Salt & the Sovereign: The Siren's Curse 2 (The Elemental Origins Series Book 8)

by A. L. Knorr

  “Why do you care?”

  His dark eyebrows shot up. “Because if we know where these plates overlap, we might be able to determine where the most disruption might happen in the future.”

  He explained more about his science. From the bright expression on his face, it was clear he was enthusiastic about his studies.

  “But where is your lab?” I asked, still trying to understand where this healthy and obviously very well educated Atlantean had come from. Did he also have some territory inside a mountain range or cave system? Why was he so different from others of his kind?

  “I live in Gibraltar. My lab and work is there, along with my family. Where do you live?”

  “Okeanos, of course,” I replied, now floating beside him as he retrieved his sample and put it into a small bag tied to his belt with several others.

  “My father has spoken of it,” he admitted, “but frankly I never paid much attention. I wasn’t entirely sure it was real.”

  “Of course it’s real! You’re not far from our mountains,” I pointed back the way I had come.

  “I see.” He seemed to consider this rather seriously. I could hardly believe I had come across an Atlantean who did not know anything about Okeanos, but I supposed the Atlanteans had no organized way of passing knowledge down to their children. After all, they were homeless. They were poor, ignorant scavengers. Weren’t they?

  “So, you live on land? Gibraltar is above the water, is it not?”

  “That’s right. It’s a kind of peninsula. It’s not far from here.” He looked at me with what I thought seemed a hopeful expression. “Would you like to see it? I realize my invitation might be inconvenient, for I’m sure you were on your way to somewhere, but you are welcome to visit my home. You seem the curious type.” He was talking a little more quickly now, and his nervousness was back. “I’m curious myself, especially since I’ve never actually spoken with a siren. I mean, I have seen them in the distance but they never approach and I never want to bother them. This is the first time…”

  “I would like to see where you live,” I interrupted. In fact, at that particular moment in time, there was nothing else I wanted to see more than where Jozef lived. I was overcome by curiosity about this well-mannered, even cultured, and handsome Atlantean. “How far is Gibraltar?”

  “Half-a-day’s swim at forty kilometers per hour.”

  I hadn’t heard of speed referred to in this way, and didn’t know how big a kilometer was, so I replied, “You set the pace, then.”

  So he did, and while Jozef was fast, he was not as efficient in the water as I was with my tail. We conversed, but speaking came easier to me than to him.

  Time passed, but I barely noticed, as I was engrossed in Jozef’s commentary about the sea floor passing beneath us. I saw things in a way I hadn’t seen them before, noticing how rock jutted up in places as though it had collided with other rocks, how there were cracks and deep narrow gullies carving their way between mounds of coral.

  The ocean grew shallower and the terrain beneath us rockier and less hospitable. The number of broken bits of hull, jagged broken masts, and fishing nets documented how treacherous this part of the ocean was. The sun’s rays were bright and penetrating here, shining down into the water like beams, refracting off white pebbles scattered between black rocks. Seaweed and small, brightly colored fish glimmered in the light, and the snaps and crackles of happy sea life grew loud as the depth of the water lessened.

  Jozef ascended to the surface and I followed. When our heads broke through and I inhaled, Jozef said, “That’s the tip of Gibraltar, just there. Can you see?”

  I nodded, but I could hardly focus on how Gibraltar looked in the distance because the sound of his voice in the open air seemed to penetrate to my very heart and soul and pluck it like the strings of a harp.

  Fifteen

  Startled by the feeling I had not felt in a very long time, I was momentarily struck dumb. Not wanting to alarm Jozef, I hid my emotions behind silence and a deadpan expression. I was thankful that he was happy to talk as we got closer and closer to his home on Gibraltar, and relieved that he didn’t seem to expect me to converse.

