Maire doesn’t even look around to see how many people are near us. But she tilts her head, and I realize she is listening. “Yes,” she says. “For now.”
I keep my voice low. “How did the sirens go from being loved to hated?”
“There was a step in between,” Maire says. “They were worshipped.”
“What do you mean? Like the gods?”
Maire smiles. “No,” she says. “I mean they were the gods.”
“I don’t understand,” I say. “The gods have existed since long before the Divide.”
“People worshipped gods for thousands of years,” Maire says. “So yes, gods have existed long before the Divide. But our gods—the ones you see in the temple—were only sculptures in the beginning, brought down from the Above. They were salvaged from the ancient cathedrals on the surface and used as decorations. Embellishments. People didn’t believe in gods at the time of the Divide. It had been years since anyone believed in anything.” Maire puts her hand in the water, trails her fingers through it. “Then the sirens came and changed all of that.
“There was no scientific or logical explanation for them. So the people began to turn elsewhere for an answer. And when they looked up, they saw those statues in the temple looking down, and they began to wonder. They wondered if there were gods after all, and if they had sent the sirens. Some people even believed that the sirens were gods. That’s when the miracles and our religion all came about. Did you know that the first Minister was a siren?”
“No,” I say. “They don’t teach us any of this.”
“The Council changed the history long ago,” Maire says. “Even most of our own Council now doesn’t know what happened. They believe as you did, as most people do, the version that you’ve been taught.”
Could this be true? I think back to that voice Maire saved, that long-ago woman who came Below and who witnessed the siren children. The only even remotely religious word she used was miracle. That might have been the beginning of their belief.
Who else knows this? Did my mother know? Did Bay? I can’t bring myself to ask. I don’t want to know how many more things they kept from me.
“Did that first siren Minister invent our religion?” I ask. “And then force everyone to believe it?” That could be a reason for people to come to hate the sirens—if they felt manipulated in their belief.
Maire shakes her head. “The religion was agreed upon by the sirens and the people together. They studied old histories. They learned about the gods. And then they shaped it all to fit the way their lives were. The Council took our religion to the Above, and the Above began to believe as well.”
“Did the Above hate the sirens and the people Below for that?” I ask. “Because we told them what to believe?”
“No,” Maire says. “At first both the Above and the Below believed the religion was right, that it made the most sense. In fact, they came to believe that they had not created their faith and belief system. Rather, they felt that they had been led to the truth by the miracle of the sirens. But the religion became warped and twisted as both the Councils Above and Below used it for their purposes. As I said, a very few people in Atlantia know the truth. Now you are one of them.”
“What evidence do you have of all this?”
“The siren voices,” Maire says. “This is what they told me. And I believe them.”
“Do you have any of them that I can hear?” I ask. “Like the voice of that other woman in the shell?” If I could hear the sirens say all of this, I would know that it’s true.
“No,” Maire says. “The siren voices were too strong to save. I heard them once, and then they were gone. They had been waiting a long time.”
So I can’t hear them myself. That’s convenient, I think. Do I believe Maire?
“The siren voices are gone,” Maire says, “but you can still hear some of the others. Like the one I caught in the shell. I was listening, and when I found one that I knew would be good for you to hear, I saved as much of it as I could before it was gone. They can all only speak once, you know. But they have things worth saying, too. Haven’t you heard any of the voices before?”
“Not speaking,” I say. “I’ve heard breathing. Screaming. I thought it was Atlantia.”
“It is,” Maire says.
I’m not sure I understand what she means, but there is something else I want desperately to know.
“How do you do it?” I ask her. “With the shells?”
“I tell them what I want,” Maire says. “I tell them to hold the voices, and they do.”
She makes it sound so simple.
“Could I do it?” I ask. “Control things that aren’t living?” I wait for Maire to laugh at me. I wait for her to tell me that I can’t. That I’m not powerful enough. Or that I shouldn’t try. Or that it’s not safe. That’s what my mother would say. She cared so much about keeping me safe.
But Maire doesn’t say any of those things.
“You can’t be afraid,” she says. “I failed in my first attempts at saving the voices because I was afraid.”
“You were afraid of the shells?”
“I was afraid of what I was asking them to do,” she says.
“Are there any other rules?”
“The sirens of the past told me that we can only control physical things that have been made,” Maire says. “We cannot control things that are more elemental. Air, wind, water—you cannot control the things that have almost always been.”
“And we can control people,” I say.
“Their bodies,” Maire says. “But we cannot control their souls.”
“Is there anything else?”
“You have to be near the object when you command it,” Maire says, her tone practical, instructive. “At least that is how it is for me. And eventually your command will wear off. You and I won’t be able to communicate through the shell forever.”
She stands up. “I need to get back.”
“Wait,” I say. I’ve realized that this information isn’t just interesting in abstract—it’s useful for me now. I could use this in the tanks. “You’re saying you can command other things,” I say. “Not just people. Not just shells.”
