LITMIR.BIZ

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directly over the rook, so they hovered in the air at a safe distance.

      The painter frowned. Obviously, he was failing to recreate exactly what he intended. But when he caught sight of Lilophea treading the water, surrounded by a trail of foam, he nearly dropped his brush in surprise.

      «Don’t move! I’ll paint you!» He shouted from a distance, but Lilophea didn’t want to pause for a pose. So she copied the gesture of the white fairy – elegantly put her fingers to her lips as a sign of silence. Let the artist know that the queen of the sea, walking directly on the water, should not tell anyone, or there will be a storm and the sea will not survive. She straightened her train a little as she passed by, just for showmanship’s sake. The boat shook on the waves so much that it almost flipped over.

      White foam flowers bloomed right on the water. Lilophea spotted the body of a drowned woman with a large pearl sprouting right into the flesh in her chest. The sight was beautiful and frightening.

      The silhouette of a large merchant caravel loomed in the distance. Was it not headed for Sultanite? Lilothea remembered how easily Seal had carried her aboard the ship. Would she be able to climb onto the caravel? As soon as she moved her train, a wave so high formed under her feet that it swept her directly aboard the caravel. Those on board must have thought she appeared out of thin air. Grant, obviously the master of the caravel, immediately fell to his knees.

      «Do us no harm, your majesty!»

      He knew unmistakably who she was by the crown. He must have had a road with the Morgens himself. How to sail the seas and feel safe without a non-aggression pact from the underwater inhabitants?

      Is this the same Grant that once gave Seal the ring of fire? Or was it the wrong one? Lilophea tried to see if the living pearl was sprouting right in his forehead.

      «I’m not going to sink the ship,» she hastened to calm his panic. «All I want is one small favor from you and your crew.»

      «Anything you command!»

      Grant trembled.

      «I must get word to Sultanite. Are you sailing the wrong way?»

      «I will change course for your sake,» he hastened to oblige. «It is almost on the way. It is but a little detour.»

      «Will you be received at the royal court?»

      «I think so. I have good trade relations with the King of Sultanite.»

      «Now it is the queen.»

      Grant was a little taken aback.

      «The king died recently,» Lilophea felt it her duty to explain. «Sultanite is ruled by his daughter Ornella.»

      «Didn’t her brothers all die too?» Grant was astonished, but covered his mouth as he noticed her hem splashing frothy sea water all over the deck.

      «Apparently matriarchy reigns in the Sultanate. There is a woman on the throne. All the brothers obey her. That’s why you must speak to Ornella in person. You can arrange that.»

      «She always comes personally for the silks I bring. Her brothers prefer tobacco and spices.»

      «You’re a noble man, and you trade with the Sultanite? It is astonishing!»

      «It is better to trade with the Sultanite than to fight. It is a dangerous power!»

      «It is good that your caravel is equipped with more cannon,» Lilothea estimated. «If the Griffins attack, that’s the end of the trade, and you can fire every gun in the ship without thinking twice. But if you do manage to get to Ornella, tell her that the underwater queen reminds her that it is not delicate to go to war with blood kin.»

      «Is that all?» Grant was relieved. He’d thought he’d have to take a report of the attack on the Sultanite. And such news could get him killed.»

      «That’s all!»

      «I can send her that message right now. I have a cage of carrier pigeons in my quarters.»

      «You’d better give it to her in person.» Lilophea wondered what she could give him to make Ornella understand that these were not empty words. All she had with her was a pair of amber bones and a shell she had found at the bottom. Moralla mentioned that if you want to send people messages, you have to whisper the words right into the hole of the empty shell and, once in the right hands, it will speak itself. Lilophea decided to check it out. She brought the shell to her lips and whispered into it:

      «You cannot go to war with your own family!»

      The shell, as if mesmerized, immediately emitted something that sounded like a whisper, and a second later the same words echoed from the empty hole. The shell repeated them several times and wouldn’t have stopped if Lilophea hadn’t mocked her:

      «The message is only for Ornella!»

      It is of no use to the princes to say all this. They are under their sister’s thumb. An exception is the younger Prince Condor. But he’s hardly capable of deciding for himself whether to go to war with Aquilania or not.

      «Tell her!» Lilophea placed the glowing shell in the trembling hands of Grant. He was afraid to hold it. «Do not break it! Here’s something for your trouble!»

      Lilophea also gave him a pair of amber stones.

      Probably it was necessary to put some kind of sea seal on him, so that he did not dare to disobey her orders and accurately fulfill the order, but Lilophea did not know how to do it. She merely ran a damp hand across his swarthy forehead, and something resembling a seal of runes such as those on Seal’s pectoral appeared on his skin all by itself. Grant wrinkled his nose, tried to brush the skin against his forehead, but there was nothing he could do. His gaze became somewhat hypnotized.

      «I obey you, Queen of the Seas!» He bowed gracefully and pressed the shell carefully to his chest.

      There was a servility and subservience in him. It seemed to be the work of a spell. Lilophea glanced at him to the door of his quarters and slipped back out to sea.

      Somewhere far out in the depths of the water came trumpet sounds. They mingled with the murmur of the waves and seemed at times inviting, at times threatening. Such was the sound of the wondrous horn that summons the sea-dwellers to attack the mortals who are vulnerable by the moon by the shores of the sea. All night long they may attack before the sea calls them back. They will leave, but only corpses will remain in the towns near the coast.

      Such are the usual rules! But today the horn heralded war between the underwater races. The human tribes scattered along the coasts remained in the background for now.

      Lilophea walked farther across the water. Shallow waves lay before her like a blue desert. Everywhere she looked there was nothing but the sea. It was more interesting under water than on the surface. Lilophea was about to dive back in when she noticed a whole flotilla ahead. Dozens of ships hurtled forward at full speed. There were no Sultanite’s flags flying over the unfurled sails, but Lilophea was alarmed all the same. Passing between the ships would be difficult. If she didn’t dive underwater, they might crush her.

      She’d barely had time to think about the danger when blue scaly reefs emerged from the sea. They looked like humps on a smooth surface. After a moment it was clear that they were moving, too. They were water dragons!

      The sentries on the ships had spotted them too and already panicked, but it was too late. The blue sea dragons appeared in flocks and surrounded the fleet. There was no use shooting them with crossbows, or even cannons. Their azure skin was as impenetrable as magic armor. The dragons, on the other hand, after listening to the chorus of screams, opened their mouths and pounded the flotilla with such a torrent of water that the ships sank. The crackle of splinters and the screams of those drowning were mingled into one cacophony of sounds. The whole fleet was sunk in a matter of minutes. Those that sank more slowly, the dragons circled their blue tails and began crushing them like hazelnut shells.

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