Brows pinched, Selena shook her head in distaste at the directness of my question.
But Xiane sighed, walking on. “We were away when Thaan attacked. We came back after it was over. By then, my aunt had been dead long enough her blood had lost its power.”
I frowned. “You’re still aPrizivac Vode, are you not? You still have your own power.”
Xiane didn’t immediately answer. Our footsteps echoed, the rock sending them back to us at different levels of volume. Sometimes a whisper. Sometimes a wail. I wondered how far Aegir had explored alone in the dark while waiting for us.
“Any Naiad could start a colony,” Xiane said. “It’s simple in execution. Round up a hundred sirens, convince them to offer a drop of their blood. Their loyalty. Each drop supplies you with power. With longer life. Your children will inherit a fraction of it, but most stays with you. For the longevity of the colony. Until you name an heir.”
Selena and Aegir listened, eyes ahead, both well-versed in the ways Naiad power transcends over generations.
Xiane quirked her mouth. “You choose a child and either allow them to take your blood while you live or plan for them to after you die. If it's while you live, all you have to do is swear your loyalty to them, just like any other Naiad in the colony. And the transfer is complete. If it’s after you die, it needs to be done quickly. Within an hour.”
Aegir released a deep sigh, tilting his head to his shoulder to stretch a strain in his neck.
“A break in the chain will steal all the power,” Xiane said softly. “Set it back hundreds of years.”
I glanced at her. “A break in the chain.”
“When a monarch dies and their blood expires before their heir can reach it. ParianVidereshave suffered such a fate for the last three generations. Now we remain here in secret.”
My mouth parted in understanding. “You’re aVidere, but your power is a fraction of what it should be.”
Something in Xiane’s dark eyes smiled sadly. “It’s why Ursa took a gamble with Thaan. He swore his loyalty in blood. By Naiad law, he shouldn’t have been able to attack. She had no reason not to trust it.”
I watched the hem of mybyssusdress shift over my knees with each step. “Thaan’s blood isn’t fully Naiad. He traded part of himself to Darkness, and we don’t know what he is. He can do things Naiads can’t.”
Ahead, a soft haze of light rooted between the edges of the rock. A hue quieter than our jars. Fog gathered at my mouth, not unlike the eerie chill of Pheolix’s eclipse, and I crossed my arms against the cold.
I stepped around a crevice in the rock. Then stopped. “We were here. When Paria fell.”
Xiane stopped too. “I know. I didn’t recognize you at first, when your friend was lying on the floor. But afterward, when I had a good look at you, I remembered you. Ursa had brought you here thinking to possibly name one of you as heir. I always wondered what had happened to you both.”
She turned her head, and we followed her line of sight to a single glowworm hanging from the ceiling. “We’re here.”
The end of the tunnel opened, the ceiling above as wide and tall as a mausoleum. Worms covered its surface, their silky strands suspended like delicate icicles, drawing our attention up and across the vast canvas of it. Twinkling like a night sky, stars soft and lulling. The air sang softly, the tune tragic and lilting, a sound that raised every hair along the back of my neck.
“Don’t touch the water,” Xiane said, tugging Selena away from the clear pool that lay ahead. “The crying walls feed into it here, and there’s a drop-off just a few feet away. You can see it if you look.”
We stretched our necks, aiming our sight below. If there was a drop, it was nearly impossible to see. The gentle glow bounced off the smooth surface of the water, but a stark edge lay just ahead, a sudden ending to the light.
Pheolix whistled.
“Where’s the crystal?” I asked.
Xiane tapped her fingers against her thigh in thought. She took a deep breath, her chest lifting in silence. Then bent to look across the cavern floor, selecting a gnarled gray pebble. “Stand back.”
Aegir met my gaze, archer eyes both apprehensive and curious. We moved a collective step away from Xiane as she took aim over the still pool, arm recoiling behind her head.
Below her, the water rippled.
No one had touched it.
She watched the circles form. Expanding, overlapping. For a moment, I thought she had changed her mind. Then her arm snapped forward.
The stone flew, bounding off the ceiling. Drops of water fell from the silk threads where it hit, and the surrounding worms lit up, twice as bright as the moment before. Each row of worms followed, illuminating the rock canvas above, chasing shadows strand by strand as though unraveling a dark dream.
The drops fell and hit the water. The rock bounced away.
