Heartened, Merletta swam forward, pausing in front of the guards, both of whom were watching her closely.
The silence stretched out, and Merletta cleared her throat awkwardly. “I’m a trainee,” she said. “I’ve come to view the records, for my studies.”
Neither guard’s expression changed in the slightest, but one pulled out a small writing leaf which he handed to her.
“Write the watchword here.”
Merletta took the leaf, bringing her satchel around to rest it on as she retrieved her coral writing implement.
Vazula.
It was the first time she’d ever written the word, and she took a moment to admire how it looked. It was an incredibly strange sensation, handing over a physical inscription of her greatest secret to these forbidding strangers.
The guard glanced at the word for a fleeting moment, then waved her inside. She looked over her shoulder to see him destroying the leaf with emotionless efficiency.
As soon as she turned her attention forward again, all thought of the guards fled. She’d expected the restricted records room to be bigger than the public one she was used to, but in fact it was smaller. Not that it was less impressive. It was meticulously organized, with shelf upon shelf of well-maintained records stretching not outward like in the public room, but upward. The room must go up several stories, she thought.
And it was quiet! So peaceful. At present no one was in there but her—it certainly made a nice change from studying while surrounded by whispering first years.
Merletta moved slowly along the rows at the bottom level, not entirely sure what she was looking for. Where should she focus her studies if she wanted to pass her educator test? She was just reaching for a record from a section entitled Oral History, when a door she hadn’t previously noticed opened.
A merman swam in, then pulled up short at sight of her.
“Oh.” He blinked, then his eyes narrowed in suspicion. “Should you be in here?”
Merletta nodded. “I’m a third year trainee,” she said, trying to sound confident. “I’m here to study.”
“Ah.” He studied her thoughtfully. “You’ll be sitting your educator test this year, will you?”
She nodded again.
“Well, we could do with some fresh blood,” he said. “Not enough are signing up for our entry level training. But I suppose you’ll want to continue on to fourth year.”
“Are you an educator?” Merletta asked, her interest piqued.
He grunted in acknowledgment, swimming past her and stopping in front of a section marked Dragon Aggression.
“You’re getting a good opportunity to see our work in action,” the educator said, selecting a record after careful perusal.
Two others swam into the room as he spoke.
“Did you find it?” one asked.
He nodded, handing Merletta the record. “Pass it to that mermaid, would you?” he said distractedly, already moving to the next one.
Merletta moved across the space, scanning the record as she did so. She didn’t have time to properly take in its contents, but she got the gist. It was an account of dragons hunting merkind through shallow waters, actually diving into the ocean to seek them out and kill them.
It was hard to reconcile the image with Rekavidur, somehow.
“What’s this for?” Merletta asked, handing the record to the impatient educator.
“There’s some kind of riot happening in Tilssted,” the other mermaid said distractedly. “A whole group is threatening to breach the barrier. The guards are already there, of course, but we’re sending a team to try to prevent disaster with information rather than spears.”
Merletta frowned. She was all for using education instead of violence, of course, but the record she’d just handled wasn’t information—it was misinformation.
“Riot?” she repeated. Was this the same event Freja had described as a public meeting?
“You sound surprised,” the mermaid said vaguely. “But it’s Tilssted. What do you expect?”