The Cerulean (The Cerulean Duology #1) - Amy Ewing Page 0,39

easy to see by. The other two girls still seemed disoriented. They were peering over the lip of the crater, the starbeam swinging this way and that.

“I think it crawled out,” the girl said.

“Ah!” the low voice cried. “Something touched me.”

“Leo, that was me.”

“Oh.”

Sera didn’t know what to do. All around her was empty space. No trees, no dwellings, no temples. Just . . . nothing. For a second, she was frozen with indecision.

Suddenly, there was a snapping sound, and Sera was hit in the face and fell to the ground. Whatever the thing was that hit her had surrounded her whole body, and the more she struggled with it, the tighter it held her. It almost felt like the twine her green mother used to tie tomato stalks to stakes, but it was thicker and rougher.

The starbeam drew closer and Sera shrank from it. She shouldn’t have hesitated. She should have just started running.

“What are you doing?” the girl demanded.

Sera thought the girl was talking to her until the low-voiced girl replied, and the triumph in her voice sent a chill up Sera’s spine.

“I caught it. It’s mine. And I’m taking it back to Father.”

13

Agnes

THE LOOKS ON BRANSON’S AND HIS CREW’S FACES WHEN they finally returned the next day to find Leo, Agnes, and the silver girl with blue hair had been priceless.

But then the whole situation devolved into a lot of chest thumping and arguing over who would present the “prize” to Father. Branson insisted that since they’d used his net launcher, he was partly responsible. Leo laughed and said he’d let Branson have 10 percent of the credit, since that was how much he’d contributed. It was nearly mid-afternoon by the time they were packed up and ready to head back to Old Port.

The girl was only an inch or two taller than Agnes, and slender—Leo carried her easily to the back of the truck. Though it was cramped, Agnes stayed with her, refusing Branson’s offer of sitting in the front car. She couldn’t imagine how frightening this all must be for the poor thing.

“I’m sorry,” she said over and over on their way back to the city.

The girl’s skin was iridescent silver, more beautiful than any chain or watch fob or brooch, and her hair was a rich, vibrant blue that matched her eyes exactly. Cerulean blue, if Agnes wanted to be specific. Otherwise, she looked quite like any Kaolin girl. She wore a necklace with a pendant shaped like a star, but it wasn’t the way Agnes would have drawn a star, with five even points—it was made of points in all shapes and sizes, some long and delicate, others short and stubby. In its center was a beautiful stone, similar to an opal but richer in color and vibrancy. Three jeweled bracelets hung from her right wrist, and her dress, torn and filthy but made of an impossibly soft material, had a detail around the hem, poorly sewn in a zigzag fashion in the same colors—purple, green, and orange.

The girl spoke in an unfamiliar language, her voice high and musical, but even though they couldn’t understand each other, Agnes decided to talk to her all the same. It felt like the decent thing to do.

“You’re in Kaolin,” she said. “It’s a pretty big country, and quite hot at the moment, as you may have noticed. I don’t know what the weather is like where you’re from, but here every year seems to get hotter and hotter.” She bit her lip and cringed.

The weather, Agnes? she thought bitterly. You have a potentially new species of human sitting in front of you and you’re talking about the weather?

But the girl didn’t seem to care. She kept pushing at the net.

“I’m sorry,” Agnes said for the millionth time. “I would take that off you, but I’m in quite enough trouble as it is.” Or I will be, once I get home. “My father is sort of . . . well, he’s a difficult man, to put it mildly. He’ll probably lock me in my room for a month after this. I just can’t seem to act like the daughter he wants me to be. I don’t fit in Old Port society and I don’t want to.” She knotted her fingers together. “I only snuck onto this expedition so I could catch a sprite and write an essay and be accepted to the University of Ithilia. And now I’ll never get there. I’ll be stuck in Old Port