Sera held her breath as the soldiers returned to their ship. There was another creaking of wood and then a splash. For a long while, no one on the Maiden’s Wail moved. Sera’s back ached and her legs cramped, but she stayed as still as stone, waiting. . . .

“Do you think they’ve gone?” Leo whispered just as the top of the bench was flung open.

“They’re gone,” Agnes said breathlessly, reaching down to help Sera out. She blinked in the sunlight and saw the ship off in the distance, a black outline against the horizon.

“This is not good,” Vada said as Leo climbed out after Sera, stretching his arms over his head. “Misarros stopping Pelagan ships?”

“Misarros?” Leo asked.

“The elite fighting force of Pelago,” Vada explained. “They guard the Triumvirate and some of the wealthier families who can afford their protection.”

Violetta strode up to them. “Never in my whole life have I needed permission to dock at Arbaz,” she said, waving the paper as if it personally offended her. “I fear what awaits us when we arrive. Things are changing.” She looked out across the water to where the Misarro ship was sailing away. “And not for the better.”

2

Leo

LEO HADN’T BEEN ABLE TO FULLY SHAKE OFF THE JITTERS left behind by the Misarros, but then the port of Arbaz had come into sight and he found himself momentarily struck dumb. He’d spent all his life hating Pelago so much, he’d never really thought about what it might actually look like. He was shocked to find it . . . beautiful.

Structures like terra-cotta fingers pointed up toward the sky, glittering in the light of the setting sun as if their surfaces were encrusted with diamonds. There were clock towers and spires and domed buildings made of yellow or orange stone, wisps of smoke curling upward from rose-colored chimneys, and somewhere far off Leo heard a bell tolling. The city was ringed in hills, houses painted in cheery colors clustering around the central market, which Leo imagined was just inside the enormous white stucco structure with a red tile roof that loomed over the docks. The water was crystalline blue, a color that almost hurt to look at. It was all so idyllic, especially compared with the smog and steel and murky waters of Old Port. For a moment he wondered why their chauffeur, Eneas, had ever left this place.

He shuddered to think about what would have happened if he himself had never left, if the escape plan had failed—he’d be on a train somewhere in Kaolin right now, getting his palm sliced open daily by the actor James Roth. He’d be selling Sera’s blood along with Boris’s and Errol’s replenishing powers—well, not Boris’s, not since the poor tree burned. But the very thought made bile rise in his throat.