Chapter Two
The whip cracked. How I loathed that sound. Time to wake up. Another day of hard labor. Another day of monotonous routine.
I groaned and stretched my arms, then helped Sohee and Jina to rise. Toward the back, Minha and Nam had their heads together, voices low, something about the dagger passing between them that they clearly didn’t want overheard.
We dragged our feet toward our workstation as guards dumped oysters on the tables, then scrambled back to their posts. Perfect time for me to gather the unique pearls. One day I might need them to bargain with. Because one day, we would all get out of here.
“Look at the size of this.” Jina held it up against the sunlight.
A perfect round black pearl. Gorgeous. I snatched it from her before any of the guards noticed and tucked it into the hidden pouch at my waist.
Jina’s eyes widened, then she did the same with the next pearl she dug up. I shouldn’t have shown her. Not because I didn’t trust her, but if she got caught, the punishment would be death. Stealing from the King, well… we all knew how that ended.
I stiffened when the crunch of pebbles beneath boots echoed closer. My pulse spiked. Had he seen what Jina and I had done? The young guard from yesterday, Mac, leaned toward Nam, and the thunderous pounding in my chest eased. I couldn’t hear what he whispered, but he raised his voice.
“The king demands more pearls. Work faster.” He cracked the whip against the table.
Oysters scattered toward the edges.
What was he doing? Had he gone mad? I feared for our lives. And I’d thought Agusto was the worst.
Nam’s fingers balled into fists. “Listen, boy. You know nothing of hard labor.” She tossed a handful of oysters at him.
Nam was always the one telling us not to start anything for fear of our lives. Had she had enough? Did she want to end hers?
Mac grabbed Nam by the throat as the other two guards approached.
Sohee didn’t look surprised. She just stood there as if she knew Nam’s plan.
Bora whimpered. Jina’s lips moved in that silent count she did when she was afraid, standing beside me.
Minha snarled, poised to leap. The others covered their mouths to suppress screams.
My trembling fingers found their way to the blade’s hilt in my secret pocket, but I didn’t have a chance to draw it. Mac snatched a dagger, one that looked like what Minha had made from Nam’s hand, and drove it into the first guard’s neck, then the next.
They dropped, crimson pooling in the dirt. Nam had told me not to take one of Minha’s weapons. But she had.
To my horror, boils formed on their exposed skin and burst, black blood seeping out, as if poisoned. I’d known the contact of a shell made them recoil as if burned, but watching what the oyster-shell blade did after it pierced flesh—that was a revelation.
Nam shook me to get my attention, shock rendering me speechless. “Go with Mac. He’ll take you out of here.”
“What?” Did I hear her right? “What are you talking about?”
“I’ve been working with Mac for weeks to get you out.”
Not Bora. Not herself. Not all of us. But me.
“What about you?” The words came out broken. I couldn’t fathom what was happening. It felt like a dream. “What about everyone else?”
“Only three,” Mac said. “We must leave. Now.”
Nam grabbed Jina’s arm and pushed her toward Mac. Minha gave a curt nod to Nam and stood beside Jina.
None of the others said a word. I couldn’t process any of it—the dead guards on the floor, Mac’s hand still shaking, Nam’s face completely calm, like she had been preparing for this moment for weeks.
Nam embraced me tight and kissed my cheek, then murmured, “I know you. You don’t belong here.” She shoved me toward Mac. “Jina. Minha. Go now. Go.”
What did she mean? What did she know about me?
I tried to break free of his hold, but Jina and Minha dragged me along.
Tears streamed down my face as I looked back.
Bora had buried her face against Sohee’s side.
The others stood frozen, watching us go, like they already knew this would happen.
But Nam… she stood apart from all of them, spine straight, chin lifted, hands loose at her side.
Nam didn’t reach for me. She didn’t cry. She just watched with those dark steady eyes, the way she always had, like she already knew how this story ended and had made her peace with it. Nam gave one small nod when my eyes found hers.
Go. I did it for all of us.
I turned away before I lost what little was left of me. But what would become of my family?
Punishment? Death? I couldn’t bear the thought.
We rushed up a slope at the back of the cavern, opposite the metal gate, then turned into a dark tunnel.
The walls narrowed, close enough to graze both shoulders, and the ground beneath my feet changed from pebbled dirt to smooth stone.
The air shifted, damper, colder, carrying the smell of deep earth.
The sound of crashing water grew louder, then a cold gust of wind carrying a scent of salt hit my face.
“What did Nam offer you?” I whispered.
He kept walking.
“Hey.” I poked his back. “I’m talking to you.”
He clenched his jaw. “I’ll explain later.”
We passed through the kitchen, past a few servants who paid us no mind.
I caught a glimpse of fire burning in a hearth, iron pots hanging above it, the smell of honey that made my stomach clench with hunger.
The heat grazed my arm as we passed, the first warmth I felt that didn’t come from another body pressed against mine.
