by Hazel Grace
Tybalt chortles, pushing himself up on his elbows. “The best way to die.”
“Good.” A skin-prickling crack jolts through the room as Tybalt’s body lifelessly slumps to the floor. Davina disregards him just as quickly as she snapped his neck, steps over his body, and strides in my direction. I’m blind with rage and remorse. These men will all suffer for my getting caught, and Davina will make sure I see every single one of them die.
“That was for you,” she jabs, stopping in front of me. “My sisters won’t be so kind tomorrow.”
Then she disappears out the door, leaving me with a dead shipmate and my dick semi fucking hard.
My ship rocks to the left as a cannonball hits the hull. Men skid along the deck, holding on to each other and any object they can to keep from falling while I’m staring at the fucker on the other ship, tipping his large black hat at me. On the Captain’s deck, he’s above everyone, in perfect view and as cocky and stupid as ever.
Delilah was built to be the strongest vessel in the Black Sea. With the most cannons, the strength to carry the largest amount of gunpowder and men. Whoever this lout thought he was, he is going to be pondering it beneath the waves of my ship.
He thought he was someone, I’ve never seen his ship before, but he flew a red Hunter flag and has been trying to ram us for the last five minutes to get some of their men on board. Some have attempted to, swinging off lines to land onto our decks just to delve right into the ocean.
However, the main problem was how far south he is. How close he is to Davina’s home and that no Hunter has ever come this far because Sirens are known to like the cooler water. So, immediately, something tips me off that this isn’t a coincidence because it has my Uncle Declan written all over it.
“Fire,” I bellow to my crew, already used to the sound of the twelve cannons going off almost simultaneously.
The ship rocks back a little from the force as I peer over at Asher, who has taken the wheel.
“Damage report,” I order.
“Few more hits, Capt’n,” he yells back. “Should be able to disable ‘em.”
I turn back to my crew. “Load up.” They follow my instructions, packing the cannons and waiting for my next order.
“Theon,” I shout over the whines of the ship, hitting the larger than normal waves that’s causing the damage it’s taken thus far. He appears at my side within seconds, silently waiting for me to speak. “I want the best men on the ship suited up to fight. The next round of cannons should incapacitate them.”
“Aye, aye, Capt’n,” he replies then scurries away.
“Men, get ready,” I charge. “The next pass they make, I’ll give the order to fire.”
The anticipation makes it feel like a lifetime. Impatiently I watch my men stand along the rail to receive my direction, adrenaline sprinting and heaving throughout my whole frame.
It feels like forever for their ship to turn around and make another drag along our vessel. The wind picks up around us, reminding me of Davina’s red hair and how she loves to sit along the ocean’s edge. How I left her with a dangerous Viking to find my brother, who’s still missing.
“They’re along our starport side, Captain,” one of my men exclaims. My eyes fall on their bow, sailing alongside our edge.
They are going to try and jump our ship.
“Start firing the left side,” I bark, pulling out the small blade Davina gave me as I stride toward the banister.
The first shot goes off, busting into the close proximity of the enemy’s ship. Snatching up a rope that has a pronged-hook at the end, I toss it over their railing and catch the wood banister of the enemy’s ship.
“Fire the center guns and watch for the splintering wood,” I yell. The roar of more shots go off, making wood fly in every direction as I pull back from the debris. “Anchor the ship and tie it off. I want them close.”
Shouts and chaos sounds on the other side to their ship. Metal clanking together as I get ready to board. Peering behind me, over a dozen of my men are armed with their weapons. Knives, swords, and pistols decorate their attire as I jerk my head to the side for them to board.
That’s when everything happens in a blur.
My jumping onto the ship, my dagger inserting into a man’s neck as the splatter of warm blood hits my hand, the cries of men in the throngs of battle while my main focus lands on the fool who decided it’d be a fantastic idea to attack us.
