They didn’t laugh, not even my Hurley who always had a smile on his face. Instead, they looked forlorn. Their eyes searched the harbour and what they could see of the town, as if to catch a glimpse of me. It only made my guilt worse and my heart ache.
Even when the boat pulled away from the dock, they stood on the top deck at the railing, watching the city, their faces hidden from the crew but not me. I saw the heartache and regret there and it mirrored my own. These men were my everything, but even everything had its limits. I forced myself under the water and matched their ship’s pace, determination flowing through me. I kept telling myself the quicker I sought proof and took it to my father, the sooner I could be back in their arms. My plan had holes, but desperation did strange things to a person.
Their ship wasn’t the fastest through the water and I found myself replaying everything that had happened while I was on land. I also wondered where my sisters were and how they were doing. Hopefully better than me.
An orca’s distressed cry had me stilling in the water, and my tail flicked from side to side as I listened. Glancing back at the boat, I chewed on my lower lip unsure what to do, but when the distress call came again I turned away from the ship—and my men—and towards it. I knew I could catch them later, but I needed to know what had happened and help. It’s just who I was, and after witnessing so much death today, helping someone might have made me feel better.
My decision made, I lowered my head and cut through the water. I might have always been the dreamer, not the most serious of my sisters, but I was the fastest and I used that to my advantage here. Racing through the water, letting the distress call and the water current guide me, I found the pod quickly.
Slowing underneath the two whales, I almost cried at what I found. There, above me in the water, clearly breaking the surface, was a mother and a calf. The mother was underneath, and when I swam to the side to get a better look, I noticed the calf was on its side with blood pumping steadily from it, and it was obviously unable to swim. The mother was there supporting it the whole time, crying for help as she tried to keep her baby alive.
A splash made me look behind me to see four killer whales, they had obviously been tracking the distress call and the blood too, and they were on the hunt. As much as I wanted to, I couldn’t interrupt it, it was nature after all, but when I turned back to the whales, the mother was looking at me. Her black eyes were locked on me and pleading and I knew I was going to help.
I swam closer slowly so I didn’t startle them. Circling, trying to find the cause of the problem, I finally saw it and anger burst to life in my chest.
A harpoon was stuck in the baby whale. Ripped through its tiny body, and each breath and touch of the water must have been agony for it.
The killer whales were watching now. Usually they would be chasing the mother and waiting for her to tire before killing the baby, but with me here they knew to stay back. All the predators of the deep feared the siren, but they also respected us. I couldn’t let them kill her and her baby, something rose deep inside of me and I locked eyes on them, power filling my voice.
“You will leave them be.” I ordered, the same power from my song but in my voice this time wrapping around the whales. They stopped instantly, heeding my command and I blew out a relieved breath.
Laying my hand on the mother whale, I tried to tell her I would help, but it would get worse before it got better. Her eyes slowly closed and blinked open, and I took that as acceptance. Swimming to the harpoon, I laid my hand on the baby to brace and warn it. I counted down in my head before I yanked the harpoon from the baby. It let out a weak jaw clap, which its mother answered. I sealed my hands on the hole, and I noticed that my long, black, sharp nails and scales clashed with its skin before I closed my eyes.
All sirens had powers, magic, it’s in our blood, in our voices, but we were more than just a song. We could take lives as easily as we could save them, and for once I was going to save one. Ignoring my lust powers that always lingered, I pushed deeper. I found this one by accident and when I realised neither of my sisters possessed it, I pushed it far down. I didn’t want to stand out or have people looking too closely at me, and this would have made them.
Calling it to me now, I pushed it out of my hands and into the baby. It thrashed underneath me, but stuck between its mother and me, there was not much it could do. I could see it in my mind’s eye, my pink power swirling through the damage and fixing it, pulling together skin and muscles nothing but a silver scar remained. I removed my hands and drifted downwards and away, letting them have space. My body felt drained, but I knew it would pass, it was just the cost of using magic.
