Jonah shivered under the influence of her compulsion. But Mira did let up, and Jonah’s euphoric expression faded into a disappointed pout. She felt mildly disgusted at herself for resorting to such a heavy-handed use of her magick, but was even more disgusted by the Danjou. Before emigrating to the States, the European enclaves had long desired to claim the deserts of Africa and Arabia, but the Mediterraneans prevented them from crossing the seas. Then the Amir had been born, and the miracle of such a powerful mage arising out of the desert had stymied the Europeans’ ambitions.
“How will the Danjou get past the djinni?” Mira asked. Air travel may have mooted the sirens’ control of the seas, but the Amir’s geas-barrier still stood between the Danjou and Arabia’s rich silica-salt fields.
“Elder Hilda is perfecting a counter-spell. Or so she tells Elder Tyrone,” Jonah replied.
Despite Mira’s pressing, Jonah didn’t know much more than that. She left him to find his fruity drinks and forget his troubles for the rest of the weekend. As she dove back into the water, Mira wondered if it were now time for them to try to get direct access to one of the Danjou elders. That would be hard though; the elders so rarely left the enclave, and it would be beyond dangerous to interfere with the most powerful of the Danjou. Still, her conversation with Jonah proved Atlantea was right: this war was coming — will she, nil she. Mira looked forward to the swim up to Boston to clear her head; she did not look forward to telling Atlantea what she had learned.
Most active sirens dwell exclusively in siren settlements for community and protection. Attempting to continue your mundane life among people who are now instinctually driven to passionate and irrational hatred of you is extremely dangerous. Fertile humans, even latent sirens, have no control over their reactions. The only known means of preventing their response is through biological fertility elimination; mage spells are ineffective. The prevalence of hormonal birth control, combined with the relatively lower levels of aggression and societal power in human females, has made it increasingly possible for female sirens to settle in mundane communities. These factors, however, make it more difficult for a male siren to settle outside a siren community. It is strongly discouraged for any male siren to even make such an attempt.
– Sirens: An Overview for the Newly-Transitioned, 3rd ed. (2015), by Mira Bant de Atlantic, p. 17.
Chapter 18
Thomas dragged himself back into the house, waving absently at the gate guards who monitored his front entrance. The women were competent in the extreme, their natural affinity towards him amplifying their professional concern for his well-being into near obsession. He had spent the morning playing soccer with Kadu and the rest of the were team, and felt a pleasant soreness from the activity. Of course, the jaguars treated sports like combat training, so playing soccer with them could be extremely dangerous. Thomas felt a bit of a thrill at having escaped the match without serious injury.
He was also relieved to be back in Brazil. His mother had given him an earful for failing to tell her about Cordy’s pregnancy; he was still smarting from her lecture, but at least she had decided to stay with Cordy. And now that her baby was born, Thomas was off the hook to go to back to Kasos … or Yorkshire. He refused to let himself feel guilty.
But he wondered how Angus was doing … and all the Aos Sí. He’d even called Marisol to see if she were headed back there anytime soon. Her power was infinitely stronger than his. Unfortunately, she’d gotten the wrong impression, and thought that Thomas wanted to go back to the preserve. He’d had a difficult time explaining to Marisol why he cared. Indeed, he had a difficult time understanding why he cared.
Thomas shrugged the memories aside to focus instead on the ache in his legs. Despite all of his racing with the fae, he was out of shape. The jaguars were the toughest group he’d ever met. He was punching well above his weight with all the company he kept; sometimes Thomas marveled that he was still alive. Maybe he did have a death wish.
All in all, Thomas was having a harder time fitting himself back into his Brazilian life than he had expected. The short break in his routine had thrown him off his game. Or maybe he would have found himself in a rut even had he stayed in Salvador. There was so little for him to do with his business, really. It wasn’t a failing enterprise to be rescued anymore; after five years, it was running smoothly.