Climbing the stairs to the Captain’s deck, I don’t get but two steps before a blood-curdling scream rings through the air. It’s not the scream that gives me pause but the sex of the scream that just penetrated the air.
It’s a woman’s.
Turning on my heels, I look around the deck for anything in a dress but see nothing. I blink at the reality that I’m in. A woman on this ship would be close to impossible since pirates are so superstitious of them being on board, let alone look at it. Plus, the crush of men fighting doesn’t leave much room for me to see anything else.
“Please,” wails the same voice. “Don’t do this.”
Glancing over my right shoulder toward the sound, the door to the Captain’s corridors is open slightly. Cautiously, I make my way toward it, pulling out the pistol at my side in case I need to blast it into some lad’s face that might be awaiting me.
Peering around the door’s entrance stands a burly man, violently shaking something in front of him. The soft gasps and sobs of weeping illuminates that I did in fact hear a woman that is now in the hands of a pirate, rattling her around like a doll. With my non-existing patience already being inconvenienced by being bombarded by a random group of assholes, I’m at the man’s back, driving my blade into his shoulder.
Crying out in pain, he hunches over slightly, giving me the perfect opportunity to pull back and jab it into his neck. He falls into a heavy thud on the floorboards and leaves me to stare at the woman in distress that just became another mission I didn’t sign up for today.
And all I can do is stare.
Wavy, raven locks make up her hair, plush pink lips tremble in fear as she gapes back at me with dread filling her features. But that’s not what gives me pause or makes my body lock up in shock.
It’s her eyes, so clear-cut and vivid. That glimmer in hues of greens and a twinge of brown. They are almost identical to Davina’s. So close in fact, that, for a moment, I believe it to be her with darker hair.
“Please don’t hurt me,” she begs with her hands extended before me. “I just want to go home.”
Pocketing my knife and pistol, I take a step back. “I’m not here to hurt you. I’m from the other ship.” It doesn’t take the terror out of her eyes as she begins to cower away from me, backing deeper into the room.
“Listen, Miss, I know you have no reason to trust me, but I need to get off this ship. If you want to stay here, you’re welcome to but I’d advise against it. I’ll take you home.”
“I—you don’t—I don’t know,” she quakes.
“I’m Tobias Nathaniel,” I offer. “I don’t hurt women or auction them off. I can—”
“You’re the Prince of the Black Sea.”
I nod, feeling the rumbling of the ship. “I am, and we have to get off this vessel because my ship is about to sink it.”
That gets her to move in my direction. I give her my hand, which she takes immediately, following me outside and toward Delilah. A man abruptly stands in our way, and I waste no time, pulling out my pistol and aiming it at his forehead. Gunpowder wafts in my nose as I step over his body, but I’m halted by the woman in my clutches.
Peering over my shoulder, she’s frozen, glancing down at the man I’ve just stabbed. I forget she’s a woman who doesn’t deal with this bullshit on a daily basis, so I round the fallen man, getting her to follow another path to safety as I get her onto my ship.
“Get her something warm and some food,” I tell one of the first men I come across. “She’ll sleep in my bed.”
“I can’t,”
she retorts. “I mean—thank you but—” I nod anyways, and he immediately guides her away without further questioning as she still complains and frets over my order.
“A few men are still alive on the other ship, Cap’n,” Ashton informs me while approaching my side. “Do you want prisoners?”
Readjusting my coat, I try to brush off how beautiful the woman I just saved is, how, even though we are surrounded by a thicket of danger, she still argues with my instructions.
Something Davina would do.
It’s been over a month since I’ve seen her. Every night I look up at the stars, wondering if she’s looking at the same ones. If she thinks about how different our lives are now that we’re older and everything has changed. I didn’t want them to, but she forced it.
“Kill them all,” I convey. “It’ll send a message to good ‘ole Uncle Declan.”
“He’s losing his mind in there,” Nesrine frets across the dining room table from me as I continue eating. “We need to do something before he harms himself.”
