. She's going to make me ask again, each specific question.

“Who was it?”

There is a moment of nothing, and I press the shell closer to my ear.

The Council.

“Which one?”

All of them.

“How?”

They called her in for a meeting. When she arrived, they gave her something to drink, as was the custom, and they had each put some of the poison in her cup. They all did it.

“Why?”

She knew too much.

I don't want to believe Maire.

But I do.

The Council killed my mother.

A cold fury, as implacable and full as water through the floodgates, comes over me. Maire didn't kill my mother. But she knows who did. And she hasn't told anyone. She hasn't cried out to Atlantia as I know she could, telling them of the evil the Council has done, calling the people to help bring about justice. She has done
nothing
.

“How do you know this?”

Nevio told me, after it happened. He helped them arrange it.

And Maire's still in communication with him. She gave him a shell. I can't speak because my voice will be full of hate.

And she told me. Your mother told me, too. She realized what had happened.

“Why would the Council let her go?” I ask. “Why would they risk her telling someone?”

Because they knew exactly who she would tell. Her sister. And they wanted her death to serve as a warning to me. When I found her, I made sure she was dead and then I stood over her body waiting for the Council to come take her away. I had received the warning. There was nothing more I could do.

I'm sick, hearing this. “How could you let them take her away? When you knew what they'd done?”

It was what I had to do.

All I have to throw in Maire's face right now is my perfect, practiced control. So I do it. I hold everything in. “You know her killers, but you've done nothing to make them accountable. And you still work with the Council and with Nevio. Oceana's murderers.
Why?
”

Love.

Of course.

Maire told me who she loves, who she protects at all costs.

Herself.

That's why Maire sometimes sits in her cell instead of unlocking her doors. Sometimes you can't speak, not because others won't let you, but because you are afraid of what you'll say. You can't trust your voice. You can't trust yourself. You stay silent and contained for your own protection.

And I understand, because even though part of me wants to go scream in the streets, telling everyone what the Council has done, I won't. Because that will put my plan to escape at risk.

I'm looking out for myself, just like Maire.

But at least I won't go up with her. I'll go up my own way. My mother's way.

I never thought Maire could replace my mother or my sister. But somewhere, deep down, I must have hoped that I could love her. Was I stupid enough to think that she might come to love me, too?

You
always have more to lose, until you die.

I find myself asking Maire one final question.

“Does being a siren mean that you are always lonely?”

Yes,
Maire says.

She's right.

I have
always
been lonely.

Even when Bay was here, I often felt alone.

This is what I need to face. Even when I care about other people, there's a part of me that can't seem to stop being alone. Maybe it means those people are right, the ones who say that sirens don't have souls.

If I had one, would I be less lonely? If you have a soul, are you always companioned?

But then I realize that even if I did have a soul, it's not as though someone else would be there. It would only be more of me.