Even their latest novelty sport that he’d been so excited about before didn’t interest him now. Thomas had never been involved in any of the day-to-day operations — it would have been far too dangerous for him to have led any of the tours himself. They had female tour guides to handle all the face-to-face interactions, and his partner, Marcia Santos, piloted all their flights. Thomas simply dreamed up new amusements, then developed the marketing strategy to attract their foreign clientele. He’d originally been annoyed that Cordy’s summons had delayed the rollout of their new skydiving offering, but now he didn’t even care that the Swedish National Team was coming at the end of the month to try the wingsuits.
Thomas’ cellphone rang. It was a blocked number, and he debated answering. But his heart started pounding in the vague hope that it was her, and he picked up. “Olá.”
“Thomas? It’s Kevin.”
“Kevin, how are you?” He felt like he had just seen his biological son, but thinking about it, realized it had been over a year since they last spoke. While it seemed to Thomas that mundane parents typically initiated calls to their children, it was the reverse in siren communities: offspring called their progenitors, hassling them for being out of touch. Or perhaps it was only Thomas who never called anyone; that was one of Mary’s common complaints.
As Kevin started filling Thomas in on the latest events in Kōkai-Heika’s court, Thomas wondered why they didn’t speak Japanese to one another, now that Thomas knew the language. Well, they had always spoken in English before. Given how infrequently they actually talked, it would probably be weird to shift to Japanese.
“I have good news.” Kevin was finally getting to the point of the call. While he may have been born in America, his mannerism of polite indirection was completely Japanese. “My second child will be born in December.”
“Congratulations!” Thomas said. Kevin already had a son, who would now be about five or six. Mira sent Thomas fairly creepy updates about his offspring’s lives every now and again. He supposed he should be grateful for his mother’s obsession in ensuring transition survival, but he would rather not know so many details about the life of a near-stranger.
His mother had actually argued with Kevin about the wisdom of placing the child with a Japanese family. Ultimately, her pitch regarding the risk of a culture with a low birthrate won out, and Kevin’s son had been adopted by a well-off couple in the Philippines. Mira had wanted the child in the United States, of course, where it would be easier for her to keep track of him, but her winning argument had cut both ways in that regard.
“Thomas, I have given much thought over the years to what Nanna Mira said when Adrian was born. And recently, I have begun to feel more of a — I’m not sure how to phrase it — a pull perhaps to the Atlantic.”
“A pull?” Thomas asked. Kevin had been raised in the Pacific, home of his biological mother, but Thomas was an Atlantic on both sides.
“Ever since my first trip through the Atlantic for the Festival of Aphrodite.”
Thomas murmured his assent, but only vaguely remembered that Kevin had even gone to Kasos.
“I sometimes think I hear the Atlantic in my dreams. I hear ice cracking and it seems to call out to me…” Kevin’s voice trailed off.
“You’re a cross-Oceanic child, Kevin. It was never certain that you’d feel welcomed by the Pacific instead of the Atlantic. I expected my father’s ocean to embrace me, but it didn’t work out that way. I’m far more at home here in the Southern Atlantic than I ever was in the North.” Thomas wondered how he could have wasted so much time at his progenitor’s court. Looking back, he could see how unhappy he had been then; b
ut at the time, he had felt only a grim determination to make it work.
“Liu Yang, my daughter’s mother, is also of both oceans. But the Pacific favors her, and she doesn’t hear the Atlantic calling. Still, we’ve been discussing it and think that Panama City would be the right choice.”
For a moment, Thomas didn’t know what Kevin meant. Then he realized Kevin was talking about finding adoptive parents in Panama. “That could be a good location for a cross-Oceanic child, latent though they will be,” Thomas temporized. He had never been to Panama.
“How do you find living among the mundanes, Thomas?” Kevin asked, and Thomas thought this was perhaps the real reason his son was calling him now. Many sirens yearned to be part of the “real world,” as they called it, only to be destroyed by mundanes when they attempted it.
