Page 8 of The Demons in the Deep: Extended Edition
Those two sailors had more in mind than becoming her assistants. She’d become slowly aware of their interest during the voyage—hard to ignore it when they kept stumbling over each other to help her with one thing or another, usually getting in the way and distracting her from whatever she was trying to do. And now they wanted to shadow her as she explored the city and the university? Mai groaned inwardly at the thought. No doubt they viewed this as a way to win her affection.
She wanted to experience her first city on her own—alongside Kestra and Flay of course, but not with a pair of bumbling, well-intentioned sailors pestering her to give them attention or asking for tasks to do.
The mere thought of the city sent a delighted thrum through her veins, a sparkling anticipation. Acity. An actual city. Something she’d never thought she would get to see. With the toothy swarms infesting the waters around Kiken Island, it had never been a real possibility; and now she was nearlythere, at one largest port cities in existence—an island city that, according to Flay, had been mostly decimated by the Great Upheaval and had been rebuilt by merchants and slavers.
Knowing the city’s primary form of trade made her deeply uncomfortable, but she tried to push the issue aside. She couldn’t change such a deep-rooted practice, much as she might hate it. She was only here to learn, not to protest the slave trade. Not even someone as charismatic and clever as Flay could change it, beyond his refusal to participate. And he hadn’t really refused outright, after all—he had merely found a more lucrative substitute that his father would accept.
Mai looked toward the dark oncoming shape of the city again, at the spiky masts of ships sitting between the broad curved arms of the bay. For a second she pictured the mermaids, as they used to be—a thrashing multitude of tails and teeth, gnawing and gobbling any flesh that came too close to their snapping jaws.
Were the slavers of Stragnoag any different, really?
Plump fingers pressed Mai’s shoulders, rubbing the muscles firmly. “You look anxious,” Kestra said.
“You can’t win my forgiveness with a shoulder rub.”
“I know how important your studies are to you,” Kestra began, but Mai cut her off.
“No,” she said. “No, you don’t. You can’t possibly imagine. Your primary passions are cooking, gardening, and Flay. Laudable pastimes, yes, but mine is so much bigger than that. No offense intended.”
“Of course not,” said Kestra dryly.
“What I want to study is the very essence of nature, the building blocks of life itself. The mermaids and humans who made the belt technology unlocked something, and their discovery has been lost in the century since the Great Upheaval. But according to Flay, this university in Stragnoag holds recovered tomes and artifacts from the days before the Upheaval. There might be clues about the science behind the belt tech, or better yet—information about the civilization that created it. But to find that information, I needtime. Time that you and Flay are apparently unwilling to give me.”
Kestra stopped rubbing Mai’s shoulders and moved to stand by the railing, staring out at the glittering sea. “There are things you don’t understand. The longer Flay stays in this area, the more attention he’ll draw from his father, and that’s bad for everyone. This isn’t only about you and your studies, Mai. It’s about the integrity and safety of everyone on this ship. We’ll give you as much time as we can, and you’ll have to be satisfied with that. I won’t ask Flay to risk himselfagainfor your scientific exploits.”
“The risks paid off last time,” Mai retorted.
“But it was Rake and his monsters who carried the day, not your science.” Kestra’s voice was tight and low.
Mai sucked in a breath and pinched her lower lip between her teeth. She hadn’t heard Kestra say Rake’s name in days.
Silence stretched taut and painful between them.
“I thought you’d forgotten him,” Mai whispered.
“Never.” The word punched from Kestra with such force Mai’s stomach twisted.
“You cared about him,” she said.
“Not the way he wanted,” Kestra replied. “But yes. He was a friend.”
Mai focused hard on the ocean, on the countless blue divots and gold sparkles of its surface. Out of the corner of her eye she saw Kestra turn, and she could feel her cousin’s eyes on her.
“Sometimes I think you cared about him more than I did,” Kestra said quietly.
“That’s silly,” Mai snapped. “I was sorry to lose the specimen. I hadn’t really had a chance to study him thoroughly.”
“You cried. A lot. I heard you.”
“It was a tragic day. He was an ally. And I was mostly sad for poor Jewel.”
Kestra made a little sympathetic hum in her throat.
More silence, and then Mai said, “Baz and Corklan want to escort me around Stragnoag. For my protection, they say, but I suspect it’s more.”
“You finally noticed that they both like you.” Kestra nudged Mai’s elbow. “I was beginning to wonder if you had any sense of such things at all.”
“I’ve told you before—I get satisfaction from scientific study, from invention, from discovery,” said Mai. “I don’t need that from a person.”
