Merletta raised an eyebrow. “Why didn’t they send you to finish me off this round, Ileana? It’s surely a bit of an affront to you, to know they picked other guards to carry out my murder this time. Don’t tell me you’ve fallen from favor.”
Ileana flushed darkly. “You don’t know what you’re talking about,” she said, her voice stiff.
Merletta regarded the other mermaid thoughtfully. She’d clearly hit a nerve. It seemed Ileana really had fallen from favor. And, unless she was a better actor than Merletta had seen evidence of before, she really didn’t know what Merletta meant about the attack on her. Apparently, she wasn’t part of whatever group had decided to use Merletta’s test as an opportunity to get rid of her permanently.
“Why aren’t you training with the more senior guards anymore?” Merletta asked quietly. “What did you do to lose the special treatment you were enjoying when I came back from my break?” She was thinking aloud, not really expecting a response. “Were they angry you didn’t finish me off back then, after all? But no, because you were still more elevated than you should have been at the memorial, months later.”
Ileana ignored Merletta’s words, her expression stony. “I’m surprised you survived the test,” she said rudely. “You must have gotten lucky, and had an unusually clear swim.”
“I had a fun little dance with the giant squid, if that’s what you mean,” said Merletta calmly. “Not to mention a run in with a pod of killer whales. The maelstrom itself is no paddle in the park, either. And did you have two armed guards waiting to murder you when you finished? I don’t know if I’d call it an easy swim.”
Ileana was staring at her by the end of this speech. Merletta found it strangely freeing to tell Ileana about the planned attack, when she usually had to be so careful what she said.
“I see you ran into one of your dear friends,” said Ileana, recovering herself. Her eyes rested maliciously on the welt on Merletta’s arm, from the jellyfish in the fissure she’d dived into when fleeing the whale.
Merletta looked up into Ileana’s face, and saw bitterness beneath the taunt.
“That’s it, isn’t it?” she said, as comprehension dawned. “That’s why you’ve been pushed out. Your little stunt with the jellyfish bloom wasn’t a sanctioned attack. It was just you, acting out of malice. And you got in trouble for it.”
“You don’t know what you’re talking about,” Ileana said again, but her burning face and angry eyes gave her away.
Merletta thought back over her practice test, how much more heavily supervised it was, how many merpeople had known exactly where she was. It would have been much harder in the practice test to make her disappear without raising suspicion than in the actual test. No wonder the ones targeting her hadn’t authorized Ileana to use that as an opportunity.
“You think you’re invincible, don’t you?” said Ileana angrily. “So you’ve made it to third year, congratulations.” Sarcasm oozed from her voice. “Don’t think that means you’re inside. Don’t think that means you can’t be touched, can’t be exploited then thrown aside.”
Merletta stared at the other mermaid. Ileana’s words were bitter, certainly, but there was something more in her tone.
“Are you trying to threaten me, or warn me?” Merletta asked, perplexed. “Because if you think I’d ever trust you enough to accept your help—”
“I don’t want to help you!” spat Ileana. “You’ve cost me everything I’ve worked so hard for.” She hesitated. “Just don’t think you can relax now.”
Without another word, she turned and swam away, leaving Merletta staring blankly after her. Whatever Ileana said, that had sounded more like a warning than a taunt. But if there was one thing she was certain of, it was that Ileana hated her, and would love to see her fail.
Shaking off the bewildering encounter, Merletta swam into the dining hall. Sage, Emil, and Andre were sitting together at the trainees’ table, and they all rose into the water at the sight of her. Merletta smiled at their expressions: Sage’s open anxiety, Andre’s eagerness, Emil’s casual inquiry.
“I did it,” she said, her face breaking into a grin. “I passed.”
They erupted into cheers which brought disapproving looks from some of the dining hall’s occupants. Merletta noticed, though, that at least as many were watching on with indulgent expressions. Ignoring Oliver’s slightly sour expression, and Lorraine’s usual unresponsiveness, Merletta hurried to join her friends.
Even in the midst of such a triumphant moment, her thoughts swam far away, to the world above the surface. She couldn’t help wishing she could share her news with Heath like she was sharing it with the others. She imagined his look of delight and relief when she told him she’d not only survived, but passed the test. He’d surely break into that smile that always warmed her as much as the sun on her skin. Maybe he’d even take her in his arms, and—
Andre clapped her on the back in a congratulatory way, drawing her back to the present. Knowing she couldn’t speak to Heath right now, she tried to put him from her mind. All she could do was hope he was watching from afar with his incredible extra sight, breathing more easily in the knowledge that she’d emerged from the test in one piece.
“I have a lot to tell you,” she muttered to Sage, Emil, and Andre, when the fuss had died down. “And it’s big. But it will have to wait until later.” They looked intrigued, but they all knew better than to press her for details in the dining hall.
There was one thing Merletta couldn’t resist asking Sage straight away, however. When they had returned to their food, a few minutes later, she bent her head close to her friend’s and whispered, “You know that rocky ledge thing, at the middle of the maelstrom?”
“Merletta!” Sage hissed reprovingly. “We’re not supposed to talk about the contents of the test. It’s part of the rules!”
Merletta rolled her eyes. “We talk about a lot of things we’re not supposed to talk about, Sage.”
Sage apparently had no response to this.
“I know you’ve been there, because I saw where you carved your name,” Merletta whispered impatiently. “Why didn’t you tell me about the watchword?”
Sage looked at her like she was out of her mind. “It’s a watchword, Merletta,” she whispered. “The whole point of it is to be secret unless you’ve made it to that level and seen it. You need it in third year. There are some records you can’t look at unless you can give the watchword, that kind of thing.”
Merletta was silent for a moment, processing this. “But surely it was worth making an exception,” she argued, her voice still low. “You’re a better actor than I realized, Sage. I can’t remember you ever so much as flinching when I talked about Vazula—”