He stepped inside the circle and opened the box he carried with him. Inside was a feather, matches, and a small, brown lump of incense. He passed the feather to Petra, then struck a match and lit the incense, setting it on the ground. He gestured at the twinkling line bending around him and Petra. “Dust from a fallen comet,” he explained. “Understand, Petra, that Ariel doesn’t need stardust or feathers or incense to find its way here. These objects are not even purely associated with air. After all, even birds must land on the earth from time to time. I use these objects to help me concentrate. They are helpful only because I consider them to be allied with the air, not because this is wholly true.”

In spite of herself, Petra was intrigued.

“Ariel knows all languages,” Dee continued. “We will both know what it is saying. But that doesn’t mean we will be able to understand the words we hear. Clarity isn’t Ariel’s strong suit.”

Smoke from the burning incense spiraled into the air. He looked at it, swept his gaze along the curve of comet dust, and glanced at the feather in Petra’s hand. “One last thing,” he said. “Be silent. I cannot stress this enough. You might not like taking orders from me, but I assure you that you’ll like it even less if Ariel rips you into bloody shreds and scatters the pieces to the four winds.”

Dee stood still, closed his eyes, and began to murmur.

After several minutes of this, Petra fidgeted.

This is quite fascinating, Astrophil commented.

I’m glad one of us is entertained.

Petra, it would be to your advantage to pay attention. Do you realize that Dee must be an extremely powerful sorcerer?

He’s an extremely powerful pain in the—

Witnessing this spell is an opportunity I doubt you would have even if you attended the Academy. Have you not noticed that Dee seems to be trying to teach you?

Teach me what? How to close my eyes and speak nonsense? Because I can do that already. The only thing he’s done since we walked into this room is to try messing with my mind.

Yes . . . but he seems to be doing it in a very, hmm, instructive way.

They broke off their conversation, for a blue-green light began to gleam in front of Dee. It grew larger, sparking like a candle sprinkled with pepper. It stretched taller and swelled, and then it took a shape that made Petra blink.

Hovering before her and John Dee was a creature that was half woman, half dragonfly. Her turquoise hair streamed in stormy ribbons, and a set of wings flowed from her elbows. From the waist down, her body tapered into a point that looked as sharp as a shimmering blue-green needle.

“Ariel is a she!” Petra was startled. “She isn’t an it or a what!”

“Shh,” said Dee. “Ariel, tell me about the girl.”

“Sutton Hoo,” chimed the dragonfly-woman.

“And she doesn’t speak Czech,” Petra continued. “Or English. Dee, you spin a fancy tale but that doesn’t make you anything other than a liar!”

“Sutton Hoo is a place in England,” Dee told Petra. “Now be quiet.”

“King of the air-swimmers,” Ariel hummed, “changed into gold.”

“Yeah,” Petra muttered. “This is really helpful. Bet all your questions are answered now, Dee.”

“Petra Kronos,” Dee said sharply. “You will anger Ariel if you cannot be still and listen! If you care nothing for your own life, show some respect for mine!”

Petra snorted. Then she began to giggle uncontrollably.

Petra, Astrophil said shakily. Do calm down. I can spare a few legs, but you only have two, and they work best when attached to your body.

Dee gripped Petra’s shoulder. The urgency on his face only made her laugh harder.

Ariel chuckled, too. “Chimera,” she said.

“She is?” Dee asked.

Petra stopped laughing. She stepped away from Dee.

“Chimera,” Ariel repeated. “A silver-singer. A dream-thinker.” She cocked her head and looked slyly at Petra, her snaky hair twisting. “Murder, betrayal, black teeth, a tree dressed in robes, the heavens pressed into a ball, a dirty metal river.” Her last word was a hiss: “Assassin.”

She drifted close to Petra, and she raised her wings around the girl’s head, shielding her from Dee’s sight. Ariel’s mouth drew close to Petra’s left ear, where Astrophil clung. Petra stiffened. Would Ariel tell Dee about him? Petra needed to keep the spider hidden from the spy. Dee had proven months ago in Salamander Castle that he would threaten someone she loved for his own ends, and Petra refused to risk Astrophil’s safety.

