The Cerulean (The Cerulean Duology #1) - Amy Ewing Page 0,9

finger, which glowed bright blue. “We don’t want to wake the novices.”

Sera pressed her lips together and nodded. While the temple was technically open to all Cerulean whenever they wished to use it—as were most things in the City Above the Sky—it wouldn’t do to have the chosen one caught out of bed, on a night of prayer and meditation, climbing on it.

The chosen one. The words set Sera’s stomach in knots.

She held out her own finger, already glowing, toward Leela.

The blood bond was one of the most sacred aspects of Cerulean magic. It was deeply personal and intimate. Sera had only ever bonded with her mothers and Leela. It was not to be taken lightly, the reading of another’s heart.

Their fingers touched. Sera felt the familiar rush of heat as Leela’s magic entered her, and the exhilarating sense of power as her own magic danced into Leela’s veins until it twined and curled around her friend’s heart. Sera could feel Leela’s heartbeat inside her, a second pulse in perfect rhythm with her own.

Frightened, Sera’s heart said.

Cerulean were not meant to be frightened. They were meant to be calm and loving. They were meant to value Mother Sun and their community over all else. They were meant to be better people than Sera was. All of this she poured, unspoken, into Leela.

Frightened, Leela’s heart answered, and Sera read her friend’s confusion and was surprised to find anger in Leela’s heart as well. Both of their fears mixed together and Sera felt a burst of relief, not because she wanted Leela to be scared, but because, for one moment, at least she didn’t feel so alone.

“Sera,” her purple mother called. “There is someone here to see you.”

Sera rubbed her eyes. Pale morning light filled her room—she had watched it turn from gray to gold as the sun rose, unable to sleep, the comfort of the night’s blood bond with Leela fading away, leaving her own fear to grow and gnaw at her.

“Sera.” Her purple mother stood in the doorway.

“I do not wish to see anyone,” Sera said, keeping her gaze on her star mobile. Why was it so hard to look at her mother?

“It is the High Priestess,” her mother said.

Sera sat up so fast her head spun. “Here?” she asked. “At our dwelling?”

The High Priestess had never visited a Cerulean dwelling before, as far as Sera knew.

“Your orange mother is making her tea,” her purple mother said, with a halfhearted attempt at a conspiratorial smile.

Yesterday it would have been fun to see her orange mother in a tizzy over such an honored visitor. Yesterday she would have laughed with her purple mother, and perhaps added a jest of her own.

Her knees felt wooden as she got out of bed. Her purple mother helped her into a fresh cloudspun dress and they walked down the hall to the sitting room, just as her orange mother was serving tea. The scent of lemongrass and sage filled the air.

“There you are!” she exclaimed. “Look who has come to visit you.”

Seeing the High Priestess sitting on the sofa was bizarre—it was like seeing a seresheep in prayer robes or watching a laurel dove fly backward. It didn’t make sense. Her radiance made everything in the room seem a little plainer, from the upholstery to the teacups to the framed pressed flowers that hung on the walls.

“The chosen one,” she said in her honeyed voice, standing and holding out her arms. Sera wasn’t sure what the gesture meant, but her orange mother jerked her head and so she took a few wobbly steps forward. The High Priestess placed her hands on Sera’s shoulders—she could feel the heat of them through her dress. She had never been touched by the High Priestess before.

“Will you come for a walk with me?” she asked. “We have much to discuss.”

The thought of being alone with the High Priestess was stranger than having her in the sitting room. But Sera nodded anyway, wondering if she was even controlling her actions anymore or if her body was simply moving on its own through pure instinct. She followed the High Priestess out the door, catching a glimpse of her green mother in the kitchen as they left—she was bent over the table with a sewing needle in her hand.

The air was scented with sunlight and grass, a smell that declared a new day’s beginning. It was more pungent today, sharper and clearer, as if reminding Sera of how few mornings she had