Of Sea and Stone (Secrets of Itlantis) (6 page)

“Myo,” I said as he turned to go. “I have questions.”

He faced me, arms crossed.

“What happened to my village? Are they all dead?”

“I don’t know.”

My throat tightened. “Why did they do this?”

Myo shook his head. “I can’t tell you.”

“What about me? Why did you have them take me?” Anger mingled with sadness, and my voice wavered.

He shook his head again. “I cannot tell you.”

“Why not?” I shouted.

“Listen to me. I saved your life. Be thankful for that. It will have to be enough for now.”

“For now?”

He didn’t reply to that question. He turned to go, then paused in the doorway as if reconsidering his abrupt exit. His face softened slightly.

“We arrive in port at Celestrus in a matter of hours,” he said. “I understand from the guards that you know nothing of our people or civilization. You’ll need to keep your ignorance to yourselves if you want to blend in and not attract suspicion from your new masters.”

“Masters,” Nol repeated bitterly.

Myo gave him a warning look. “Indentured service is better than death. You will learn what I have to teach you, and you will learn it quickly and without giving me trouble. I think you will find me kind compared to some.”

“What is Celestrus?”

He turned his dark brown eyes on me, and to my surprise, he smiled.

“That you must see in order to believe,” he said.

~ ~ ~

I stood at the great glass wall that separated us from the water, staring at the infinite stretch of blue water before us. Light lanced down through the darkness, creating a palate of shades that rivaled the sky. In the distance, shadowy shapes of fins and flutter passed through the deep.

“Dolphins,” Myo said.

Fish swam together in groups that turned and swirled like a single living creature, but when the ship passed through the midst of one, they all scattered and revealed themselves to be a thousand tiny, striped bodies.

“They swim together like that to fool predators,” Myo explained of the fish.

Once, a long black shape glided beneath us, and I caught my breath because I had never seen such a creature before. The back was curved, the tail long and thin, with fins at the end that curved like a scythe.

“There are many secrets in the deep,” Myo said, catching my wondering eyes. Then— “Look. Celestrus.”

At first, it was just a glimmer of light, a flash of metal in the distance. The darkness of the water brightened as we rose higher, and ripples of sunlight filled the water. I saw a shape, hard to distinguish, surrounded by clusters of moving things that flashed and glittered. Ships?

Then the city became clearer.

I stared.

The city of Celestrus was a collection of massive needle-like structures—gold and silver and transparent—that hovered in the middle of the dark blue water in a spiral, like a necklace around a floating woman’s throat, the points stretching down into the darkness below. Above the highest spindles of the city, sunlight danced in the water, making patterns atop of the city that flashed and glittered.

Nol stood beside me, as speechless I was. His lips were pressed together in a straight, white line.

“Itlantis is split into six cities that lie in secret beneath the sea,” Myo told us as we watched the city grow larger and more distinct from the blue haze of water around it. “Celestrus is called the Jeweled City, the second-oldest of the cities, the seat of culture and the arts, and regarded by some as the most beautiful.”

He’d refused to answer any of my questions, but his words flowed as we gazed at the city. He pointed to a string of massive orbs that were transparent as bubbles and floating closest to the surface of the water. “Celestrus’s six floating gardens,” he said, “are a wonder of our world, and one of the most iconic pieces of Itlantis’s architecture. Each garden is dedicated to a city of the republic, and reflects its strengths and traditions. Each city contains six gardens like this, in honor of the six cities, but Celestrus’s are the oldest and most elaborate.”

They were so beautiful, like pearls. The sunlight made their surface sparkle, and I could only faintly see inside to where plants were growing and waterfalls were splashing. I saw people in rich robes with elaborate hairstyles watching our ship pass as it swept over the top of one of the orbs and then beneath another.

“It’s time to go back to your quarters,” Myo said. “We’ll be docking soon.”

Before we could leave, Myo grabbed my wrist.

“Don’t tell anyone where you came from,” he said, “or the circumstances of your capture. If it is discovered that you were not executed on that ship as ordered, you will be hunted down and killed. You saw things that you were not supposed to see. You know things you are not supposed to know. Say nothing. Trust no one. Keep your heads down and your mouths shut and you will survive, do you understand?”