  My hand found the aquamarine at my throat, thinking with a flash of panic that it had fallen from my neck without me noticing. Feeling the small cool stone under my fingers calmed the panic, but not the surprise. I had always believed a siren incapable of having romantic feelings while carrying a stone, but the warmth in my belly and heart continued to grow with the sound of Jozef’s voice.

  What did this mean? I made a study of my feelings, dissecting them like a scientist dissects a specimen. Jozef’s voice was having a perceptible effect on me. It was a similar experience to how I’d felt toward Mattis, but there were differences. My consciousness had not relegated my life in Okeanos to the dark corners of my memory the way it did when I was in a mating cycle. There was less urgency, less single-mindedness, less obsession in this feeling. Was this because I was Sovereign? Was that why it was happening? And it was happening with an Atlantean, not a human, which was probably even more shocking.

  “…built just for the purpose…” Jozef was saying, as we approached the shore.

  Jutting out into the water was a small boathouse, exquisitely made with details in the woodwork of the eaves and frames around the windows and door that was unusual to see in such a utilitarian structure. I set human feet on the rocks below the boathouse then crawled up the ladder after Jozef and stood up inside, looking around.

  Jozef pointedly kept his eyes averted from my nakedness and I bit my cheeks against a smile. So, some Atlanteans shared the embarrassment of being uncovered with humans.

  “I haven’t got any women’s clothing for you, I’m afraid,” he said, rifling through a wooden trunk and pulling out some articles of clothing. “But these should work. We wouldn’t want to give anyone in the house a startle.”

  Jozef’s webbed hands and flipper-feet had transformed to human. His gills had closed up and his pupils had retracted to a normal size. Looking at him now, if I had seen him while on land, I would not have been able to tell he was Atlantean at all.

  I took the button-up shirt and the cotton shorts he handed me and pulled them on over my damp body. While I dressed, Jozef stepped behind a shelf loaded with metal boxes to put on dry clothing. When he stepped out again, he was wearing plain clothing––a simple knit sweater with no fastenings up the front or back, and gray-blue trousers with wide bottoms. This was my first exposure to the fashion of the seventies. Many things had changed.

  My hair was so long by this time that it hung to the backs of my knees. Twisting it into a large bun at the nape of my neck, I used a thinner tendril from the nape of my neck to tie it in place so it was off my back and didn’t entirely soak the clothing Jozef had given me.

  “Are you all right?” Jozef was looking at me intently. “You haven’t said anything for a while. Do you feel anxious? I can assure you, you’re quite safe with me.”

  That voice. It caressed me like a silk scarf, wrapping itself around my waist, my belly, my chest.

  I smiled at him genuinely and with some humor, for he’d said this as though he wasn’t aware of what a siren was capable. There was no one I feared, least of all the man whose voice could incite the feelings his had.

  “I’m fine, thank you. It’s just been a while since I was on land.”

  He gave a nod and smiled back. “Good. This way, then.” A nervous energy was rolling off him in waves, whether it was at the opportunity to share his work with someone, or it was more personal than that, I couldn’t tell.

  “What was that black thing you were wearing in the water?” I asked, recalling its strange texture and thickness.

  “It’s called neoprene. You are not aware of it?”

  I shook my head.

  “When was the last time you were on land?”

  “I don’t know,” I answered. “It would take some work to pinpoint a year, let alone a date.” This wa
sn’t entirely true, I knew that I had left Poland in the spring of 1869, but that was the last human life I’d had. I’d been on land since then, but not to mate, just for curiosity’s sake. I enjoyed catching glimpses of humanity’s progress––the development of electrical light, fuel-powered ships, and the growth of their coastal cities.

  For some reason, I felt the need to keep things vague until I got to know Jozef better, even if I felt attracted to him. He was Atlantean after all, a potential rival, though it appeared that he was completely unaware of this rivalry, and certainly unaware of my status.

  We left the boathouse and took a rocky pathway away from the shore and up to an impressive structure sitting among boulders and rock-gardens the way a bird sits in a nest.

