‘Don’t be stupid,’ Asper chastised. ‘She needs something elegant . . . like from a play.’
‘Lashenka!’ Dreadaeleon piped up, enthused. ‘You remember the tragedy, don’t you? Lament for a King. She looks like the young heiress, Lashenka.’
‘Sounds too close to Lenk.’ The priestess tapped her chin. ‘Were there any other players in it? I never saw it on stage. For that matter, was it any good?’
‘It was . . . decent. Nothing too thrilling, but worth the silver spent.’
‘Silver? When did theatre become worth that kind of money?’
‘Well, this particular one had the Merry Murderers, the troupe from Jaharla, and—’
‘Enough.’ Gariath was on his feet again, stomping upon the ground angrily. He snorted, levelling a claw at the siren. ‘Your name is Greenhair. Get on with it.’
‘Greenhair?’ Asper scratched her head. ‘It has a certain charm to it, but I’m not sure that—’
‘Tell me,’ Gariath almost whispered, ‘can you finish that thought with your tongue torn out and shoved in your ear?’
‘I don’t—’
‘Do you want to find out?’ With a decisive snort, he glowered at the siren. ‘Her name is Greenhair. Get on with it.’
‘It’s a fine name.’ Lenk nodded. ‘Just so we’re all on even footing, though, our names are—’
‘There is no need.’ The siren held up a hand while casting a smile at Dreadaeleon. ‘I have been informed, Silverhair, of much of who you are and what you do in the Sea Mother’s domain.’ Her smile broadened. ‘And I expect it is by Her hand that I meet you now.’
‘Rather high praise,’ Lenk muttered. ‘But you said you needed our help.’
‘And I thank you for it.’
‘Save your thanks,’ he replied. ‘I didn’t say we’d give any.’
A smile played across her features. Lenk felt his hand unconsciously resting on his sword; something in the creature’s gaze was unsettling. Absently, his thoughts drifted back to the Abysmyth. This thing expressed as much emotion in a twist of pale blue lips as that thing could not in a cacophony of shrieks.
‘Your . . . callings are not unknown to me.’ She did not so much as flinch at his bluntness. ‘You are . . . adventurers, yes? And adventurers seek compensation for their trials. Such is the way of the sea. What is given must be earned, what is earned is not easily lost.’
‘If that’s a lot of fancy talk for gold, then I’m interested.’ Denaos eyed the wispy silk she wore. ‘I dare suggest I’d be more than tempted to help you if you planned on showing me wherever you hid it, though.’
‘I have no riches for you, Longleg.’ She shook her hair. ‘What I offer, however, is something more precious than gold. Something you have lost.’
Lenk leaned forwards again. He could sense the word resting on her tongue as a hedonist sensed a tongue resting on something else.
‘I am informed,’ she said, so slowly as to drive him wild, ‘that you seek a tome.’
Buttocks tightened collectively.
Not a single face remained unchanged at the word. Expressions went alight with various stages of greed, hope and anticipation. Even Kataria’s eyes seemed to widen, if only at the simultaneous reaction amongst her companions. Lenk himself could not imagine what his own face must have looked like, but fought to twist it into stony caution nonetheless. The last time someone had mentioned a tome to him, it had led to him and Kataria nearly being slaughtered.
He had since come to treat the word warily.
‘What do you know of it?’
‘What I have been told by the lorekeeper and what I am able to conclude on my own,’ the siren replied. ‘The tome was lost. You, specifically, wish to find it. I am at once filled with joy and sorrow for you.’
Lenk felt his face twitch; good news never began with those words.
‘You don’t know where it is?’ he asked.
‘I know where it is,’ she replied. ‘I have seen much, heard much from the fish before they fled at the presence of the demons.’ As if reading his thoughts through his eyes, she nodded grimly. ‘The two you discovered on the blackened sands were but the sneezes and coughs of a sickness with many, many symptoms.’
He almost loathed to ask. ‘How many?’
‘Many,’ she said simply. ‘They have risen from the depths of