The only thing every melusine had in common, it seemed, was their legs.

“We have not walked for many years,” Aurélien said as means of explanation.

From around the bend of the street, a team of sienna-colored octopi surged into view, pulling a gilded carriage behind. Except its paint had disintegrated in the salty water, and its wood had mostly rotted, caving in half the roof. Still, the melusines nearest it clapped gleefully, and the couple inside—one wore a monocle, for Christ’s sake—waved as if royalty. And perhaps they were. Perhaps kings and queens in the world below owned octopi and carriages. Perhaps they also sewed shark teeth into veils and wore golden cutlery in their powdered wigs.

The entire city glittered with the air of ludicrous opulence gone to seed.

I adored it.

“I want a wig.” I couldn’t see enough as we marched past little shops of stone with planter boxes of red algae. One melusine walked his pet spotted turtle on a gold-threaded leash. Another lounged in a claw-footed tub at the street corner, pouring water from a pitcher onto her legs. They transformed back into obsidian fins before our very eyes. Merchants hawked wares of everything from conch fritters and crab legs to oyster-and-pearl earrings and music boxes. The light of the sea stars undulated eerily across each face, the only illumination in the entire city. “Why do melusines own wigs?”

“And gowns?” Coco asked, eyeing the couple nearest us. They both wore heavy trains of brocade velvet and . . . corsets. Just corsets. No bodices. No chemises. “How do you wear them with fins? Wouldn’t skirts weigh you down in the water?”

“Can a melusine drown?” I asked curiously.

Olympienne tilted her lavender head between us in consideration. She pursed her lavender lips. “Do not be silly. Of course melusines cannot drown. We have gills.” She bared her neck, revealing pearlescent slits along the side of her throat. “And lungs.” She inhaled deeply. “But yes, unfortunately, such handsome attire can prove quite troublesome underwater. We have much anticipated your arrival for just this reason.”

“To wear dresses?” Beau frowned as a young boy strode past in scarlet breeches and billowing cloak. He bared sharp teeth at us. “You drained the entire city to wear . . . dresses.”

“We drained the city because we are courteous hosts,” Lasimonne said, his voice unexpectedly deep. “That we should also wear our treasure is a pleasant inclusion.”

Wear our treasure. Huh. It made sense. Where else would a melusine trapped below water find such sumptuous clothing but sunken ships? Perhaps Lasimonne’s ruby nipple rings had come from the ship we approached at this very moment, splintered at the base of Le Palais de Cristal.

“How long does it take to drain an entire city?” I peered down a darkened alley that seemed to drop straight into an abyss, where I swore I saw an enormous eye blink. “And what’s down there?”

“A giant squid. No, do not provoke it.” Aurélien steered me back onto the main road with the tip of his trident.

“Isla foresaw your arrival months ago.” Sabatay tossed his braid over a sculpted shoulder and gestured for us to keep moving. The palace loomed directly ahead of us now. “From the moment you chose to marry the huntsman rather than flee or allow the authorities to lock you away.”

Beau cleared his throat, glancing up at the waters far above. The sea stars’ reflection pulsed faintly in his dark eyes. “Yet Constantin was quite adamant that Célie and I not enter this place. Indeed, he said humans who drank of the waters would go mad.”

Elvire looked at us from over her shoulder. “And did you drink of the waters?”

“I—” Beau frowned and looked at Célie. “Did we?”

She shook her head slowly, brow creasing. “I don’t know. I did have a rather disturbing dream while unconscious, but I thought . . .”

Elvire patted her arm knowingly. “Dreams are never dreams, Mademoiselle Célie. They are our deepest wishes and darkest secrets made true, whispered only under cloak of night. In them, we are free to know ourselves.”

Beau’s skin appeared sallow in the ghostly light, and he swallowed, visibly disturbed. “I didn’t speak any truth.”

Elvire arched a silver brow. “Didn’t you, Your Highness?” When he didn’t answer—merely stared at her in confusion and dismay—she chuckled softly. “Never fear. You shall not go mad from it. You entered the waters under the Oracle’s invitation, and she will protect your mind for the duration of your stay.”

My own frown deepened as more guards lowered a rotten gangway for us to board the ship. “The only human entrance into Le Palais de Cristal,” Aurélien explained, prodding us forward. Tentatively, we followed the others atop the soft wood. It bowed beneath our weight.

A buxom melusine waited for us above, her silver hair elaborately coiffed and her gray eyes clouded with age. Fine smile lines crinkled the corners of her mouth. “Bonsoir,” she greeted us with a deep curtsy, her train sparkling behind her on the deck. She wore no forks or monocles, instead looking every inch the consummate human aristocrat. Even the color and fabric of her gown—aubergine silk embellished with golden thread—would’ve been the height of fashion in Cesarine. “Welcome to Le Palais de Cristal. I am Eglantine, the Oracle’s personal handmaid and lady of this palace. I shall be attending you during your stay in our home.”

With the same impeccable grace and innate confidence as Angelica, she turned toward the colossal doors to our left. By some miracle, water hadn’t eroded the structure beyond—perhaps the captain’s quarters?—as it had much of the quarterdeck. Some boards had splintered or rotted completely, leaving gaping holes through which candlelight flickered from below. Music too. I strained to hear fragments of the haunting melody, but Aurélien prodded me forward once more, through the doors and onto a grand staircase. Covered in moldy carpet and lit by gilded candelabra, the stairs seemed to descend into the belly of the ship.

I glanced at the crystal spires above our head. “Are we not going up?”

“Guests are not permitted in the towers.” Aurélien poked me more insistently now. “Only the Oracle and her court inhabit them.”

“Are you part of her court, then?”

He puffed out his muscled chest, a peculiar shade between white and gray. Like fog. “I am.”