  “You live in a cathedral!” I cried when I looked up and fully took in the sharp features on the roofline of Jozef’s home, the stained-glass windows, the stone gargoyles.

  Jozef chuckled. “Not quite. Drakief Manor is over three-hundred years old, but it was never a cathedral. The architect was inspired by things he saw on a visit to France, but the Manor doesn’t have the feel of a religious building, I can assure you.”

  “You really do not make your home in the ocean then,” I wondered aloud.

  Jozef looked back at me, the dark slashes of his eyebrows arched, his thickly-lashed eyes wide. “Certainly not. Life on land is much more preferable, especially for someone in my line of work. There are no universities or laboratories underwater.”

  “But you could live there, if you wished. Many of your kind do. In fact, all that I have ever met.”

  Jozef looked sad at this. “Those are the lost ones,” he said. “The ones who fell through the cracks. Atlanteans who live underwater are subject to illness, I’m afraid. Our immune systems are much stronger on land.”

  The rock path became steps and the steps became a white gravel walkway which wound its way through a lush green garden buzzing with insects and fluttering with birds. My breath caught in my throat at the beauty of the grounds and I could understand why Jozef would prefer to live here, along the ocean instead of within it.

  “Your family has wealth,” I said, further bewildered.

  Jozef’s cheeks flushed with pink, visible even beneath his tanned skin. I realized I’d said something a human with tact would not have said.

  Leading me to a small side entrance on the ground floor of the house, rather than up the wide front steps to the columned porch, Jozef stepped into a cool stone space he referred to as a ‘mud-room.’

  A short, round woman with a smiling face and pink cheeks and wearing a black and white dress bustled up to Jozef. When her bright eyes fell on me, she smiled and said something in Spanish.

  “Yes, this is Bel.” Jozef introduced me.

  The woman made a strange bobbing motion with her head, bending her knees and lowering her eyes for a second. The gesture triggered a memory; the staff in Poland used to do that. She was an employee, then.

  “This is Gabriela,” Jozef said to me before turning back to the woman and telling her she could use English with me.

  “Very good,” she said in accented English. “Would you like to take tea in the library, or the parlor, perhaps?”

  Jozef looked at me, his dark gaze full of questions, his damp hair curling around his ears and at the nape of his neck. I had to take a steadying breath when he turned those eyes on me like that. “You’re welcome to stay for supper, if you like. I know this is a long detour from your planned route.”

  I didn’t know how to answer this. ‘Detour’ was an understatement. I took a little too long to answer and Jozef, feeling the need to fill the empty air perhaps, went on to say, “Or just stay for tea and some of Gabriela’s delicious scones?”

  I was not unaware of Gabriela’s eyes wandering my person, the odd clothing Jozef had given me, and my huge mass of hair tied at the nape of my neck.

  “Just tea,” I began, and then added, “Thank you.”

  Gabriela bobbed again and disappeared up a set of wide white stone steps.

  “Does she know what I am?” I asked, then added, “Does she know what you are?”

  “No to the first, yes to the second.” Jozef smiled.

  “She’s human?”

  “Yes, she’s from a small village near Barcelona. My growing up years were done when she came to us, but some women will care for anyone in their path, as she’s done for me. My father is an investor and isn’t home a lot. I’m thankful for Gabriela’s company.”

  “And your mother?” I followed Jozef down a long narrow hallway until he opened a door and ascended a set of wooden steps not nearly so grand as the ones Gabriela had taken.

  “I never knew my mother,” Jozef explained, “but Gabriela has enough maternal instinct for three women. She still refers to me as Master Jozef, even though I asked her not to many times. I can’t disabuse her of it, and so I suppose she’ll call me that until she dies.”

  “Until she dies,” I echoed. “Do you say it this way because she is older than you and you presume she’ll go first, or do you say this because you would easily outlive any human?”