The chill of Ariel’s skin rippled off her in icy waves. Petra shivered, stared at the blue-green wings, and didn’t know what to do.

“Greetings, web-spinner,” Ariel whispered.

“Hello.” Astrophil’s voice was tiny.

“Secret-keeper, heed my words and save your lady: never trust a poet.”

Ariel lowered her wings. Petra was relieved when the spirit turned to Dee and breathed no word of the spider, saying only, “Liberty for truth is a fair exchange, deep-searcher.”

He nodded. “Go, then.”

The spirit wrapped her dragonfly wings around her body, dwindled into a slender oval, thinned to a point of light, and vanished.

“Well.” Dee stuffed his hands inside his pockets. He began to pace, his feet breaking the circle of stardust. “Ariel seems to like you, Petra, though why is beyond my comprehension. You reckless fool. Laughing at Ariel. Do you think I invent threats for my own amusement? Why can’t you heed a simple word of warning?”

“Why should I believe anything you say?”

Dee stopped abruptly.

“I was laughing at you,” Petra said.

Dee opened his mouth, but then shut it.

“Anyway, Ariel wasn’t at all like you said,” Petra continued. “There were no tempests. And Ariel is a she,” Petra returned to her earlier point. “Kind of insecty, but definitely a she.”

“ ‘It’ is more appropriate. Ariel doesn’t always look like that. It appeared that way because of you. Because of what you are.”

Petra raised an eyebrow. “I’m a dragonfly?”

“You are a chimera.”

“Right. And is a chimera someone who kicks her captor in the shins, causing him to fall down, conk his head, and lose his memory, making him forget that he was ever a pompous sneak? Because that does sound an awful lot like me.”

“Petra, sit down. There are things we must discuss.”

“No. There are games you want to play, and I’m sick of it.”

“No more games.” Dee reached for his waist and seemed to unbuckle the air. He offered his empty hands to her.

She took the invisible sword, and the weight of it calmed her a little.

“I ask you again to sit, Petra. Allow me to explain what you are, for truly there are few of your kind in this world.”

9

Riddles

I HAVE A BROTHER with four legs and a big hat,” said one of the children sitting in a circle at the stern of the ship. “What’s his name?”

“Too easy!” cried a boy in a red shirt. “Everybody knows that one! It’s a table!”

Parents hovered near their children as they challenged one another with riddles. A few feet away, the gadje sat cross-legged, staring intently at the cluster of people. Two sailors worked close by. Klara was coiling rope and Brishen was scrubbing dried fish scales off the deck, but they both listened to the children’s game.

“I’ve got one,” Klara said, flicking back her braids. “My sister is tiny, thin, and has a long tail that trails behind her.”

“I know,” Brishen said, “it’s a—”

Klara elbowed him.

He gave her a guilty look. “A squid?” He winked at her.

“A squid?” the children yelled. “It’s not a squid!” “What kind of idiot would think that?” “Brishen, you’ve been out in the sun too long!”

“Maybe, maybe,” he said. “But what is it, then?”

They fell silent. Then one girl raised a timid hand. “Um, Klara, is your sister . . . a needle?”

“That’s right!” Klara sang.

Neel was watching this from a distance, his arms folded across his chest as he leaned against the port side of the ship. He noticed that the blond boy was running his fingers absentmindedly through a patch of sand by his feet, but his gaze never wavered from the riddlers. Neel wondered what the gadje found so interesting about a game he couldn’t possibly understand. The children continued to chatter in Romany.

“My sister has a big belly, two long hairpins, and rocks herself to sleep every night.”

“A ship!”

“I have a brother,” began the boy in the red shirt, “who has many round eyes and a mouth that opens sideways. He has a home wherever he goes.”

There was a pause. Neel guessed what the answer was. Judging by the faraway looks on the parents’ faces, they were thinking the same thing.

Everyone was astonished when the gadje cleared his throat. His accent was thick, but he spoke in perfect Romany: “Is it a wagon?”

