CALLIE
The fluorescent light of the seedy motel parking lot where Vex has parked burns my eyes. After so many weeks of being in the deep, and the months of only being a part of the surface world during the hours when the moon illuminates the sky, my retinas just can’t take it. It sheds a stark and unpleasant light on the concrete covered space, showing discarded soda cans and cigarette butts that daunt me a little. Do I really want to do this?
It’s what you want, so take it. Take him.
The hissing tones of the dark whisper to me, filling me with a primal confidence, a reliance on my senses rather than my ability to reason that is intoxicating. Vex dismounts the motorcycle and stands, his skin so pale it’s practically translucent under the neon blatancy.
“I’m guessing we don’t have a reservation,” I mumble, suddenly nervous.
“Hey. Look at me.” Vex pulls my chin up. “When you’re a Psiren, you don’t need invitations, or reservations. It’s simple, Love.” He walks over to the door of the room right at the end of the block. Pressing his ear to the wood for a few moments before continuing.
“See,” he braces himself against the frame of the door. “Want,” he steps back from the wooden barrier, preventing him from reaching the location he desires. “Take,” he makes a grunt and forces himself against the door, pushing the weak lock past its breaking point. The door relinquishes, cracking open with a splintering sound and a jerk. The old me would be horrified about breaking and entering. The mer have everything together, they operate on a massive scale, always within the law and with a grandeur that never failed to impress.
The Psirens, unsurprisingly, don’t have the same luxury, and so resort to petty crime and seedy motel rooms. I’m beginning to see why they so envy the mer. I wouldn’t say no to a room at Lunar Sanctum right now.
He doesn’t hold the door open for me, as would a gentleman, but lets it swing back in my face. I catch it with my palm, the peeling paint flaking away like dead skin onto the floor, before pushing it open and entering. The motel room is… well… what you’d expect for a motel room.
A simple metal bed frame is donned with black sheets, no doubt a giant mistake for an establishment that probably doesn’t even wash their bed linen. The carpet is tortoiseshell, and the walls are a dirty looking green. There’s an adjoining room with a double sink and a long mirror on the wall leading to the bathroom, two bedside tables and a desk with an old television to one side, it’s aerial is twisted like a pretzel and I doubt it even works. The whole room sucks light into its corners and returns only shadow, no doubt a preference when one does whatever deeds are common for a motel in the middle of nowhere. This is the kind of place you come when you don’t want to be seen or judged and where moral caution is thrown to the wind. There is no better place for what I want.
Vex throws his leather jacket onto the chair and then pulls his black t-shirt over his head. He doesn’t have Orion’s body, but it’s still muscular. His black leather pants and belt remain where they are, thank goodness.
I’m doing this my way.
He walks over to me, passes me as I stand, a tall awkward reed in the middle of the room, shivering slightly. Pushing the door shut and propping a cheap metal chair under the handle, he turns.
“Don’t want you escaping now do we…” He smiles salaciously, like he’s been waiting for this ever since the day we met.
“I think you’re forgetting that I asked for this,” I remind him and he walks over to me, his boot tread lost in the distasteful carpet, grabbing me at the elbow and causing a vein to protrude across his left bicep.
“Yes… I just can’t figure out why. I can’t work out if it’s because you’re trying to forget Nancy boy, or if you you’re trying to forget what you are…” He looks deeply into my eyes, his lilac irises too pale in the dim light, and his flawless stubble free jawline so smooth it could be ceramic.
“What I am?” I cock an eyebrow trying to seem uninterested.
“Dark. Untameable. Take your pick, Love. You had the perfect guy, and you couldn’t let him love you. What do you think that says about you? You’re dark inside… and you always will be,” he spits out the word, his lip curling in disgust. I wrench my arms from his grasp and shove him in the chest. He stumbles backward, though his expression is unimpressed.
“Shut up!” I cry out taking a step toward him.
“Truth hurts, doesn’t it, Pet?” He licks his bottom lip, abs flexing into six overly defined segments. He takes another step back, meeting the desk. I watch him and my mind races. I talk about Orion not listening, but maybe that’s what I’m doing.
“Maybe,” I relinquish slightly and he smiles.
“That’s right, Love, you know it’s true. You know you’re rotten all the way through…” His words sting me, causing a torrent of raw emotion to come hurtling through me.
“You’re no better!” I yell, angry once more.