A woman in clean linen stirred a pot without looking up. Others peeled skin off potatoes, some chopped onions. Then we were out into the hallway.
“Where are we going?” Minha yanked at Mac’s shirt. “This doesn’t look like escaping to me.”
No answer. He walked even faster.
Jina lagged as the hallway opened into a vast area filled with soldiers clad in black, a symbol on their chests, spears in hand, swords at their waists. Too many to count. Nam had trusted Mac. But why did I get the feeling he had betrayed her?
Mac finally halted and turned to us. “This is the only way to get you out of here. Whatever I say or do, is in the best interest. You must trust me.”
Jina held my hand as she counted silently, and I held on to Minha. Together we walked into the throne room.
I had never seen a castle before. The only frame of reference I had was the cavern—cold rock, dripping walls, and the smell of shells.
The floors here were polished smooth, and I had to tilt my head way back to find the ceiling, carved with coral reefs and sea creatures rendered in such details I nearly stopped walking.
Soldiers lined every wall. At the far end, on a raised dais, sat the king and queen.
The room swallowed us whole. Every step echoed. Every soldier’s eyes tracked our movement. The air smelled different, foreign. The cold settled into my wet clothes, and I forced myself not to shiver. I had never felt so small. So exposed.
“My King and Queen.” Mac bowed, head nearly touching his knees. “I bring before you the three women who have killed your guards and tried to escape.”
Rage flared in my chest. Minha snarled. Jina whimpered.
I was going to kill Mac the moment I got my dagger out. I didn’t care if I was executed on the spot. Every stab I’d imagined driving through Agusto’s body I redirected it to him. He had just handed us to the people who decided whether we lived or died. There was no coming back from that.
“Interesting.” The king descended the steps, golden crown on his head never shifting.
He was middle-aged with strong features, dark hair, and cruel eyes that examined Jina, Minha, then lingered on me a moment longer.
His eyes narrowed, and for one suspended second the entire throne room seemed to hold its breath.
Then his features hardened and whatever it was—recognition or curiosity—closed off like a door shutting.
“I’d like to know how three women killed two guards.” The queen’s delicate voice matched the softness of her features. She was simply stunning with golden long hair, a crown of pearls on her head.
She wore several strands of pearl necklaces. One each of white, pink, and gray. Even her gown had pearls along the neckline and bodice. Beyond using pearls as medicine, I had never known what else they were meant for… until now.
“With this.” Mac placed Nam’s dagger before them on the ground, the inner shell of the blade glowing.
The king nodded, understanding what the shell would do to them. “How many of these weapons did they make?”
“Three. I have the other two.”
“Where is Agusto?” The queen’s gaze shifted from the king to Mac.
“Agusto is out in the field with a troop, as the king requested.”
“Did Agusto not explain to them what happens when they retaliate?” The king narrowed his eyes at me.
“They know the consequences,” Mac said.
“They do not.” The queen drummed her jeweled fingers, then descended, pearls clicking with each step.
She approached me, her fingers digging into my jaw, forcing my face upward to meet hers. Up close she smelled of flowers, something I had no name for. Her flawless skin glowed as the sunlight streaked across her face, coming from the window.
“Pathetic.” Her thumb pressed harder, her eyes cold. “Look at you. You exist only to serve.” Her gaze swept over me the way one might assess livestock. “Know your place.”
The pearls at her throat, her fingers, that crown, the strands layered one over the other on her elegant dress, all of it ours.
Every hour standing until our legs went numb.
Every oyster pried open with aching fingers, searching for the precise point in the hinge, until our hands knew nothing else.
All of that labor reduced to decoration.
To beautiful things on a woman who had never once stood in the cold.
I held her stare. I wouldn’t look away. I refused.
She released me with a flick of her wrist, as if touching me had dirtied her hand. “Take them to the cliff. See if they can swim. Perhaps their kind will understand. And only when they beg for mercy, bring them back to shore.”
Their kind. The words snagged somewhere deep. What did she mean, their kind? Wasn’t I human, the same as her? The same bone, the same… No, not the same blood. She couldn’t possibly know that I bled blue.
I wasn’t going to go down without a fight. I was going to die either way. I might as well take this queen with me. My fingers found the secret pocket. The shell hilt was cold against my palm, smooth and familiar. I had it halfway out when Mac’s hand closed around my wrist like a vise.
He gave me a look. Don’t ruin my plan. Do as I say.
I yanked my arm back.
“Once the forest witch figures out a formula, your kind will all be dead.” The king flung his hand. “Get them out of here. They stink of the sea.”
Forest witch? Who or what was that? How small my world had been, locked in the cavern. If Mac held to his promise and helped us escape, the wondrous world would open to me, and perhaps then I could learn what the queen had meant by my kind.
And one day, when I understood what I was and what I was capable of, I would come back.
For Bora. For Sohee. For every woman still standing at those tables with aching legs and empty shells at their feet.
I would come back for all of them. That was not a hope.
It was a promise I made to myself in the throne room of the king who had never allowed us to have names.