I nodded. Nol stared straight ahead, and Myo grabbed his chin and forced Nol to face him.

“Your life could depend on it,” he said.

Nol glared. “I don’t plan on making conversation with my
master
.” He spat the word as if it were poison.

Myo seemed satisfied with that. “Remind yourselves every day,” he said, “to tell them nothing.”

AFTER WE DOCKED, Myo ordered us up the ladder again, into another holding cell to wait for the guards. I stared at the bars and shivered. Nol demanded to know what he was doing.

“This is simply standard protocol,” Myo explained. “I’m sorry, but it’s the way it must be done. All Indentureds are treated this way. Make it convincing.”

When they came for us, Nol put up a fight. He yelled and kicked and twisted until the first guard kicked him in the groin and he fell to his knees, groaning.

He’d certainly made it convincing.

The guards looked at me, and I could see that they were gauging whether I was going to act the same way. I shook my head to show them I did not intend to fight the inevitable. The closest guard closed his fingers around my arm and nodded to the other. They pushed me in front and hauled the moaning Nol up between them.

We walked across a bridge enclosed with glass that stretched between the ship and the city of Celestrus. Glass and twisted metal were the only things standing between the sea and us. I looked up and saw a long, sinuous shape curl through the waters above us—some giant, unknown sea creature—and a shiver passed over my skin as I remembered the dark shape that had passed beneath our ship on the journey over.

What other things lurked in the ocean’s depths?

The first guard planted his hand between my shoulder blades and pushed me forward, drawing my thoughts back to the present, back to the rush of warm air from the round opening ahead, the clank of our feet against the metal floor, and Nol telling the guard exactly what he’d like to do to him if he had a sword in hand.

I kept my mouth shut, because I wasn’t stupid.

We stepped through the round doorway, entering a round room with walls and floors of polished metal. The ceiling arched above us, made of rose-colored glass and shot through with metal that I supposed held it aloft. I could see shapes moving above it, churning shadows that stamped and brushed the ceiling and bewildered me until I realized I was seeing people’s feet and garments. The ceiling above must serve as a walkway for an even higher level, I realized. I stared at the strange shadow dance until someone nudged me. The guard.

A bench ran along one wall, and a man sat on it, waiting for us. He stood when we entered.

He must have been old, but his face was astonishingly smooth, almost ageless. His skin was the color of copper. His long hair black hair, streaked with gray at the temples, hung down his back in a mass of braids, and he wore light purple robes that draped off his thin body and engulfed his wrists. He did not look unkind, which was a good sign.

The guards herded me forward.

“What is your name?” he asked me.

“Aemi,” I said.

“Ah, Aemi. Exquisite name. Means
sea-born
in the old tongue.”

I lifted my gaze, startled. “Yes, it does.”

He smiled, a quick quirk of his lips that transformed his face into something kindly. “And you?” he asked Nol.

Nol turned his head and would not speak. The man looked back at me.

“He’s called Nol,” I said, and I saw a muscle jump in Nol’s jaw when I spoke his name. He gave me a look of pure loathing, and I knew I had betrayed him by giving up his identity to the man when he had clearly wished to make a statement by withholding it.

“Nol, eh? Short for Nolen?”

“Just Nol,” he growled.

“I am called Merelus,” he said, seemingly unruffled by the waves of anger radiating from Nol. “I hope we can learn to respect each other, as unfavorable as this situation may be for you.”

Respect each other? His words confused me, but I bit my lips and said nothing.

“Come,” Merelus said to us, and nodded to the guards. “I’ll take you both.”

“Their wristlocks, sir,” the guard said.

“Ah, yes.” Merelus paused and waited as the guard approached us and snapped a thick band of silver over our right wrists.

“This will set off an alarm if you enter any area forbidden to Indentureds,” he informed us gruffly. “And you will be punished.”

I looked around for Myo, but he was gone. I supposed I would never see him again. He’d never bid me goodbye. Why would he? I was just a slave.