“That’s right,” Maire says.
“And the trick is to not be afraid,” I say.
“It’s not a trick,” Maire says. “It’s the way it is. And you have to listen.” She pulls her black robes tightly around herself. “It’s time for me to go.”
She doesn’t look back. I don’t follow after her.
When I glance down at the pool, I see that all the coins have come up to the surface. They’re floating there. All I have to do is pluck them from the water and put them in my bag, if I want them. But coins sink. They don’t float. Unless—
My aunt must have told them to do it.
Maire has done something very dangerous, I realize, by teaching me so many things when she knows sirens are to be taught only under Council supervision. But what Maire’s done isn’t public. I’m the only one who knows. She’s put herself in my hands. I could go to the priests, I could tell Nevio the Minister, I could warn the Council about what she can do and what she’s said to me.
I have the power to make things very difficult for my aunt, and she is the one who gave that power to me.
Does that mean Maire trusts me?
I don’t know. But I do know that she’s told me something that could help me make it Above, alive.
As I walk to the gondola stop, I think about my new idea and try not to jangle the coin I’ve taken from the pool. It’s heavy in my pocket. When I pick up my pace to pass a group of people, I think I hear a voice, a person crying out, and I turn too fast. I slip unexpectedly and fall hard to the ground, hitting my knees and hands and sending an aching, sharp song through my bones.
A woman near me exclaims and reac
hes down to take my arm and help me up.
“Thank you,” I say, after a brief pause, to make sure the pain won’t come out in my voice. I’m still stunned by the suddenness of the fall. I should have been more careful.
“Are you all right?” someone else asks.
“Yes,” I say. “I don’t know why I slipped—”
And then we see it.
A small puddle of water, right there on the ground. In unison we all look up to try to find a source.
“Is it a leak?” someone asks.
A drop of water sails down from somewhere up high.
“Where did it come from?” I ask.
“I think it’s coming from one of the rivets near that fifth seam,” someone else says. “Can you see?”
I try to focus on the ribs of metal sky arching above.
A peacekeeper pushes through the crowd. “What’s the problem?” he asks.
“It looks like a leak,” says the woman who caught me. “This poor girl slipped in the water from it.”
“Don’t worry,” the peacekeeper says. “We’ll get it fixed straightaway.”
I’ve heard of tiny leaks before, but I’ve never seen one. I’m fascinated by the growing pool of water on the ground, and I have this strange desire to kneel down and touch it, maybe even taste it. Real seawater, sneaking in from the outside.
When I change into my racing suit, all I feel is focus. I have to see if this will work. If what Maire says is true. And if I am strong enough, powerful enough.
Once I’m in the water for my practice swim, I open my mouth, and I speak. Unafraid.
I use my real voice, but it sounds different under here. And of course my mouth fills with water even though I try to let in as little as possible. There is only so much you can say like this, but all I need is a word or two.
“Come,” I say.
And the fish and the eels come to me, without hesitation.
“Go,” I say, and they swim away.
I am exhilarated.
I might survive this after all.
The fish and eels are small. But if I can control them, is there also a chance that I could control the mines out there in the water? And could I tell the doors of the morgue to unlock and let me in when it’s time for me to shroud myself and go up through the floodgates?
For once in my life, something is easy. I used my voice, and it worked exactly the way I wanted. Does the water magnify my voice? Make me more powerful? There’s so much I don’t know, and it feels wonderful for the first time, instead of miserable.
I swim up and down and up and down the lane, wearing myself out, practicing telling the fish what to do.
Maire and I are not like the other sirens.
Even things that aren’t alive have to obey us.
For once I’m glad to be like my aunt.
When I get home, I look at my pile of coin and my pile of fish and I feel a deep satisfaction. I’m not there yet. But it’s coming together.
Except for one thing.
When I lift up Bay’s shell, it has gone silent.
No singing, no breathing. Not even the sound of the ocean. Nothing at all.
Is it because I am getting closer to the Above? Because I am going to hear Bay’s real voice again soon, in person? Or has the magic worn out? Maire said it wouldn’t last forever.
My sister is gone again.
CHAPTER 13
It feels like I might be the last person alive in Atlantia. The deepmarket stalls are shuttered and locked against thieves, and it’s dark and quiet. But then I hear sounds, hiding sounds, hurrying sounds, and I move fast and keep my eyes straight ahead and make sure I stand tall and walk with my shoulders squared.
Without Bay singing, it was too hard to sleep, and I decided to do what she did when she couldn’t rest.
I decided to go to the night races.
When I get to the racing lanes, I climb up into the stands. The water doesn’t look blue in the dim lighting. It’s no color at all. People talk in murmurs as they make high-stakes bets. They don’t laugh and joke the way they do during the day. When a bettor comes up and asks what I want to wager, I shake my head. I don’t have money for this.
