Read Waterfire Saga, Book Three: Dark Tide: A Deep Blue Novel for Free Online Page A

above it, written in ancient Mermish. Sera’s pulse quickened as she read them aloud. “Merrow, Nyx, Sycorax, Pyrrha, Navi, Orfeo…the Six Who Ruled. This is a
tomb, Soph, only it has no bodies in it. I bet Merrow had this built in memory of her fellow mages.”
    Sera knew that Merrow was the only one of the Six who had survived the fall of Atlantis. The other mages’ bodies were never recovered. As her eyes traveled over the figures, she saw that
they were all depicted the same way—gazing out at the viewer, left hand at his or her side, right hand raised to chest height, palm up. Resting on each palm was a different object. Sera
gasped as she realized what they were.
    “Great Neria, it’s all
here
in this room…” she whispered, trembling with excitement. “The answers I’ve been trying to find ever since I entered the
Iele’s caves are right in front of me!”
    She and Ling had discovered what three of the six talismans were when they visited the ruins of Atlantis, but they’d had to flee for their lives before learning about the rest.
“Sera, check this out,” Sophia said. “Merrow’s holding—”
    “—a blue diamond,” Sera said.
    “And Navi’s got—”
    “—a moonstone.”
    “Orfeo’s holding—”
    “—a black pearl.”
    “How did you know that?” Sophia asked. “You’re not even looking at them.”
    Sera didn’t answer. She was still gazing at the figure before her—a regal, dark-skinned man with long black braids and blind eyes.
    “Nyx has a ruby ring,” she said out loud, wanting to engrave the image into her memory.
    She swam to the next wall. A tall, strongly built woman with long red hair and intense blue eyes stared back at her. “Pyrrha has a gold coin with an image of Neria on it,” she said,
her excitement growing.
    The mosaic on the next wall featured a slender woman with onyx-black hair and almond-shaped eyes. Sera examined it closely. “Sycorax has a white…is that a puzzle ball? Looks like it has
a phoenix on it. Remember that, Sera. You have to
remember
,” she told herself.
    “Hey, Sera?” Sophia said. “What’s going on?”
    “We know
where
they are. I discovered where Merrow hid them thanks to a conch in the Ostrokon. And now we know
what
they are—
all
of them.
We
know,
and Rafe Mfeme
doesn’t
!” Sera said, still staring at Sycorax.
    “Um, okay. Which means?” Sophia prompted.
    Sera turned to Sophia, her eyes triumphant. “Which means that maybe, just maybe, we actually can
do
this!”

“W HAT
EXACTLY
ARE you talking about?” Sophia said, her patience with Seraphina’s cryptic comments wearing thin.
“Would you
please
tell me?”
    Sera struggled with herself. Only a handful of mer knew the enormity of the battle they were fighting. It was safer that way. Spies were everywhere.
    “You can trust me. With your life. You know that,” Sophia said, as if sensing the reason behind Sera’s hesitation.
    It was true. Sophia had proven herself worthy of Sera’s trust outside the Traitors’ Gate. Also, Sera realized, as regina and leader of the Black Fins, she was currently in a
compromised position—badly wounded and a long way from safety. There was still a good chance she’d be captured. If that happened, how would she get the information she’d just
learned to Neela, Yaz, and the others? She
had
to rely on Sophia.
    Taking a deep breath, Sera started to talk. “Our fight…it’s bigger than Miromara. It’s as big as all the waters of the world and every creature in them,” she said.
    While Sophia listened, wide-eyed, Sera explained that the mage Orfeo had created a monster called Abbadon and had used it to destroy Atlantis. Then she told her that she and five
others—Neela, Ava, Astrid, Becca, and Ling—had been summoned by Baba Vr ă ja, the leader of the Iele, a coven of river witches, and had been given the task of
destroying the monster.
    “Why you?” Sophia asked.
    “Because each of us is a descendant of one of the