The click of the wristlock around my arm made me flinch. Merelus watched my face, and his eyebrows drew together as if he were seeing more than I intended him to. I turned my head away and met Nol’s eyes. They smoldered with fury as he submitted to having the wristlock placed on him.

“Well,” Merelus said when it was done. “That’s over. Let’s go, shall we?” He indicated the door.

My mouth fell open as we stepped through it.

Arching ceilings soared overhead, joining in a web of patterned glass held in place by golden metal beams that swirled and formed fantastic shapes. The floors were gleaming stone set in curling patterns beneath our feet. Doorways and corridors branched off from the main thoroughfare, opening onto other plazas and rooms filled with fountains and statues.

Far ahead of us, six corridors converged on a round plaza with a sculpture of a dolphin in the center. Blinding light poured over the dolphin from a ceiling that glowed with light like a captured sun.

I glanced at Nol. He stared ahead, his mouth pressed in a rigid line. His hands were white and clenched at his sides. He refused to seem impressed.

But I saw no reason to hide my amazement. I gaped at everything.

“You have never been to Celestrus before,” Merelus observed, watching my reaction.

“No.” I remembered Myo’s warnings and said nothing else of my past.

“The Jeweled City,” he said, smiling. “Seat of learning and the arts. The most beautiful place in all of Itlantis. Exquisite, if I may say so.”

I believed it.

Men and women filled the corridors and corresponding plazas that connected them. Most wore flowing tunics or robes over the one-piece jumpsuits, or simply the jumpsuits. A few were dressed in other garments—trousers, dresses. The blend of fashions bewildered me. The people had varying appearances too—some with skin as brown as polished driftwood, others as pale as sand. Most had long, straight black or brown hair, and large eyes that came in vivid blues, greens, and browns. Nol’s pale hair stood out and drew him a few looks of interest and curiosity.

We crossed a bridge of shining metal and glass and into a round-roofed chamber large enough to fit the Village of the Rocks inside in its entirety. A vast floor stretched before us, and the ceiling was ribbed with metal supports and set with colored glass. Through the glass, I caught glimpses of the ocean, vast and dark and rippling with fish.

“The commons,” Merelus said, gesturing to the space before us.

This place was anything but common.

We passed through this glorious space and reached another. They were like a string of bubbles, one after the other. This chamber had dozens of doors set into the walls, and staircases going down into the floor and up toward the roof. I craned my neck to see around us. Balconies spiraled around the domed roof as far as I could see.

Merelus stopped before a door of bronzed metal and touched the handle.

“Welcome home,” he said.

MERELUS’S HOME WAS a palace.

I stood in the center of the entryway, staring at the way the water-strained sunlight flickered through the colored glass walls and danced on the smooth floors. The walls that weren’t transparent to let in the view of the ocean were brass-colored and smooth to the touch. Thick rugs made of what looked like dried sponges covered the floors.

Nol folded his arms and grunted as if sparkling glass and glittering metal composed our old homes in the village, but I could tell by the stillness of his shoulders that he was impressed in spite of himself by what he saw.

“Go on,” our new master coaxed as he hung up his cloak, perhaps mistaking our awe for fear. “You should see the main rooms. They’re exquisite.”

A musical chime sounded above our heads as we entered a large living area decorated with scattered pillows and curving chairs that reminded me of nautilus shells. Blooming plants cascaded down from hanging pots, filling the room with a lush, sweet scent. The air was cold and blowing down on us as if a wind were trapped inside the room and roaming in search of a way out.

“Your duties will be simple,” Merelus said. “Aemi, you will help our doumeu with anything she needs. Cooking, cleaning, errands… Ah, I am not sure what all it will entail. She will have to tell you herself.”

He pulled a cord, and after a moment, a door slid open in the wall as if by magic. A woman with sharp eyes and frown lines between them glided into the room. She set her gaze on me and her mouth curved in a way that made me shiver.

“This is my doumeu, Crakea,” Merelus said. “She keeps the house in order, handles all the cleaning, and manages the servants and other necessary details. As for you, Nol…”