I held my breath as the baby moved only to still again. All was silent until it turned over and faced its mother. A relieved smile broke out across my face, flashing my fangs as the mother and child started to make their journey away from the now pissed looking killers. I narrowed my eyes and swam their way, and spanked each one.
“Naughty, now go on. Get going!” I ordered, pointing in the other direction. Huffing, they turned and swam the other way—not wanting to piss me off.
Turning back to the direction of the ship, I cut through the water again as exhilaration raced through me from stretching my tail after being trapped in human form. My heart felt like it was aching being away from my men, so I sped up, only to slow again when blood-red water surrounded me.
What now?
Blinking hard, I swam through the blood saturating the ocean until I found the source. A trail of now finless sharks littered the water, as they slowly sank down to the bottom. Passing more and more, anger started to build in me until I came upon a ship. It was small, the smallest I had ever seen, but from below the blood-red water I watched as another dead, finless shark’s body was tossed carelessly back into the sea.
Spinning, I looked down to see a gam of sharks waiting in the darkness below, watching the bodies of their family and friends. I could feel their bodies vibrating with hate and the need for violence. Looking back up, I felt that same feeling run through my body. How could they be so cruel, so uncaring? Hesitating under the boat, I froze when a baby hammerhead body was flung into the water right in front of me. A cry sounded below, a mother’s wail, as her baby’s body was returned to her. Her pain called to me, begging me to stop them. To do what I was born to do. Fighting the feelings I reached out and cradled the bleeding, finless babe.
I held it to my chest as I swam down to the waiting sharks. They circled around me as the blood of their own leaked out. The mother came forward and I let go of her babe. It floated between us as she nudged it, before it started to sink again. I watched, my heart breaking, as she followed it down and both were swallowed by the darkness of the deep.
Kill them.
The whisper came through the water, it begged me, a plea only for my ears. The monsters of the deep turning to me for help.
The water swarmed with thrashing fins and angry sharks, and I floated through the middle, as my anger replaced my sadness. Something dark pushed from my chest, coursing through my body and whispering that they must pay.
Looking back up through the ring of sharks, I saw the bodies slowly floating down from the boat and I knew what I needed to do.
Decision made, I let go of my reservations. Instead, I let my siren side take over. I swam through the sharks and they let me pass until I was underneath the boat. I wanted this over fast, but I also wanted them to know why.
Grabbing hold of the hull, I yanked myself up the side until I could peer over the metal railing. The sailors had their backs to me as one hacked at sharks and the other tossed the dead ones off the side of the boat. Blood coated the men and the entire hull, and it made me gnash my fangs together. Throwing myself over the side, I landed as a siren. My mouth opening, as my song poured out.
They froze before dropping everything and turned to face me. Their faces were pale and entrapped as they sluggishly started to stumble towards me. I felt the change come over me,
faster than ever before, and when I stood on human legs, naked, the song was still on my lips as they stopped before me. Stronger men could fight it. There were even myths that men truly in love were immune to a siren, but not these men. These men were mine.
Two more emerged from the hold below, shuffling over to me until they stood in a line with the others. I leaned forward and cupped the first man's cheek, watching as he closed his eyes in bliss, and happiness, pure unfiltered happiness spread across his wet, blood-stained face. It dripped onto my hand, a reminder of why I was doing this.
Moving closer, I let my song wrap around him as I trailed off.
“Take your cleaver and kill yourself, like you killed them,” I whispered seductively. A tear trailed from his eye and I wiped it away gently. “Now.”
I pulled back and carried on singing as the others started to rouse. I watched as the man turned, picked up his cleaver, and hacked at his other hand. He screamed, wordlessly and long, as blood spurted and splattered everywhere. When he didn’t die, he took the clever to his neck and sliced, trying to cut off his own head. As he dropped to the deck, blood pooled around him from his half-decapitated head, and his now vacant eyes were still locked on mine when I turned to the others. The one who was throwing the sharks overboard was sweating, his body was fidgeting. He was trying to fight me.
