“The tether must break.” Wyllin had risen to her feet, breathing heavily. “The City must move. The tether cannot provide for much longer. And then the City will die, as it nearly did during the journey after the Great Sadness. The moonflower fields will wither, the seresheep and the bees and the birds will perish, the Estuary will dry up . . . and Elysse will cling to it anyway. Because her guilt has crippled her.” She ran her fingers along the edge of the fountain. “We used to speak, from time to time. I could see her through my moonstone, hear stories of my home and news of my friends. And then my magic and my stone grew weaker until at last this fountain froze over and I saw my City no more.” Her eyes gleamed for an instant. “I got the moonstone out, though, before it froze,” she muttered. “I did that at least.”

She held the pendant out to Sera, who took it and slipped it back around her neck. “This moonstone is yours now. Take it and return. But know that a sacrifice must be made. You fell before, and you—”

Then Wyllin gasped, staring over Sera’s shoulder.

Leo turned and saw Ambrosine striding into the courtyard, Hektor and a group of Misarros at her heels. Hektor had a spear pointed at Matthias; one Misarro had a blade pressed to Eneas’s throat, and another held Vada, sporting a freshly blackened eye, in a chokehold. Ambrosine herself looked slightly worse for wear after the climb, her hair lank and sticking to her face, her clothes torn and stained with sweat and dirt.

“What are you doing?” Agnes cried, as Leo instinctively moved to stand in front of Sera. “Let them go, don’t hurt them!”

Ambrosine ignored her. She looked from Sera, to Leela, to Wyllin, her face gaunt and greedy. Then she turned to the fountain. Though neither she, nor Agnes, nor Leo himself could see the tether, he was certain she could feel the energy humming from it the way he could. It made the back of his teeth ache, it made his mouth water and his toes itch and his spine crackle. It spoke in a wordless whisper that made him think of green fields and warm summer days and the flapping of a butterfly’s wings.

“The power here is tied to Culinnon,” Ambrosine said, moving forward with a crazed gleam in her eyes. “I can feel it in my veins.” She inhaled deeply through her nose. “It declares itself for me.”

“Who are you?” Leela said, and Leo could not help but be impressed at her fearlessness as she stared down the most powerful woman in Pelago. But then, what was Pelago to Leela?

“Ambrosine Byrne,” Sera growled. “She is related to Agnes and Leo.”

“Byrne?” Wyllin asked. “Did you say Byrne?”

Ambrosine tore herself away from the tether she could not see, ignoring Leela and focusing her attention on Wyllin.