Amberine forgot to breathe for the half heartbeat after Chancellor Lisanor said the name.
"Professor Draven Arcanum Drakhan."
The words struck the amphitheater like a gavel. Amberine's throat tightened first, then her ribs followed—as if her chest had decided it was suddenly too small to contain a living heart. Her palms were slick inside her gloves. She tried to flex her fingers and found the movement stiff, like her nerves had turned into damp rope.
Under the sweep of the crystal dome, the ocean light shifted. Bands of refracted blue slid over the crowd and the floating platforms, and for a moment Amberine felt as if she were seated on the floor of the sea itself.
Ifrit, tucked under her robe like a secret coal, twitched against her skin.
"Too much water," his voice rasped in her mind, irritated and low. "It presses. It mocks."
