Page 74 of A Magic Deep & Drowning

“I was wondering when you would come to pay your respects.”

“I thought... Maurits thought you dead.”

The queen’s sharp eyes momentarily went hazy. “My son thought I was dead, did he? He ought to have known better.” She tipped her head back and laughed. “As if a dire whale would be enough to topple me. You find me alive and powerful as ever. Did you think the water would reject its rightful queen? Thade might have taken the throne, and the dire whales dismantled my court, but Iamthe water, and so long as the moon sits in the sky, I shall be in every pulling tide, every traveling current.”

The queen was not telling the entire truth. If the dire whales had spared her, it was not because she was powerful or they harbored some deep respect for her. There had been a deal made, some other bargain struck, though Clara could not begin to think of what it might be.

She doubted that the queen would tell her, so instead she asked, “And Thade?” The memory of Thade facing off against the dire whale was still sharp in her mind, the awful moan, the creaking jaw.

The lingering smile vanished from the queen’s lips. “My poor, troubled son. He was always so headstrong, so quick to be moved to passion. And can you blame him? He could see far and clearly, and felt every injustice in the world like a stone on his shoulders.” A cloud passed over the moon, shifting the light, and the queen shook off the mist that had filled her eyes. “But you did not come to talk to me about that son. Tell me, Clara, why have you sought an audience with me? Surely you have your every heart’s desire now that you are granted leave to live. I see you on land, painting and living a life of freedom. I see you on the beach, wrapped around my son as if you were the only two beings in the world.”

Clara knew she would not have another chance. She swallowed, the memory of Maurits’s heart beating under her ear strengthening her resolve.

“You know what I want,” she said, her voice only breaking a little at the end.

“Of course I do. But what I do not understand is why you come to me for it. You have a wish in your possession. You do not need me to make it come true.”

The wish burned in her pocket, begging to be used, to release its magic. Maurits would have his form returned to him, and they could live on land together as man and wife. Her fingers itched to curl around the stone.

“How happy you could be,” Queen Maren crooned.

Clara withdrew her hand from her pocket. She shook her head. “No, I will not use my wish on that.”

The queen did not so much as blink, but Clara thought she saw a flicker of surprise behind those shrewd eyes.

“There is something else that I want. I wish... I wish for the lost children to find peace, wherever they may be, and whatever that may look like.”

It was a dangerous wish. It did not ask a specific thing, and the magic could twist and distort her words into something she did not mean. But her intention was pure, and that was all that she could offer.

“I might have told you that such a wish was unneeded. You had only to look around you, and you would see for yourself that the children do not need your help, never needed it.”

“I don’t understand.”

With a littletsk,Queen Maren bid Clara follow her outstretched finger which was pointing at the ceiling of the cave. The shimmering lights had returned, illuminating the cave in a soft green glow.

“I am a mother, Clara,” the queen said, her voice the gentlest Clara had ever heard it. “A mother first, and a queen second. Did you truly think I would harm children?”

“I... I don’t understand.”

“Children, whether born of man or egg, on land or water, belong to the world. To kill a child would be the gravest of crimes. The burghers might have thought they were sendingthe children to their deaths and justified it with their greed and progress, but I would never allow such a thing.”

A strange feeling—not quite hope, but close, began to spread through Clara.

“I told you, children deserve a world of beauty, an eternal childhood where there is no fear or pain. I gave them that.” She lifted a long arm draped with seaweed and gestured again to the damp walls of the cave.

Clara followed her line of sight. Then, slowly, the lights began to shift, losing their indistinct haze, and separating into glowing orbs.

Voices. A thousand voices of children began to ring through the cave. Some were laughing, some excitedly chattering in lisping tones that overlapped each other. Clara’s neck grew stiff as she watched the orbs dancing and playing, transforming the cave into something cozy and warm.

She turned back to the queen. “But they are not alive then, not truly.”

“You have a very narrow, human understanding of what it is to live,” the queen told her.

“But I saw Fenna,” Clara protested. “She appeared at my window, a terrible vision of pain and rot.”

The queen tilted her head. “And you believe what your eyes told you?”

“I heard her as well.”

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