“Throw yourself over,” I ordered, before carrying on singing. He turned, blubbering like a baby, before taking a running jump. He flew over the edge of the ship and I heard him hit the water, and then he screamed as the sharks took care of him.
Turning back to the other two I stopped singing. The younger man on the left shook as he tried to plead with me. “Please!” he begged, the words garbled like he had pulled them from the bottom of his soul.
I stepped forward and cupped his cheek like a lover would. “Shh.” He calmed at the sound of my voice and I stroked him. “Did you stop? Did you listen to their cries? Their pleas? Did you?” I asked, my lips hovering over his.
“No,” he whispered back, and I grinned before dropping a gentle kiss on his trembling lips.
Stepping back, I dropped my hand from his cheek. “Steer the boat into that rock, and crash it,” I ordered.
They both turned towards the helm, making their way to the upper deck to do my bidding. With one last disgusted look at the massacre covering the deck, I turned and dove into the water, and the change took over as the water hit my skin, making me fully siren once again.
I swam farther down, trailing the ship with the sharks following me, until the ship crashed straight into the rock. I heard the engine stutter before exploding, and a fire raced along the ship. Two bodies splashed into the water, the two remaining sailors, and I frowned. Next time I would have to be more specific. Wait, next time?
Wood, bodies, and other items rained down into the water where the sharks and I waited. I turned to face them and nodded.
I sensed their gratitude as they picked off the remaining crew members who escaped to the water. But reality hit me then, what did I do?
I had finally fulfilled my destiny, so why did it feel so hollow? Was taking a life for a life really the best way? What if it was to stop the culling of a species? Did that make it better? The two halves of me warred, and it left me vulnerable. So vulnerable that I didn't notice another boat turning up, or the net that descended into the water and around me.
Once it closed, I started struggling, thrashing my fins and tail. When it did nothing, I grabbed the net and started tugging and pulling, but even with my strength I only managed to create a small hole. I felt something touch me and when I looked behind me, I found a shark panicking, also caught in the net.
Fuck. There had been enough death today. Leaning forward, I gnawed on the net and pulled at the same time, creating a hole just big enough for the shark to slip through. I pushed it and it swam away right when we broke through the water, which left me visible to the pirate ship it belonged to.
I heard gasps and the shouts of men and I turned in slow motion, meeting the eyes of the crew. They hauled the net in while I thrashed again, choking and trying to get free. Panic curled through my body. Don't get caught—it was our number one rule, and after seeing the destruction I just caused I didn’t think they were likely to be kind.
The net was heaved over the edge and dropped in the middle of the deck. I gasped for air as I felt my magic coursing through me, as did the change. It’s the one time I was truly weak and helpless, and I was acutely aware of that when my tail split into legs and my gills and fin retreated. My rapid shifts had obviously weakened me and slowed me down.
My ears rang and my eyes were fuzzy, and when I came back to myself I was curled up in my human form on the cold, wet wood. I blinked to clear the haze and looked up from between my wet, red hair as boots stopped right in front of me. I trailed my gaze from the boots, up thick thighs and a solid middle, until I met the eyes of Loch—my captain. His eyes flashed in shock before he covered it, and his lips twisted into a hateful sneer as he watched me coldly. That look alone made me cringe backwards, so unlike how soft and kind he was to me before. I could hear the call of my sharks, my whales in the water. They called to me, they asked if I needed help.
“Lock her up in the brig, and get me my first and second mate,” he shouted, before turning on his heel and leaving me to his crew. A tear dripped from my eyes as my heart froze in my chest. What were they going to do with me?
Chapter Six
The crew manhandled me, dragged me below deck to the brig, and threw me in a cell. I thought they would have left, but around five big sailors stood around the bars and stared at me. Shivering from being wet and cold, I curled into myself and peered at them over my knees, with blood still splattered on me.
