Page 6 of A Sea of Vows and Silence (The Naiads of Juile #3)

Cebrinne

“ N ever.” Selena opened the balcony door in a violent swing and launched the empty silverspire flowerpot over the railing. “Never, never, never. You will not .”

My eyes followed the clay missile as it exploded against the western parapet.

The distant guards jumped as it collided with the wall.

They peered down to the ground, craning their necks to see what might have been hurled in their direction.

A few glanced our way, and Selena threw an offensive finger at them before slamming the balcony door.

I hadn’t said a word since Theia’s message. I’d gathered myself as the sun breached the cover of the moon, shedding light over us again, and shuffled back to the palace in silence.

Selena, however, had said plenty.

Back straight, neck stretched, she’d defiantly listed every reason why I could not simply escape south to the islands Thaan avoided just to have a baby and die.

I strained for sound between her ramblings, ensuring Thaan and Deimos had already left for morning meetings in the advisory wing.

Then opened the partitioned study between our apartments, scanning the shelves of dusty maps.

“Would you even want a husband, Ceba?” Selena asked, hands on her hips. “A human one?”

We both knew I didn’t. Selena was the one with a heart for romance. The one who flung herself deep between pages late into the dark hours. Wasting candles and sleep to read about women swooning like idiots over men, avoiding the nightmares that loomed under her eyelids.

She paused for my response, but I didn’t offer one. My fingers shifted over the old parchment rolls until I withdrew one at random, unraveling it over the desk.

“You don’t even speak their language,” she seethed.

Unnecessary , I thought. I was sure I’d heard somewhere that most of the island people spoke Calderian in addition to their native tongue.

“Not to mention what Sidra would do if she found a servant of Thaan’s in her waters.”

Not the right map. I rolled it back up, selecting another.

“And I don’t have to point out that you have no maternal instincts.

” Another map of the north. I needed the south.

Selena’s eyes narrowed as I shelved that one, too.

“You couldn’t even watch the kitchen maid’s cat for a week when she delivered her baby.

A cat . They’re the most self-sufficient creatures alive. ”

I pursed my mouth, unwilling to remind her that I’d tended to a rare mountain flower for the last seven years, along with all my other plants.

Her words might have stung, were I a different Naiad.

Someone who longed for children. Who batted my eyes at males in hopes of being noticed.

Being desired . But I knew fear drove the acidic words from her mouth, not malice.

Besides, she was right. Finding love and family was as meaningless to me as a pebble lost in the tide.

I’d never wanted anything other than my sister’s company.

I blew dust from a fresh map and spread it across the desk.

My eyes scanned the ink and oil across its surface.

It was perhaps a hundred years old, and for all I knew, it hadn’t been opened in that time.

But at the southern tip of Calder stood The City of Towers, tall over Juilean shores.

A dotted line below indicated the trade route for ships carrying fish and crab.

The map’s creator had even opted for a change in color, the cold blue waters of Calder tilting into hues of aquamarine to surround Leihani.

Four islands sat in the center of the map, grouped together like the pads of a paw.

The home of the only group of humans to worship the moon over the sun the way Naiads do.

Selena slammed an open hand over the blue topography. “Look at me.”

“Theia said the other stone is here.” I trailed the line of a volcano on an island labeled Neris .

“Oh, so we’ll just frolic into the mouth of a volcano and find it. Might be a bit hot, but who cares when your face is melting off?”

“Calm down, Senna. I’m just looking at a map.”

A map of the islands where Theia promised I’d die, should I choose to go.

“Yes.” Selena grabbed the corner of the parchment, yanking it out from under my finger and sending it in a slow launch through the air.

It wafted aimlessly to the floor with less passion than she probably intended.

She fixed me with a hard stare. It wasn’t often that she reminded me so painfully of our mother.

But in rare, heated moments such as this one, she did.

“After everything we’ve done,” she murmured, her voice suddenly quiet and laced with danger.

“Everything we’ve been through. The trap, the transition, the night the Parian colony fell, the years and years and moon-damned years of promising we’d never leave each other, promising we’d find some way out—” She batted the hair from wet lashes with a shake of her head, punctuating her words with an extended finger aimed at the floor. “You’re. Looking. At. A. Map.”

“Theia burn the skies, Senna. It’s just a map,” I said, though a flutter of something shaped like shame trickled through the roof of my stomach, pooling in my gut.

When Thaan had threatened our lives, I’d been the one to cave and sign his contract at the notion that he might hurt us if we didn’t. That he might hurt Selena .

I’d sealed my fate in blood. But she’d never left me. And I held no doubt that she’d follow me to the farthest reaches of the world. That’s how it had always been. I was vicious, but Selena was loyal.

I protected our bodies. Selena protected our hearts.

Avoiding her eyes, I reached for the parchment between our feet, slowly rolling it up as I straightened. She crossed her arms, a hip rocked to the side. Our mother had done that, too.

“You could always come with me.”

It was the wrong thing to say. Her jeweled eyes lit with crystal fire, her mouth thinned to a taut string, brows mashing together. She leveled me with a murderous stare. “For three years, Ceba, until you die . And what, then?”

“You’d be free.” For a moment, I thought she might slap me. I waved her away. “It was a jest, Senna. I’m not going anywhere.”

She didn’t move.

“I’m not leaving you. I promise.”

“Promise me.”

A huff of air shot from my mouth. “I just did!”

But she shook her head once, eyes still hard and narrow. “ Promise me.”

Ah. That promise. The one we saved for only each other.

Sisters can be an odd breed. Twins even more so.

We fought, but we never really made up. We didn’t need to.

Peace treaties between sisters were as simple as laughing at the thought of Deimos’s expression when he’d reached the height of his patience with us and vacated the room.

Stealing to the kitchens together to plunder fresh-baked pastries.

Sneaking away from our daily duties to eavesdrop on the administrative offices, decoding the small verbal exchanges we’d heard for hours into the night.

Apologies were built on shared conspiracy, not the word sorry itself. The same with promises. No matter what age we’d reached.

I curled my fingers into the palm of my right hand. All of them except the smallest. Selena’s shoulders softened slightly, and she did the same. We knit our pinkies together in an oath that, for Naiad sisters, was more binding than spilling our blood.

“I promise,” I said. “I won’t leave you. I’ll be wherever you are. Always.”

Her hold tightened into mine. She lowered her chin, locking into my eyes, and said the words we’d always said in place of I love you .

“Until the ocean dries up.”

“Until the moon burns out.”