“And without it, we die in the cold, if we’re unlucky enough to live there.”
“Yes.”
“There’s more?”
“Yes.”
“You’re not going to explain it, are you?”
“No. But I am not unpleased, Kaylin.”
“Why is that, exactly?” She didn’t often say something right to her teachers, and she thought it might be useful if she ever wanted it to happen a second time.
“Water,” he said. “Tell me what you think.”
She knew she was chewing on her lower lip. “Well,” she said at last, “you can drown in it.”
“Yes.”
“And the storms at sea—”
“Yes.”
“But if you don’t drink it, you die.”
“Very good.”
“And so do the plants, in a draught.”
“Indeed.”
“And there’s more.” But this wasn’t a question. Water is deep. “Water is deep,” she said, musing aloud.
“Yes. Those are the words of the Keeper.”
“The who?”
“You met with him today,” Sanabalis added softly.
“Oh. You mean Evanton?”
His brow rose at the tone of her voice.
“Well, he’s just an old—” And fell again as her voice trailed off, remembering him in his elemental garden.
“He was one of my students,” Sanabalis said quietly, “but he does not visit, and cannot.” He looked at her carefully. “He showed you his responsibility.”
She nodded slowly.
“And you saw something in the water there.”
She nodded again. “A girl,” she said quietly. “Bruised face. Dark hair. Wide eyes. She called me by name,” she added softly.
“Did you recognize her?” His gaze was keen now, sharp enough to cut. Had she been a liar, she would have fallen silent, afraid to test that edge. But she was Kaylin.
“No. But I—I need to find her, Sanabalis.”
“Yes,” he told her softly. Where in this case soft was like the rumble of an earthquake giving its only warning.
“You know about this.”
“I don’t, Kaylin. Or I did not. But water—it is the element of the living. It is the element to which we are most strongly tied, or to which you and your kind are. It is the element that speaks most strongly to the Oracles.”
Kaylin failed entirely to keep from grimacing.
“You disdain the Oracles?”
“They speak in riddles when they speak at all, and afterward, they tell you that whatever gibberish they said was of course true.”
“It is only afterward that the contexts of the words have their full meaning,” he replied patiently.
She stopped. “You’ve been talking to the Oracles?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“The Emperor desired it,” he replied, carefully and slowly. “And in truth, they came to him, and they were ill at ease.”
“How ill?”
“Perhaps a week ago, perhaps a little more, they were woken from their sleep by a dream.”
“All of them?”
“All of them. Even those who are mere apprentices and have not yet earned the right to live in the temple and its grounds.”
“It wasn’t a good dream.”
“It wasn’t a dream at all.”
“A—what do they call them?”
“Vision.” His momentary impatience was clear.
“Of what?”
“Water,” he told her.
“Water.”
“Yes. The waters are deep,” he added, speaking almost exactly in the tone and style of Evanton. “And things sleep within those depths that have not been seen by even the living Dragons, save perhaps two.”
She froze. “Something is waking.”
“In their dreams, yes.”
“What?”
“They’re Oracles, Kaylin,” he replied.
“So you don’t know.”
“No. They’re certain it’s not a good thing for the city. Which has a port. The Sages have been poring over the words and symbols,” he added, with just a flicker of his brow.
“And they get what anyone sane gets, which is confused.”
He actually offered a slight smile. “It is not yet clear to them, no.”
“Something big is going to happen.”
“Big enough to wake the Oracles—all of them—no matter where they lay sleeping.”
She was silent for a moment, candle forgotten. “And did they have any sense of timing?”
“Time is not as concrete for people who see into possible futures,” he told her quietly.
“That would be no.”
“That would indeed be no—but there is urgency. And I cannot think that it is coincidence that you came to me today to ask me about the element of water.” He paused. “The Keeper summoned you.”
“Well, no—” She stopped. “Maybe.”
“Then the child is someone connected to the water, I think.”
Kaylin nodded. “I have no idea where to start,” she added. “But … Ybelline also invited me to visit her … at her home in the Tha’alani quarter.”
Dragon brows rose. “And