“You think she’s really a siren?” one whispered, nudging the pudgy guy next to him.
“You saw her, of course she is!” he shouted, not bothering to lower his voice as he turned a sick-looking sneer on me.
The others in the room were quiet, drinking me in. Their eyes were seeking out every inch of bare skin and the look in a few of their gazes made me shrink into myself.
“Out, everybody the fuck out!” comes a yell, and they grumbled before trooping back up the stairs. It went silent then, and when no footsteps approached, I uncurled a little and took a cautious look around.
Bars, rusty looking ones but still strong, covered three of the walls, and fourth wall was the hull of the ship. Two other cages like this stood opposite me, hidden right at the back of the hold like I was. Sticking my head through the bars, I tried to peer past the wooden stairs that shielded this end of the ship from the other. All I could make out were bunks and crates, obviously the sleeping quarters for the crew. Pulling my head back, I shuffled until my spine met the wooden slats and leaned there. The cell was empty except for me, and when no one came down I started to fidget.
What were they going to do? Why hadn’t Hurley, Bay, or Loch come to see me? Questions ran through my head and I soon got up to pace, trying to burn off excess tension. My head jerked to the side when heavily booted feet stomped down the stairs. Turning to face them—I refused to shrink back again—I stood with my legs parted and my arms hanging by my sides.
Two men round the stairs, heading straight for me, and when I saw the sticks hanging from their hands I stepped back.
“We just had to see this for ourselves,” the one on the left jeered and his square, unmemorable face twisted. He was taller than me, skinny too. Lanky even, with greasy, unkempt hair and dirt across his face. The man next to him was massive, short, and square with muscle. His arms bulged against the sleeves of his shirt. His square face was flat and unattractive.
“She doesn’t look like a siren to me,” he rumbled, his voice sounded like metal grating on more metal, making me cringe.
“Maybe we should see.” The one on the left laughed and stepped forward. They circled the cage and I tried to spin to keep them in my gaze.
“Come on the
n, poppet. Turn for us, let us get a look so we know what we’re selling,” the first man taunted.
“Selling?” I whispered, and my face drained of colour as I stumbled—it was my first mistake. I was in close enough range and he jabbed the stick through the bars, smashing it into my ribs, making me cry out and fall back, right into the waiting hands of the other man.
He grabbed my hair through the bars and twisted, holding me there. Panting, I stopped moving. I could get out of this, I could rip myself away. It would hurt but I could, except I wanted to see what they would do first.
“Oh, you didn't know?” the lanky man sneered, coming around the cage and unlocking the door before he strode into my cell. He didn’t stop until he was pressed up against me, and his smelly breath wafted over me as he opened his mouth to show me cracked, blackened teeth. “Captain is going to let us sell you, we aren’t allowed to damage the goods though, but what he doesn’t know won’t hurt him,” he whispered and leaned forward.
Cringing, I turned my head to the side, which pulled my hair painfully in the other man's strong grasp. The lanky man licked a wet, horrible path across my cheek before pulling back with a laugh.
“Loc—The captain is letting you sell me?” I asked slowly, my heart pounding in my chest as a sick feeling started low in my stomach.
“Yup, to the highest bidder. The only siren ever captured alive.” He giggled crazily and leaned closer again. His hands drifted over my body, gripping my curves and making me cringe. Pushing back into the bars, I tried to escape his touch, but it was no use. He tweaked my nipple and I had to bite my lip to stop from whimpering. A sick feeling started in my stomach as I clenched my thighs together when his other hand grazed over my pelvis. Every finger, each touch, made my skin crawl and I had never felt so violated. He cupped my breasts, playing with them while he rubbed his hard cock against me through his leather breeches. I closed my eyes and tried to block him out, but even my thoughts were vile, like poison seeping through my blood.
Shipwreck Souls Page 7
