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I looked at Engèli, Nyala, Jabari, and Hezron. We floated on the deck, every angel already given their last orders.
"Remember," I said. "In and out. No noise, no trails."
"If there are bodies?" Engèli asked, a bit too excitedly. I groaned. He would never leave his El'Guard training dawns behind.
"If, and I do mean if, there are bodies," I shoot him a flat warning glare. Engèli grinned, wriggling his brows, hand lovingly caressing the hilt of his cutlass."I already said it. No trails." My eyes flash at my best friend. "None, Gèli."
"I heard. Besides, I can't leave a trail," he said, a touch distractedly. "How will I come back to take Kianga for a... swim?" He grinned like a wolf.
Nyala and I snorted at the same time. Jabari shook his head, though he was wearing a grin, too. I'd caught him, more than once, finding a reason to be around the hardened Terfitti. Blessed skies.
"Hezron, you know what to do?"
The youngling nodded. "Keep quiet. Say as little as possible and act ashamed or full of pride. No in-between or else King Rhòdhaire and Prince Ishaèli won't buy it."
I nodded approvingly.
Hezron had a hard task to fulfill. He'd be disguised as me, going to the party of the king and entertaining himself, and others, as if he was the pirate prince they'd all heard so much about. Anything could go wrong. I told him to stay clear of mamè. If he so much as breathed by her, she would immediately know Hezron was a fraud.
"Alright, let's move. If the Alpha is on our side, we'll be back here in no time, having made no noise." Another glare at a grinning Engèli. "Then we can get the rot out of here. Move!"
With a snap of my wings, every angel took off, flying in different directions. Sea angels were flying in and out, bustling around. This was the dawn the Avariens and Aziziens would meet, celebrate, then head to their Atlanthyst Trench for whatever solstice rituals they had planned.
I didn't give a rot about any of it. I needed to find the stone, take it, and get out.
Swimming away from the ship, I traveled out of the cave, through an empty reef, and out onto the grounds of the palace. It seemed as if every angel alive was here.
Thin, body clinging gowns with hanging pearls, shells, and jewels fell over the shoulders of ayèls, while the ayèn wore elaborate mesh-shirts and seaweed breeches. Almost all of them had a watery halo or small tiara perched on their head.
I glided towards them, letting the sea blue and green cloak around my shoulders blend in with the rest. Acting normal, I floated into the castle alongside them.
"Oh, I cannot wait to see the princess. She'll be beautiful!"
"I know! We didn't get to see her last cycle on her riseday. I'm thrilled about this cycle. And on the dawn that she'll perform the Azizien Rite to save the kingdom!"
"Just like her mamè, that one! Beautiful as the stars, honorable as the sea. She'll put her duty first so our little ones can have a chance. Their generation won't survive the poisoned waters."
"But she is so young!" A strangled cry rang out. "Princess Raeshelle Corellis Au'Pearl hasn't even accepted a suitor. Built her life. See what the sea has to offer to her. Now she'll be sacrificed as some bloody offering to the sea. It isn't a Rite. It's murder! We have the Atlanthyst Stone, so we don't have to sacrifice princesses in its place! Princess Raeshelle Corellis deserves to live!"
"Oh shut up, bitter old croon!"
I froze dead on the spot, my blood freezing over.
Princess Raeshelle Corellis Au'Pearl?
My chest pounded as my mind screamed at me. But it couldn't be. Corellis was an Ayella-in-waiting. She waited on the princess. She wasn't the princess herself.
She couldn't have been the Ayella who'd been on my ship this entire time.
I thought of the Seaveillers. How Kianga shadowed her every step. Her courtly knowledge, posture, and grace. The Serène attack...
They hadn't come for us.
They were trying to cut us down to get to her.
She wasn't just Corellis. The Ayella-in-waiting had really been Princess Raeshelle Corellis Au'Pearl. The Pearl of the Sea. Dayè of the king. I thought back to the dawn in the Crowned Bastard and everything that unfolded after. Rotting ashes. It was her. Corellis was the princess! And according to these angels, not only this dawn was her riseday, but she was also going to perform an Azizien Rite.
My pearl, my Corellis, was going to die.