I scoff. “He won’t kill himself.”
“He might pull an arm off with the way he’s pulling on his chains.” I finally look up at her from my plate of fish and seaweed to fix her with a glare.
“What would you have me do, let him roam the island free again?”
She shrugs. “It’s not as though he can go anywhere.”
“No.”
“Davina,” she argues softly. “If he really injures himself, you’ll get no answers.”
I stab my dead fish with my fork. “Won’t get any anyways. He won’t speak, I know it. And we are running out of his men to persuade him.”
Almost all the prisoners we’ve brought onto this island are dying and not by our hands. Within hours of them being locked away, all of them became extremely ill. Some regurgitating their food, others coughing so loudly it echoed down the halls.
Each day, one or two of them die, and one by one, I’ve lost some of my leverage to make Dagen speak.
“Then what’s the point of his being alive?” Nesrine asks, leaning back in her chair and crossing her slim arms over her chest.
“There isn’t one,” I reply. “Other than the idea and pleasure of having him suffer for years to come.”
“Without his men, you have no leverage.”
“Then I guess we’ll never know, will we?” I deadpan.
Nesrine reaches over the table, extending her arm across it for me to take her hand. “This isn’t you. You don’t do vengeance.”
“Why wouldn’t I?” I snap. “Is it because I’m stuck on this island and banned from the sea that I’m not like you anymore?”
Her brows deepen. “I’m not saying that at all. It’s just that—”
“Are you done talking about this,” I sigh while dropping my fork. “Because I am, and you just ruined my meal with talks about the Viking and misplaced sympathy.”
Nesrine removes her arm and straightens her back. I know that I’m taking my anger out on my sister, but at the moment, I don’t care.
“I understand you being upset that he betrayed your trust, Davina, but we can’t find any reason why he isn’t telling the truth.”
“He stole from us. He wanted the cuff to take the sea, sounds pretty self-explanatory to me.”
“Let Isolde try again,” she imparts. “He’s not in his right mind now, she might be able to dig deeper.”
“I don’t want to hear any more about his village or his clan. I don’t care if he—”
“Are my girls fighting?” The sing-song voice immediately gets me to cringe and ignites more irritation. All I want to do is eat in peace. Which is becoming a rare commodity as of late because my sisters won’t leave the damn island.
The taps of Taysa’s shoes saunters through the large dining room as I send one last glare in Nesrine’s direction before she gets closer to us. The last thing I want to do is upset Taysa because that’s all that happens when we argue. Another thing to add to the growing list of issues I’m facing.
“Just disagreeing,” I answer, finally looking over to find her with a perked brow as she pulls the chair next to me from the table and sits.
“You’re fighting over the Viking,” she alludes.
“We were just talking about what else to do,” Nesrine conveys. “Just family business.” It’s a cheap shot. My sister is upset that all this has happened when it shouldn’t have because of the veil. How Dagan should’ve never been able to grab the cuff, how Tobias shouldn’t be allowed to come and go as he pleases. It’s been something she’s bottled up and now is finally releasing after all this time.
“I come with news,” Taysa informs cheerfully, ignoring Nesrine’s comment. “About the veil.”
“What is it?”
“It’s broken,” she states. “The desired spell must’ve not considered just Sirens but other magical creatures or we’re in the midst of Sirens ourselves that can walk on land permanently like you.”
“So you didn’t do it right,” Nesrine sneers with slitted black eyes.
Taysa glances in her direction. “I did it right, someone may have toyed with it.”
“What?” That coming from both me and my sister.
“That’s impossible,” I continue. “How? They’d have to know of the spell, first and foremost. Then they’d have to—”
“I’m not the only witch in this world, my dear,” Taysa replies while giving me a light tap to my hand. “Spells can be manipulated. We were made by gods, we aren’t supposed to exist. Spells can be altered if the right witch knows how to do so through dark magic.”
