Lilophea-2: Consort of the Sea King. Natalia Yacobson

not the only one. There’s the lady of the oceans.”

      “What do you mean?”

      The spirit laughed back.

      Lilophea felt an object drop suddenly against her leg. So that’s what the jokers were fighting about. It looked like the simplest shell, but inside it was like fire.

      “Don’t touch it!” warned the spirits together, but Lilophea had already touched and burned her hand.

      “What shell can burn the queen of the sea?”

      “This is no ordinary seashell. It’s from the ocean,” the spirit explained.

      “It is a magic shell,” the other jokers sang along. They grasped hands and twirled in a motley circle over Lilophea.

      “It comes from lightning that strikes the ocean,” they chattered.

      “Look!” One of the jokers grabbed Lilophea by the arm and led her to the parapet of the bridge. He pointed to a distant shore. It was an island in the middle of the sea, and pirates had just landed there. They were trying to collect glittering seashells from the shore and were falling into a kind of trap. Their hands began to burn when they touched the unusual shells.

      “You see how hard it is for the easy bounty hunters.”

      “But I am not a hunter of easy profits.”

      “You came to the bridge without a guide, not knowing the way. You want to swoop into some rich country and steal all the treasures from the royal palace. A friend of Urun, a pirate, used to do that. He drowned her for that.”

      “For once he drowned someone for a cause. He usually does it for nothing.”

      “Right,” the spirit smiled at her like an old friend. “You don’t like Urun either. You’re nice. Come, I’ll be your guide.”

      He looked like a court jester. Lilophea followed him for a long time before she realized he was deceiving her. The jester spirit hovered over the bridge and led her in circles.

      “Do not be angry, I can tell you where to go,” he noticed how she clenched her fists with annoyance.

      “I’d better look for it myself,” the joking spirit was of no use anyway.

      “Orange Bridge is for Thyoria, platinum for Etar, onyx for Shahilan, pearl for your own Aquilania, quartz for Sultanite, and no bone bridge for the other side. If you want to go back under the water, you’ll have to choose the jade bridge.

      “Thank you!” Lilophea didn’t know if the spirit was being honest with her, but she thanked him courteously anyway. The joker gave her a slight bow. He hovered over the bridges and watched her go.

      In some ways he was right. The Onyx Bridge did lead to Shalian, and she had already checked the direction of the Orange Bridge.

      Her legs were numb with fatigue. How long had she been walking here? Lilophea decided to take a little break. Below is only the sea surface. Above is only the sky. It’s crazy up here. A quiet, melodious song came from somewhere. It sounded like there was an island down there. Lilophea listened to the words of the song. There was something familiar about them.

      And then she noticed a cave from the bridge. No, it was not a cave, but it was the open mouth of a whale, and beside it a beautiful girl was fussing as if nothing had happened, picking up shells. The whale was about to swallow her.

      Lilophea wanted to shout at her, but the girl suddenly lifted her head and intercepted her gaze. How sly her eyes gleamed! They were black as agate. And the pastel dress and headdress were something reminiscent of the fashions of the court of Aquilania. She was Catalina, the daughter of the First Minister who had supposedly been sacrificed to the water creatures. And here she is alive. Collecting lovely shells in a simple wicker basket and even humming a song while her father goes gray with grief over the kidnapping of his daughter. Something is not right here! Lilophea squinted suspiciously as she noticed the thin gold chain that slid across the sand behind Catalina. It glittered like a strand of sunlight. But it was a real chain, albeit made of gold. One end of it disappears under the hem of Catalina’s dress, the other reaches for the whale’s mouth. Are they shackled; the whale and Catalina? Or does it only seem that way to her?

      There’s a lot of weirdness here. The yellow shells do not burn Catalina’s fingers. Normally mortals are burned to the bone when they touch them, and the magic shells swarm over the unfortunate and laugh. After all, each shell is the house of a neck, not an oyster. Even pirates are unlucky when they stumble upon them. And Catalina doesn’t care! And how sharp she has become, she can see the bridge even over the sea in the fog. Catalina smiled at Lilophea with a wicked grin and said something in an incomprehensible language. At her words the green mud on the shore stirred, as if a monster had awakened beneath it.

      Catalina was very different at court. Here she lived as if she were a copy of her. The sea changes everyone terribly. Lilophea would not have been surprised now to see a whole ball of octopus limbs come out from under Catalina’s dress, but nothing like that happened. Only the whale, for some reason, began to worry. Probably noticed, too, that a flotilla of ships was coming from afar.

      Catalina suddenly made a sign to Lilophea to be quiet, and she herself stopped singing. There was a silence, like before a storm.

      Lilophea did not want to see what would happen next, so she ran across the bridge away from Catalina with her mad black eyes, from the squeaking shells in her basket, and from the whale who suddenly roared.

      After running a great distance away, Lilophea did turn around. From the bridge she could see perfectly well the whale swallowing whole ships behind her. Screams could be heard. It sounded like a nightmare dream.

      Where do we turn now? It is away from the whale for sure. He can’t get to the bridge, though. And yet! Right now Lilophea would be most frightened if a distraught Catharine, who looked more like the ghost of a drowned woman than the daughter of a respected minister, were to get in her way.

      The bridges diverged again in different directions. They led higher and higher, almost to the clouds. Lilophea did not hesitate to choose the middle road. Beyond the bridge of reddish hue that rose higher than all, the spires of the Sultanite were visible. They were the easiest to distinguish from other countries’ architecture. And the coats of arms with eagles spoke for themselves.

      “Would you like to see your loved ones?” A harlequin-like spirit, with red eyes, was already standing in the way. It must have been the harlequin who had once drowned here. He pointed her with a fluid movement of his hand toward the bridge that led directly to one of the windows of the Sultan’s palace. Lilophea had not noticed this bridge before. It was quite narrow and slippery. Some mermaid had her hands wrapped around the railing. Lilophea carefully lifted the train as she passed her. The main thing was to make sure she didn’t grab on and drag her to the bottom. The mermaid had her hands in the mud and her green-colored long hair. From a distance it could have been mistaken for seaweed.

      “Don’t be afraid!” The spirit urged her on, and Lilophea came very close to the open bay window. Here the bridge ended, and beyond the window stretched the throne room. How easy it was to get from the underwater world directly to the throne of the Sultanite rulers! It is clear why watermen are such good spies and raiders. They have their eyes everywhere on the human world. She wondered if the people in the hall can see her standing by the window. Or is the bridge with everyone on it invisible to them? It is most likely the second.

      Lilophea saw her uncle sitting on the throne, her many cousins who hadn’t honored Aquilania with a visit last time because they appeared to be fiercely competing for the right of supremacy.

      “Age means nothing to us,” cried Orvel, the middle one of the nine brothers, “we are special, we have no right of seniority, we have the right of the strong. There is a special talent. We must compete in it. Whoever wins will rule.”

      The father-king looked at him with condescension.