Verse XIII

  So far, the visit to the Wayward Drift had gone just about as Sera had thought it would. Better, actually—she thanked whatever providence had led to their arrival on the one day when the crèche teachers would not be around—but in most every other way as expected. She was now launching herself away from her third argument with Matron Mihayela that day.

  Again, as expected.

  "Doldrummed old biddy..." she grumbled to herself, not at a mutter, as she made haste through the outer chambers of the crèche. Several orphelines giggled and trailed in her wake. They'd all been expecting something like this as well.

  "The matron sank your plan again, huh?" little Gwenni asked. Sera only grimaced, which was answered with a bright pearly smile in the middle of the dark-skinned lass's face. "Thought so. Better luck next time?"

  These orphelines, these daughters under the firmament deserved a place where they could grow up happy, and the matron was yet to be convinced that the Wayward Drift was no longer that place, if indeed it ever was. Well, times would change. Sera had given her misgivings, her warnings, her words of caution. If and when things went muddy, she hoped to be able to gloat to the matron's face somewhere safe for them all.

  "We're leaving," she barked to the twins. The two were surrounded by a small school of carved figurines. The russet lookalikes shrugged and handed their tools over to little Nameel, who received them with great seriousness.

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  "Back to the city?" asked Jumilla. The twin's face spoke her distaste better than any mere words could.

  "You two, yes," Sera told them. "To fetch the float. Tell the guards the rest of us are too wobbly to swim and you're picking us up by the rear flaps. Happens all the time, so they shouldn't think twice."

  "Gotcha. Come on, sis!"

  In the next room over, she located Rook and Brownie min Front-Bubbles doing their rune-stuff to an appreciative audience of littles. She was almost sorry to interrupt. "You two, if you wanna keep working on that thing, fine, but take it with us. Find someone to send it back to the matron whenever you're done."

  A heavy huff made the front-bubbles rise higher. "And you're ordering us, because..."

  "Course of the fact that we don't want trouble, and the skola are due back by the end of the noonish hour." The princess didn't get it, predictably, but the shared look on the orphelines' faces should've told her what. Again, Sera felt like cursing the matron's stubbornness. Her own experiences with Skola Stefahni had been more than enough to convince her to leave, years ago, and she doubted Old Whiskerbrains had mellowed any.

  It was far easier to pull Ardenne away from the cleaning duties of the kitchen. The green mer didn't voice a single word of complaint, simply nodding and following along. The entire crèche of orphelines saw them out, trilling and cheering as they swam off into distant waters.

  She wished she could take them all with her. Next time, she promised herself, she'd bring a float big enough to do just that. "Go with the flow, lasses!" she called behind her. The answering shout was much louder than any skola would've approved, which did her heart proud.

  "Time to show you all the right side of this sea," she told the others.