“But how would they even know of this place?” I ask. “To the world, we only live in the sea.”
“People talk about things they shouldn’t.”
“No—” I shake my head. “—Tobias wouldn’t breathe a word about us and this island.”
“It’s not just him,” Taysa continues. “There are traitors in every faction of people. Not all Sirens are as secretive and loyal as you’d like them to be. It’s possible that the Vikings have some sort of person within their clan that could’ve put a small defect through the veil. You were able to bring his men on the island but most of them are dead because of the magic. They don’t belong here.”
“Which means there’s something up with Tobias and Dagen, Davina,” Nesrine relays. “We already know Dagen isn’t who he says he is, but Tobias might be—”
“It doesn’t matter if Tobias is something else,” I snap. “He’d never hurt us.” I don’t miss Nesrine sending Taysa a pleading look nor the faint sigh from Taysa. I may have been naive with Dagen but not Tobias. I know him better than anyone at this table. I’ve heard his fears and dreams, his hope of finding Lorne and the things he wanted to do in his life. His loyalty ran so deep within his veins that it’d be impossible for him to betray us.
To betray me.
“We’ve already tried to drown Tobias,” Nesrine reports. “To see if he was a siren, but he didn’t show any sign of—”
“But you stopped it from fully happening, didn’t you?” Taysa inquires. “That boy didn’t die, and he would need to so his true being would revive.”
“And he won’t,” I gripe. “No one is laying a hand on him or they will answer to me. And trust me when I say—”
“Can you...bring him back to life?” Nesrine interjects. “If he does die.”
I slam my palm on the table. “Didn’t you just hear me? We are not taking that chance.”
“I can’t,” Taysa replies. “Not even dark magic that I know of would bring him back to life. Only a god.”
“Our father is the son of Poseidon, could he do it?”
“Nesrine,” I warn.
Taysa sighs. “I honestly don’t know, my child. If Davina feels so strongly about him, I wouldn’t chance it. Is the Viking affected by any of your powers?”
“Some,” Nesrine conveys. “But we feel like there is a barrier of some sort.”
“A barrier?” Taysa as
ks. “Like some things come through but others are out of focus or disoriented?”
“Not so much for me, but Atarah had a splitting headache for days after her and Brylee tried to dig into his thoughts. We were hoping that, when we captured him the second time, he would be thinking about his plans and why he stole the cuff.”
“Sounds like Norse magic.”
“What’s that?”
“The oldest kind of witch, they are called seeresses. They are feared by many and hated by religious groups because of their evil practices. They require sacrifices, mainly humans, to offer a need or want by said people or persons. For the desired spell I casted, it took away something from you, that was the consequence. For a seeress’s magic, they demand a life, something to show how worthy and serious they are.”
“So, you’re saying that this seeress could influence the desired spell?” I press. “That it could be altered?”
Taysa bows her head. “I’m sorry to say that they are more powerful than I am or ever have been. A seeress can tweak a spell but not fully get rid of one that is set in place.”
“So there’s like a hole in the veil?” Nesrine inquires. “Where whomever needed or wanted to be here would be able to get through?”
“That’s correct.”
“So can you close this hole? Fix it?”
Taysa nods. “I can, it’s going to take some work. I’m not as young as I used to be.”
“What else would we have to give?” My sister’s next question sets an alarm off in my head. With every action causes a reaction and consequence with sorcery.
“With the veil still being partly up,” Taysa replies. “I don’t think anything. I just need to place a patch, if you will.”
“And how quickly can you make that happen?” Nesrine asks.
“I’m going to go home right now and start working on it. I need to eat and gather my strength.” She stands from her chair and pets my hair. “Keep the Viking alive until I get back, child. I might be able to make something for him to drink that will spill all his truths.”
Nesrine rises as well. “We’ll keep him safe. I’ll tell Atarah and Brylee to diminish whatever plans that I know they have cooking in their heads.”