“The only way I’ve made it work is because I live in Bahia, which is controlled by the were-jaguars. My home borders their largest estate. I don’t think I could survive as my mother did, truly living among mundanes. I—” Thomas swallowed. “I would not recommend it.”
“Are you far from Panama? I mean, if a transition were to occur, would you be close enough to feel it and get there?”
“They say distance doesn’t make a difference with respect to feeling a birth in your line. But it certainly matters in terms of saving the transitioned siren … Salvador isn’t close to Panama, but it’s certainly closer than Ryukyu Arc.
“Kevin, if you don’t feel the Pacific, and the Atlantic is perhaps calling to you, don’t stay.” Thomas didn’t want Kevin to waste years like he had, trying to fit himself into a place that wasn’t quite right, but also wasn’t bad enough to drive him away.
“I was thinking of going to Panama to find suitable parents. Perhaps afterwards, I might visit you? See the Southern Atlantic?”
Thomas struggled for a moment with his deep desire for Kevin to stay far away from him. His mother had barely been able to save Kevin when he was born. If anything were to happen to him here, there would be no doubt that it was Thomas’ fault. But he couldn’t say any of that. So he simply said, “Of course,” and got off the phone as quickly as he could. He’d have to tell Juliane to hire additional guards. Maybe Kadu would be interested in staying with him as well … unless it was a full moon, of course.
His brief call with Kevin had delayed his shower, and the sweat had dried into an itchy mantle around his back. As he went upstairs to finally wash up, his attention was caught by the framed picture on his wall from Christmas 1988: his last year as a human, and their last year together as a family. Of course, Mom had looked so different then. Mary had crimped her hair, and Amy and Cordy both looked impossibly young. And there he was, tall, blond and smirking slightly. While he looked the same then as he did now, his frivolous expression in the photo made him feel like a completely different person.
Thomas shook his head. Not for the first time he wryly imagined that he was perhaps the only person who would be telling the literal truth when he said Bon Jovi had changed his life.
He’d been on Varsity since his freshman year — and had even just set the Loyola record in the 800m butterfly. He might look the same in a photograph, but he was sure he could never carry off that same careless look as he had when he was twenty, when he’d been full of the kind of joie de vivre that only people who never faced any real problems had.
It had all started the fall of his sophomore year. Like most college boys, he’d been short on cash. Then one of his buddies told him about a sperm bank paying thirty dollars a pop for college guys to jerk off in a cup. That had been a no-brainer way to get some quick cash. When the New Jersey band Bon Jovi came to Long Beach on their Slippery When Wet Tour, he had enough to take his latest girlfriend to see them live.
It had been little over a year after that concert when he woke up unusually early with an overwhelming urge to head down to Playa Del Rey. Thomas wasn’t by nature an early riser; his teammates joked that if he didn’t have so many girlfriends to get him up for practice, he’d never stay on the team. But that day, he wasn’t even groggy. Charlene wasn’t sleeping over because she had a test that morning, so no one would be surprised if he missed practice this time. He grabbed his wetsuit, towel, and goggles, and headed off to the beach for a swim.
The moment Thomas waded into the water, he paused uncertainly. He had mindlessly set off to the beach, but now that he was there, he felt somewhat bemused. Why was he there? The sun was barely up, and he wasn’t planning to compete in the Open Water Swim this year, so why had he felt so compelled? Christ, he was missing swim practice to go swimming in the ocean! That was stupid.
But he was already there, and surprisingly, the water didn’t feel cold; it actually felt great. It was around dawn in March, so the beach was completely empty. No one came for sunrises on the Pacific Coast — especially when it was like fifty degrees out. The water was warmer than the air, and Thomas had come all this way for a swim, hadn’t he? So he plunged in and started swimming past the point where the waves were breaking. But instead of turning parallel to the beach, he just kept swimming farther out to sea. He wasn’t cold and wasn’t tired. At some point, his mind caught up with his body, and he turned back towards shore.