“I THINK HE’S CUTE.” Klara chewed on a dried carrot.

“You would,” Ashe said. She passed the flatbread down the table. “Cradle-robber.”

A few men looked up from their stew, alarmed by this conversation.

“Not that kind of cute,” Klara said. “Cute like a little lamb. A lamb who says, ‘I is thirsty. May have tar to drink?’ ”

The Maraki chuckled.

A young boy set down his bowl of stew. He grinned, showing baby-tooth gaps. “He asked me how to say ‘I’d like bread to eat.’ I told him the Romany words for that are ‘I slurp fish guts raw.’ ”

Nicolas reached across the table to muss his hair. “Good lad.”

Andras sliced a lemon. He bit into a wedge and pulled the yellow rind from his teeth. “Don’t know why you’re all mocking one of the few gadje who’s actually trying to learn our language.”

“A dog can sit and beg,” said Neel. “Doesn’t make him a man.”

“What’s he trying to learn Romany for, anyway?” someone asked.

“He’s sucking up to us.”

“He’s just trying to get by.”

“He’s plotting something,” said Neel. “That’s what I’d do.”

A father of five whose family had been rescued by the Pacolet remarked, “I don’t like the boy any more than most of you, but I still can’t believe we’re selling him. Our people don’t do that. When in the history of the Roma have we ever traded slaves?”

Everyone looked at Treb. “New times”—he tossed a raisin in his mouth—“new measures.”

“We could just keep him on board, Treb.” Brishen leaned forward. “He’s young and fit. He’d know the ropes soon enough. He doesn’t complain, and he seems like a helpful sort.”

“All part of the act,” Neel said. “I’m Lovari. I’d know.”

“Not everyone’s as underhanded as you,” said Nadia. “Just because you broke into the Bohemian prince’s toy chest and can never shut up about it doesn’t mean—”

“Neel saved his clan with those stolen jewels.” Andras pointed a carrot at her.

“Well, while we’re discussing people who don’t belong, why don’t we talk about him?” Nadia retorted. “Neel’s Lovari! He said so himself! Why is he suddenly one of us now?”

“Nadia,” Brishen whispered, casting his eyes at the Loophole Beach families, “show some tact. Not everyone here is from our tribe.”

She bit her lip. “I didn’t mean—all I meant is that Neel is counted as one of the Pacolet’s crew. He gets a vote in our decisions, just as if he were Maraki. But he isn’t.”

“Neel’s here as a favor to me,” Treb said. “End of story. Now, as for the Bohemian lad, I want one thing as clear as a rain-washed sky. There will be no vote on his fate. I’m your captain, and what I say on this matter goes. Tomorrow we’ll arrive in Sallay. We’ll sell him in the market, and he’ll fetch a fine price, too. Then we’ll stock the Pacolet’s larders and sail on. If some of you have gotten fond of him, that’s not my problem. I warned you not to. That little lamb’s for eating.”

TOMIK’S CELL was darker than dark. The brig was at the very bottom of the ship, in the hold. He wondered what was swimming on the other side of the hull’s wooden wall: sharks, whales, or just a school of tiny fish startled by the great ship sailing past them? He imagined the fish darting away, their scales flashing.

On Tomik’s first day aboard the Pacolet, he threw up. Repeatedly. He felt like his stomach was trying to crawl up his throat, and his brain sloshed in his head. When Andras unlocked his cell door and led him up onto the deck, Tomik was stunned by the sunlight. The wind stole his seasickness and flew away. From that time forward, he spent every minute he could on deck, letting his skin soak up the salty air. He studied the ship, trying to understand how the sails worked. He listened to the crew, learning their language. He tried fishing, though that wasn’t a success.

Tomik could almost fall in love with life aboard a ship. In different circumstances. Very different circumstances.

On hands and knees, he felt his way across his cell. In one corner there was a bowl of food. In another, a chamber pot. During his first night of captivity, Tomik had confused the two, which wasn’t very pleasant. But tonight he didn’t crawl in the direction of either corner.