Deep Blue by Jennifer Donnelly

Author:Jennifer Donnelly [Donnelly, Jennifer]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Disney Book Group
Published: 2014-04-15T00:00:00+00:00

Daughter of Merrow, leave your sleep,

The ways of childhood no more to keep.

The dream will die, a nightmare rise,

Sleep no more, child, open your eyes….

IT WAS THE SAME NIGHTMARE. The same chant. Only the monster was stronger now. When it shook the bars of its cage, they groaned and cracked, and ice fell from them.

Suddenly, the elderly witch, Vrăja, stopped chanting. She turned and stared at Serafina, her eyes wide with fear.

He’s coming….

“No,” Serafina mumbled in her sleep.

He’s close, child—you must flee!

There was a booming crash then, so powerful that it shook the walls of the palazzo.

Serafina sat bolt upright and reached for Blu. He was gone, but she wasn’t alone. Someone else was here. She could feel it. She stared into the gray, early morning light, her eyes sweeping across the room, her heart pounding. It was there. In the corner. A dark, hooded figure.

“Who are you?” she asked, terrified. And then she realized the figure was not in the room; it was in the mirror. A pale hand was pressed against the inside of the glass. “Baba Vrăja!” she whispered. “Am I still dreaming?”

She got out of bed, swam to the mirror, and pressed her hand to Vrăja’s. The glass, cold and hard at first, shimmered, then gave way ever so slightly. Sera felt as if her hand was sinking into thick soft mud. She cried out as Vrăja grasped her hand. The witch’s skin was warm, her talons hard and sharp.

“Leave this place, child! Quickly! He’s coming, and even the Praedatori won’t be able to stop him.”

“Who? Who’s coming?”

“I must go. It’s too dangerous. He’s using me to find you. You must come to us. Both of you. Please, Serafina!”

“How? Where are you? How do I find you?”

“The River Olt. In the black mountains. Two leagues past the Maiden’s Leap, in the waters of the Malacostraca. Follow the bones.”

At that very second, the door to Serafina’s bedchamber burst open.

Blu swam inside. He had Neela with him. “Get dressed, Sera. Hurry,” he said.

“What is it? What’s happening?”

“I don’t know. Something’s going on topside. We may have to get you and Neela out of here. For now, stay here and lock the door. Don’t open it for anyone but me,” he said. Then he was gone.

“Sera, it happened again,” Neela said. “The nightmare. I saw her—Baba Vrăja.”

“I did too. In the nightmare and in my room. Inside the mirror.” She turned back to the glass, but it was empty.

“The duca’s wrong, Sera. It’s real. It has to be.”

Serafina remembered Vrăja’s sharp talons against her skin. “Yeah, Neela, it is,” she said softly.

Neela was already dressed. Sera shrugged out of her nightclothes, took the blue dress from its hanger, and pulled it over her head. A split second later, she and Neela both heard shouting.

“What’s going on?” Neela asked anxiously.

“I don’t know, but we need to find out,” Serafina said.

The mermaids left Sera’s room. They swam down the hallway, past the canal-side doors, and up to the pool. As they surfaced, they saw the duca, still in his robe and pajamas, shouting orders to a dozen Praedatori.

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