Oriana opened her eyes. At a deeper depth it was even darker, but the tables surface continued
to glow, lighting Isabels motionless features. Oriana stared at that tabletop for a long time, those meaningless words and lines burning into her mind.
She felt wrung out and dull, like a chemise whose dye had all seeped away into the wash water. She needed to escape this place, but there was no longer any need to hurry. She had all the time in the world nownow that Isabel was gone.
Someone had put them here to die, but it hadnt been the Special Police. They would have known a sereia could breathe as easily underwater as above it. No, this was a trap meant for humans. Someone had wanted Isabel to die terrified and helpless.
But that someone had made one mistake.
They hadnt weighed Oriana Paredes into their equations, no doubt thinking her simply another housemaid. Theyd tried to drown a sereia. And she was going to make them pay.
Not for herself. During the year shed trained to be a spy, shed been taught that her own life might be forfeit. Shed accepted that possibility. No, she would make someone pay for doing this to Isabel, who had started the day with such great hopes and ended it with terror. She would hunt the murderer down and, one way or another, they would see justice.
In the darkness, she touched Isabels face, a final farewell. Isabels ebony hair had held to its coiffure, save for that one loose lock. It streamed upward now, almost reaching Isabels lap, a streak of darkness against her white maids apron. Lit by the tables eerie glow, Isabel was lovely even in death, her face at peace. Tiny bubbles of air worked loose from the shadowy wooden structure about them, glistening in the darkness.
Orianas throat ached, but she couldnt cry. She clasped the unmoving fingers one more time, and then swam to the top of the little room.
She wedged herself next to the fixed chairs, crowding Isabels bound feet. She hammered against that floor or ceiling with one hand. Each impact sent uncomfortable vibrations through her webbing, so she wrapped one arm about the base of the table and used her feet to kick at one of the corners instead. After a few good kicks, she felt it give. Nails tore loose from the wood. She slid her hands into that narrow opening and pushed with all her strength.
The boards gave enough for her to squeeze through.
After one last glance at Isabels lifeless form, Oriana wriggled through that space. Her skirt caught on a nail, and she had to rip it to get loose.
She was free.
She let herself float there for a moment. Her skirts were heavy, but her natural buoyancy kept her from sinking too quickly.
The rivers surface above her was dark. Before her Oriana saw shapes floating in the water, more traps like the one shed just escaped. They were twenty feet or so under the surface, trying to float but prevented from rising any higher by thick chains that tethered them to the rivers murky bed below. Why didnt they sink to the bottom? Oriana kicked away from her prison, trying to grasp the bigger picture of what she was seeing. In the nighttime waters she could make out two neat rows, stretching on for some distance. There must be more than twenty of these prisons under the rivers surface.
It was The City Under the Sea .
Oriana had read of the great work of art being assembled beneath the surface of the Douro. The newspapers often opined about it, ever since the pieces began appearing in the water almost a year ago. Each was a replica of one of the great houses that lined the Street of Flowers, the street of the aristocrats. Shrunk down in scale to no larger than a coach, the replicas were constructed in wood. They were all upside down, enspelled so that they would float, yet chained to the riverbed so they could never escape. They swayed in the grasp of the rivers outbound current, all moving in eerie unison.
Oriana looked back at the house in which shed been imprisoned. It was a replica of the Amaral mansion, Isabels home. To one side was the copy of the Rocha mansion, and on the other the elegant Pereira de Santos house.
Had Isabel been killed merely for the sake of this . . . artwork? Had others awakened in the darkness only to realize, like Isabel, that their death was seeping in about them?
Oriana gasped, drawing in water, and corruption touched her gills. The water tasted foul, reminding her of a shipwreck, bodies left behind in the water for
the fish and other creatures to pick clean. Nausea sent a flush of heat through her body. She slapped a hand over her mouth and nose, as if that could protect her from breathing in the death that was all about her. Oriana kicked hard, fighting the weight of her garments. She had to get to the surface, away from this graveyard.
She swam toward a spot of light that must be the moons reflection on the water. But when she broke the surface, her head banged against the hull of a small boat, hard enough to disorient her. She instinctively shoved away. The stars spun. In the distance she saw the lights of a city, although she couldnt tell which one. She let herself slip back under the water, the only safe place. She spread her fingers wide so she would feel in her webbing when the boat moved away.