Viola hugged her arms to her chest. “I know that. I just… I guess I don’t know Ansley very well. I don’t know why she would do this.”

Barclay didn’t know why either, but he couldn’t deny that there had been something suspicious about Ansley the night he’d stayed behind in the Planty Shanty.

“She talked to me about Lochmordra,” Barclay said. “She mentioned his bonding items, and the way she was studying the Fire Coral… it definitely wasn’t normal.”

Shazi’s eyes lit up. “And she keeps a tank of the weeping tide in her shop, doesn’t she? She studies it. She probably knows more about how it works than anyone. She could’ve made up everything she told us about the vents.”

“Then maybe it’s time to talk to the Masters about it,” Viola said. “Let them decide.”

At that, Shazi’s expression darkened again, and Hasu and Cecily kicked at the pebbles on the floor.

“I don’t know if we should tell Runa…,” Hasu said.

Yasha stormed in between the two groups, forcing everyone else to stagger back out of his way. “As the only one not in the middle of this, this is what I think. If we don’t tell the Guardians about this, and Ansley uses Lochmordra to destroy another island, then it would basically be our fault. Either we tell the Masters, or we let it happen.”

All of them swallowed. That was a lot of responsibility to put on their shoulders.

“So what’s more important to you—a feud from a bunch of years ago, or saving the Sea?” Yasha demanded. “Choose.”

His voice was so loud that it echoed throughout the cave.

Choose. Choose. Choose.

“Fine,” Shazi said. “We’ll tell all the Guardians about Ansley. We’ll trust Runa until after this is over.”

“After this is over,” Tadg fumed, “we’ll ask Runa her side of the story, no matter how mad Cyril gets.”

The three girls exchanged wary glances, but finally, they nodded.

Barclay was relieved. The Guardians needed to know what the apprentices had found out. But after the Sea was saved, the apprentices deserved answers of their own.

Like what had really happened between Runa, Cyril, and Audrian all those years ago.

The seven of them raced back to the Guild House, where supper had ended hours ago. However, the lighthouse was as boisterous and jam-packed as ever. After Lochmordra destroyed Trowe, the Guardians rarely took a break to rest—they were always bickering, always strategizing their next move. Sometimes the musicians played their shanties long into the night.