“Then why are you here?” he asks.
“I came to watch,” I say. In the dark my flat voice sounds different—inarguable and unapproachable instead of stupid. It matches the gray light. He mutters but leaves me alone.
How often did Bay come here? I wonder. I have her shell in my pocket, for comfort, but I won’t get it out. In the dark, crowded stands, it would take one bump or jostle and I could lose hold of the shell, and then it would clatter and shatter on the hard ground below.
Even thinking about it makes me feel sick.
Maybe her voice will come back. Maybe I need to give it time.
I brought Maire’s shell with me, too. I couldn’t bring myself to leave it behind. And then there’s the air mask, slung over my back, as if I’m trying to pretend like tonight is just a normal outing to the deepmarket, no different from any other. As if by obeying the rule about carrying the mask, I won’t get in trouble for breaking curfew.
The announcer doesn’t shout out the names of the racers. Instead he holds up a sign and someone shines a spotlight on it so we can see who’s up next. Everything is more discreet, more serious. If the peacekeepers decide to make a raid, everyone caught out after curfew could go to prison. But I’ve heard that some Council members like to come betting, too, and so the races aren’t ever shut down permanently.
I feel sad that Bay came here without me. And I wonder how she felt all those years before my mother died, knowing that I planned to leave. I didn’t mean to be unkind. I just knew I couldn’t stay. I always felt close to Bay, because she was the one who knew my secret about the Above. But I wonder if knowing that secret made her feel far away from me. She always knew I had to leave her.
And I didn’t know that being apart would feel like this. If I’d known, would I still have gone?
Did Bay ever race at night? She always came home cold but dry, but she could have worn a cap, covered her hair. The thought of her being in that water makes me shiver. But watching the swimmers, who are constantly, quietly moving to keep themselves from getting too cold, who have gray faces in the grainy light, I realize that I should probably try this, too.
Swimming in the cold and the dark is what it will be like when I try to go up. Even if the sun shines Above, it won’t reach me for a long, long time.
But I don’t want to race here. I’ve heard what people say about the racers, and I watch how they swim. These are the races for people who no longer hope. These people want something singular and unattainable, something no one else can understand.
These are the people who are not happy in Atlantia, who have things they cannot forget or who feel wrong in some way, as though they do not belong.
I understand them, and it frightens me.
I wish I knew a siren who would soothe me, tell me it was all right, that I can be happy, that I belong here Below.
But the siren I know does not soothe.
I lift the other shell to my ear.
“Where do you live?” I ask.
It’s late. It’s dark. She could be sleeping.
But she answers.
Maire lives in an apartment in a neighborhood not far from the deepmarket. It looks completely unremarkable from the outside, one door among many all lined up in a row. The sky is low here, so the narrow building is only two stories high. It appears that there are only two small rooms per apartment, one room set on top of another. I have to squint in the dim light of the streetlamps to make sure I have the right number.
Even though I knew my mother died on Maire’s doorstep, I’ve never known where Maire lived. I assumed she would live up in the Council blocks with the other sirens. I p
ictured my mother dying there, in one of their clean-swept, candy-colored entryways. The steps at Maire’s apartment are gray, like everything else in this kind of light.
I’ve seen everything now. My mother’s dead body in the morgue, her insignia worn around another Minister’s neck, her office cluttered with someone else’s books, and now this, the place where she died.
I’ve seen everything and I still feel like I know nothing.
Before I can knock on the door, Maire opens it. Compared to the dimness outside, the hallway behind her is a flood of light, like she’s cracked open the sun. “Come in,” she says.
“I thought you would live up near the Council,” I say.
“I prefer to live down here,” she says. “Up there they’re always listening. Down here Atlantia is too loud for them to hear much.”
“I’m surprised they allow it.”
The lower room is a kitchen area with a bathroom at the back. Maire leads me through it and up the stairs to the apartment’s other room, a sitting room with a couch, where I assume she must sleep. The shades on the windows are dark and thick—blackout shades, to keep in the light. I couldn’t even see a sliver of it from outside. Though the neighborhood is not one of the nicer ones in Atlantia and the apartment is small, it appears that Maire lives here alone—a very grand luxury in a city where space is at a premium.
“I told you I was selfish,” Maire says, as if she knows what I’m thinking. “This is part of what I’ve bargained for, all these years. There are times when they need a siren who is not an empty, vacant puppet. Sometimes they require someone who has actual power. I do what they say, and they let me live where I want.” She gestures for me to sit down on a red chair, upholstered in thick, fine velvet.
The room looks nothing like I expected. I thought there would be shelves crowded with jars full of mysterious things, shadows everywhere, not this place of order and light. I expected more of a deepmarket jumble, but the few things here are well-made, cared for—two chairs and a couch; a table; a delicate, green glass vase; a shelf of books; a jar of dirt. I wonder if it’s real.