“Go ahead and change,” Maire says.
I want to resist her, the way I refused to sit down on the chair, but I’m too cold. As fast as I can, I slip on the dry underclothes, the pants and shirt. My chilled fingers fumble with the buttons.
“Finished?” Maire asks, and when I don’t answer, she lowers the blanket. “There,” she says. “That’s better.”
And then she takes my chin in her hands and looks right into my eyes.
“Rio,” Maire says, “it’s time.” She leans in and whispers into my ear, “You need to tell us who you are.”
She pulls away. “The people from Above are tired of helping us,” Maire says, her voice brutal and clear. “Our mines are depleted and useless to them now, and they have stopped sending us food. We’re a drain on their resources. And you know what happened in the deep-market.”
Is she saying that the people Above caused the breach somehow?
The door opens, and Nevio comes into the room. So he was behind the dark glass. “You’ve said too much,” he says. “As always.”
“I’m right, as always,” Maire says. “By telling Rio what’s happening, I’m giving Atlantia a chance.” She nods to me. Her lips form the word speak. But she doesn’t command me to say it. Why? Even now, she still wants me to have the choice?
I don’t understand any of this. They’re working together, that much is clear, but I see nothing warm, no sign of collaboration between the two of them. In fact, when Maire addresses Nevio, I hear a simmering, long-brewed hatred that she doesn’t bother to hide.
Maire meets my gaze. “This is the last chance, Rio,” she says. “We’re out of time. If you want to go to the surface, this is the way.”
My mother trusted Maire. So did Bay. And Maire gave me the shell and told me many things I’d never known. And I have no other way to the surface. I have to trust her, too.
And I want to speak. I want to go to the surface.
I tried to get there myself, and I failed.
So I do it. I use my real voice. I say what I’ve wanted to say all my life.
“I am a siren.”
Maire closes her eyes.
I’ve spoken the truth. I’ve said what I am as loud as I can.
It sounds so powerful that I feel my heart will break, or break free from me.
I am.
A siren.
CHAPTER 20
Nevio stares at me.
“But that’s not possible,” he says. “You’re related to Maire by blood.”
“Nevertheless,” Maire says. “She is a siren. You heard her.”
Nevio keeps looking at me. Then he smiles. “Bring her to my office,” he says, and he walks out of the room, leaving my aunt and me alone.
“Why now?” I ask Maire as soon as Nevio leaves. I use my false voice. It’s hard to do after speaking in my real one.
She takes me by the arm, and I try to twist away, but her grip is strong.
“Good,” she says. “Keep using your old voice. Save the true one. You will need it Above.” And then the peacekeepers catch up to us, and Maire lets go.
I expect them to take us to Nevio’s office in the temple, but instead we walk down a long corridor and to another door. So he also has an office in the Council buildings. They offered one to my mother, but she never used it. She liked to do all her work in the temple.
A peacekeeper opens the door for us, and I stand there and gape. I can’t help it.
Nevio’s office here is like nothing I’ve ever seen. The walls are paneled entirely in wood. I feel like I’m standing inside a tree, where its heart should be, and I don’t like it.
“We need to take her with us to the surface,” Nevio says.
“Yes,” Maire says.
“I should have known.” Nevio paces around me. “That dull voice. It stood to reason that you were hiding something.” He laughs, a truly ugly sound because it’s full of anger and condescension, no mirth at all. He turns on Maire. “How long have you known?”
“Not long,” Maire says. “I heard her that day in the temple when her sister went Above.”
“And you didn’t tell me?”
“I didn’t,” Maire agrees.
“Did anyone else hear you?” Nevio asks me.
“Justus did,” Maire says.
“Justus,” Nevio says dismissively, as if Justus is nothing at all. “Anyone else?”
The Minister pacing, Maire betraying, neither one of them treating me as if I’m a person at all. I told them what I was, but nothing has changed—
“That boy she’s been running around with,” Maire says, and my head snaps up. “His name is—”
“Stop,” I say, and I don’t hold anything back.
For one long, long second, they do stop. Nevio quits pacing. Maire doesn’t speak.
Then Maire says, “True Beck.”
No. Not True. How did she know?
“Impressive,” Nevio says, his eyes running over me like I’m a fascinating piece of sculpture to admire; a line of scripture to decipher; a thing, not a person. “She told us to stop, and we did. How long did it last?” he asks Maire.
“Just for a moment,” Maire says. “And you?”
“The same,” he says.
For a few seconds, I made them do what I wanted.
Nevio watches me, calculating. Is he changing his mind about what should be done with me? Why does he get to decide?
He doesn’t.
“I am going Above,” I say, in my true voice.
I’ve known it all along. I’ve known it since I could first think or feel. Hearing myself say it now takes away all uncertainty. Maire shakes her head at me. She told me that she wants me to save my voice. For what? Why does it matter now?
I’m going Above.
“You are,” Nevio says. “Take care of everything,” he tells Maire. “We leave as soon as they send down the transports.”
“I know you hate me,” Maire says as we hurry down the hall together. The peacekeepers have vanished, and Maire and I follow the winding pathways of the Council buildings, a place I know only from the artfully constructed exteriors, the sand- and candy-colored stuccos of the buildings.
I don’t deny it. “You said that you’d let me choose.”
“You were the one who made the final choice, who said the words just now,” Maire says. “Which is good. Because this won’t work if it isn’t what you want. And we are running out of time. If you don’t come up with us now, you’ll be stuck Below forever.”