the sting of a knife slashing my arm.
“What the—”
“Words are so willingly spewed, like water from the mouth of a gorge. Blood, when taken, means so much more.”
Mina hands the conch with my droplets of blood to the nautilus maid, who accepts it, cradling it against her belly. She brings it to her lips and drinks from it.
“You will swear to me that the next time we meet, you will kill me.” Her voice is so alive, grazing my skin, nuzzling a warmth against my neck. I haven’t felt this way in so long, and I don’t want it to stop.
I can’t do that, says a whisper in the blackness of my mind. But it’s like shutting the door of a dream, and the whisper is gone.
“Swear,” the oracle repeats.
“I swear.”
Mina brings the conch to my lips and tilts it back. The copper drops coat my tongue. They roll down my throat, burning all the way down.
The nautilus maid sighs, filling the cave with a new breeze. A cloud is lifting over me. The pressure completely dissipates from my muscles. It’s like waking up from a long sleep.
“You can’t do that.” I spit on the ground. The burning taste lingers. “I can’t kill you!”
“Haven’t you ever killed anyone before?”
The memory of Ryan landing splat on the ground, dead, rushes into my mind. “Stop it! Stop doing that! I didn’t kill Ryan.” There. I’ve said it.
“Will it make it easier if you remember that I’m not a person?”
“You’re immortal.”
“I’m eternal. There’s a difference. The gods are immortal. They can’t be harmed. But this? I’m only skin and bones. If no one touched me, I could live forever.”
No matter what she says about not being a person, all I can see is the blush of her skin, the sadness in her eyes. People have emotions. I shake my head. “I won’t do it.”
“Say no all you want. The promise is sealed with our blood. If you don’t do it, you will be the one to die.”
I want to scream. I unsheathe my dagger and stab it in the ground. Sparks fly as it cuts a shallow wound into the stone.
“Believe me, Tristan, it will be for the best.”
“If you want to die so badly, why don’t you just kill yourself? Have one of your laria do it.”
“It has to be you.”
My whole body is shaking. I turn my back on her. “Give me Kurt and give me the trident piece and pray, just pray that we never meet again.”
Her smile is sad but pleased, as if she’s the cleverest thing in the world. It feels like she’s set me on fire when she says, “My darling Tristan Hart, I do not have any piece of the trident. But you may take your companion, for soon the day will come when you will no longer call him that.”
The blood in my mouth makes me want to retch.
The pool holding Kurt splashes like a geyser. Kurt chokes on some water. His hands grope at the ground until he grabs my hands and I pull him out. He holds on to my neck for support, reclaiming the use of his legs.
“Mina will show you the way out.” The nautilus maid turns to look at me once more before retreating behind her waterfall. “And don’t forget, Tristan. Don’t forget me.”
The moon hangs low over the Vanishing Cove, the sky speckled with stars I’ve never been able to see in Coney Island. The church bells ring in the distance. The drumbeats and singing and laughter are replaced by the rush of wind and the creak of old houses.
I don’t know how we got back here. We took a tunnel that led out onto the main road, back downhill the way we came. When we turned around, Mina was long gone, along with any signs of the door that slammed shut behind us.
I punch open the doors to the Kraken’s Tooth. It settles a silence over the remaining patrons, who shrink from me.
Layla’s the first one to ask, “What happened?”
The girls have moved from the bar and are sitting at their own card game.
“It didn’t go very well.” I pull up a chair.
I try to give her a look that says, Not now. Not here. But right now the only expression I can manage is anger. How can I tell my friends that I got manipulated by the oracle? Did the nautilus maid think I was weak? Too weak to give up a simple memory of a kiss?
Thalia