  Jozef didn’t answer at first, and he was ahead of me on the steps so I couldn’t see his expression. He paused on a step, right near a candelabra on the wall which, I noted, was not lit with a flame but with an electric light. The yellow glow lit his features, highlighting the shadow under his cheekbone, the softness of his lips. Looking down at me, the line of shadow from his eyelashes making a dart on his cheek, I abruptly forgot what I had asked him.

  “You’re very blunt,” he said, his voice soft and his expression full of curiosity. “Are all of your kind like you?”

  “No,” I said instinctively, and then laughed. “And yes.”

  He made a sound in the back of his throat. I wasn’t sure if it was a sound of thoughtfulness, or laughter, but I wanted to learn to discern that sound.

  “Of course, we do live long lives, this is the truth of the matter. It is sad, when we are attached to those who do not live so long. I feel the same way toward my pets. We love them like family, and in the end, they break our hearts when they go, whether they be animal or human.” He took a breath and his eyes looked faraway. “I don’t know if you can understand…”

  “I understand,” I answered. “I know of exactly the kind of heartbreak you speak.”

  His gaze sharpened on me then and an understanding passed between us. We’d both loved and lost humans, and that was the first of many things which bound Jozef and me together.

  Sixteen

  Jozef led me up the stairway, across a wide stone hall blanketed with ancient looking carpet, walls adorned with mirrors and sconces, and through a set of double doors. The library which we entered next took my breath away, even filled with dark shadows the way it was.

  Jozef flicked a switch and a warm amber glow emanated from multiple wall-mounted lamps which looked something like the kerosene versions I’d known when I was young, only these were electric. The soft light illuminated seemingly endless bookshelves filled with spines of all colors. A wooden staircase led to two more levels of bookcases and on each floor were desks adorned with green lamps.

  In the center of the library was a cluster of comfortable looking couches, enough to seat two dozen people easily. Coffee tables were neatly stacked with magazines, newspapers, and colorful publications. A fireplace, currently dormant, stretched to the ceiling, and wrapped around the stone wall above it was an octopus sculpture wrought in black iron.

  The books, furniture, and lighting were one thing, but the art gave another dimension to the space and I felt a longing to stay in this place forever, reading and admiring the atmosphere.

  Drawn to a set of three colorful drawings, framed and mounted side by side on the wooden paneling between bookcases, I stopped and stared. The first was done in yellow ink, and was an artful image of a tropical fish. The second was of a seahorse rendered in red ink, and the last was a blue squid, its tentacles curved an
d flowing in beautiful lines. Each drawing was labeled in tiny handwriting, each body part noted in Latin and English. I knew very little about art, but I could tell these were not prints and that they’d been done by a loving hand.

  “Who did these?” I couldn’t find a signature or a name plate anywhere on the work.

  “I did,” Jozef said from behind me, sounding self-conscious. “I did them at boarding school when I was fourteen or fifteen.”

  I tore my eyes from the drawings to stare at him. “So young?”

  He smiled. “I have always loved the ocean and everything in it for as long as I could remember. I have many more drawings like these, hidden in notebooks in my old school things. But these are the ones Gabriela loved most and so she had them framed as a gift.”

  He gazed at the drawings with affection, more for the human who’d had them mounted than the art done by his own hand.

  He turned and gestured widely to the room. “In fact, all of the art is mine, except for a few pieces, like the wrought-iron octopus over the fireplace. That one was a gift from my father.”

  “It’s so beautiful.”

  My gaze drifted to the other framed pieces and for a time, Jozef let me wander the room and take them in. All of Jozef’s work was of sea creatures or the ocean itself. The renderings of the ocean were not seascapes like those of artists I’d seen in Europe––huge, frothing waves, and ships fighting to right themselves in an angry sea. Jozef’s work was scientific. He drew in fine, colored ink, the flowing pattern of water as it hit a structure on the ocean floor and reacted above by throwing up the huge barrel of a wave. Some of these waves were labeled. Jaws, Maui. Mavericks, California. Shipsterns, Tasmania.