By the time he got back to the beach, the sun was midway up and it was almost noon. Thomas felt invigorated and somewhat astonished that he wasn’t at all tired. Maybe he should compete in the Semana Nautica this summer! He walked back towards campus, generally oblivious to the people around him. He felt so great. Before getting lunch and heading to class, he headed back to the dorm to shower and change. When he got into his room and tossed his keys on the desk, he noticed the red light blinking on his answering machine and reflexively hit play.
“Thomas, it’s your mother. Listen, something terrible has happened. Please, please listen carefully to this message.” His mother was not prone to hysterics, and her voice was tight, anxious. Thomas’ good mood evaporated and his heart started pounding.
“Do not, whatever you do, do not leave your room. Lock the door and don’t let anyone in until I get there. Please—” his mother’s voice broke in a brief sob, “please lock your door. Don’t go outside. I promise I’ll explain everything. But you have to stay inside. Alone. It’s — it’s a medical emergency. I know I’m not explaining very well now. But you have to stay inside. Don’t open the door for anyone except me. Best thing is to just pretend you aren’t home. Just stay inside. Please. Oh God, I pray you get this message before it’s too late. I’m arriving around two o’clock your time and I’ll call you when I land. I love you. Please just stay in your room. Lock your door. Okay. Bye.”
Thomas didn’t know what to think. What was wrong with him? How could his mother know something was wrong with him? Was something wrong with her? He played the message again. And a third time. A medical emergency? He had never bothered to set the correct time and date on his answering machine, but after comparing what it believed the current time to be with the actual time, Thomas figured out that his mother had left the message at 6:08 that morning.
What kind of contagious illness could he have? Why didn’t she at least tell him what the medical emergency was? Thomas hadn’t seen his family since Christmas break, so couldn’t think of what kind of illness would be so extreme that he would have to lock his doors. He’d heard of meningitis outbreaks at college campuses; but even if that were the issue, he couldn’t fathom why it would be so dangerous his mother would be flying out. Or why she couldn’t have simply said so on the phone.
His deliberations had consumed maybe three-quarters of an hour. It was past noon. Two hours to wait. His skin was sticky from the salt water, but Thomas didn’t dare leave his room to take a shower in the bathroom down the hall. He had been hungry before, but had now completely lost his appetite. He changed into sweats and wandered aimlessly from his desk to his bed, idly flipping through his books. He couldn’t focus.
Thomas remembered those hours as a numb blur. His initial frenetic worry
ing had subsided into a dull waiting. He even prayed. He remembered feeling somewhat surprised that he knew so many prayers after only going to church when dragged by his mother. Oh Star of the Sea, he thought. He fished the Miraculous Medal his mother had given him when he went off to college out of his desk drawer. “For my doubting Thomas,” she had said.
Even at Loyola, a Jesuit college, it was fashionable to poke fun at the so-called mysteries of faith. A virgin birth; how silly. All these so-called miracles of the Bible were just the output of unregistered mages. The ancients ascribed the miracles of burning bushes and resurrections to God, but in reality, they were just magical enchantments created by mages who hadn’t been well-understood at the time. The modern Science of the Magical Arts could now explain most of the “miracles” that formed the basis of most world religions.
But waiting now, trying to keep from thinking about the unknown risk to him that had his mother’s voice quaking, he prayed. He stopped doubting or questioning and simply prayed to the Virgin Mother.
The sound of his phone ringing cut through the daytime silence of the dorm. Thomas’ apparent calm was belied by his aggressive pounce to answer it. “Hello,” he said. The phone had only rung once when he picked it up.
“Thomas.” He could hear the relief in his mother’s voice. “Thank God you’re there. I’m at the Santa Monica Airport right now.”
Thomas broke in, “Mom, what’s going on?”
“I’ll explain everything when I get there. I’ll be at your dorm in about a half-hour. Everything is going to be fine, as long as you just wait inside for me.” His mother sounded a lot calmer. Controlled, but more like her usual self.
“Can I just take a shower down the hall?”
Sirens Unbound Page 22