“Oh I know, Love, and that’s what terrifies you. It terrifies you that I, a cold, dead thing, might be the only one who can ever understand you. Not your soulmate, but me,” he smiles slightly, but there’s also some truth in what he’s said, I can tell because his eyes are starting to remind me of the lilac flames, next to which Orion had made love to me for the last time.
“I hate you!” I scream at him, my blood rushing in my ears. The violence within me is rising, cresting, and readying itself to destroy everything in its path. The thing is though; I’m in human form. I have no power here.
Except… over him. I take a step forward and look into his eyes deeply. I run my fingers hard into the flesh of his arms, pushing him and causing his spine to bow against the edge of the desk. I clutch, digging my hard nails into his muscles. He exhales slightly, a tiny escape of the pleasure and pain that are melding into something confusing and forbidden.
“You can hate me,” he cups my cheek, pushing my hair back and gripping the back of my skull like he might crush it.
“I can?” I look at him and he smiles.
“Yes. It’s who we are.” I feel a relief I hadn’t known I had been looking for. He needs the violence, the pain, and now so do I. It’s the only thing that makes everything real.
Orion had me in a fantasy, which could, and had, all come crashing down in a moment. Vex… he has me embracing the reality of life… death, violence, loss… it’s all real with him. There isn’t any hiding from the brutality of protecting humankind, of the job I’ve been tasked with. With Vex, clarity comes with staggering and uninterrupted momentum, knocking me down again and again until I have no choice but to stand through it. I pull Vex to me and he lets me have the control I need, I run my hand down the back of his neck, his skin is cold and he shudders as my nails graze him over and over.
“No kissing,” he reminds me and I nod. I don’t need it with him, it doesn’t mean anything. I move my face into the crook of his neck where the smell of tequila and cigarettes diffuses and settles over me. I find myself brushing my fingertips down his back and then forward to the front of his pants. I rest my hand over his fly and look up at him.
“Yes, Love?” He asks me with a smirk. I can tell he’s ecstatic in more ways than one.
“Will you show me…” I begin but feel nervous. He presses his crotch into the palm of my hand.
“What?” He pulls my hair, bringing my eyes up to meet his gaze.
“Teach me how to… be dominant,” I ask him, gulping in air.
“Let me guess… You’ve never initiated before?” He looks at me with narrowing eyes and I shake my head. I wonder if at this he’ll turn and run but instead he smiles, pushing his body flush against me.
“You know that darkness you feel… that darkness you’re so afraid of?”
Oh…Yes. I nod.
“Just give in. Don’t think. Just… do what feels right. Follow your natural instincts. No more talking,” he puts a finger to his lips, silencing me. I close my eyes and feel my pupils dilate, the blackness overtaking everything. I shov
e him back into the wall and he grunts appreciatively, knocking the only piece of art in the room from the wall with a smash. The glass lies at my feet, shattered and jagged, but I ignore it. I feel my hands working the buckle on his jeans and I watch as his eyes widen in shock, and delight. I quickly remove and throw my jacket on top of his, holding his hips to the wall, eager, as his pants now lie around his ankles. I let my icy blue memories dissipate and get lost in the lilac ones staring at me with hungry anticipation, condemning myself to forget. I let the shadows consume me with a devouring, sharp, grating, and unquenchable desire for power.
The last thing I remember is licking my lips and dropping leisurely to my knees.
SOLUSTUS
He is late. I don’t like answering to anyone, but particularly not someone who thinks my time unimportant. I have a Kingdom to run after all, it may not be as grand as what he’s used to, but it makes my blood boil thinking that he’s making me wait. Then again, he’s the eldest, and that means he has a superiority complex rivalling that of Poseidon himself.
I float, innocuous before the looking glass; one half of a gift once passed from Atargatis, down to the people of the Occulta Mirum, and thanks to the thoughtlessness of Azure, now mine. It isn’t really a looking glass at all, because it simply seizes the purpose of reflecting what you are back at you. Instead, it allows you to see how the other half lives, in part, showing you precisely what you are not. It had been used by Azure for months, allowing her to communicate in short, hurried bursts with Starlet. She had thought nobody knew, but I did. I let her carry out her torrid little affair with her sister, all in the name of getting Titus out of the way and gaining use of the mirror.
The looking glass is flawless, a miracle seeing how I have smashed it so many times, angry at my brother, at his obsession with beating the mer from the inside. In waiting for the opportune moment. I am patient, I always have been, but he seems obsessed with waiting for a single moment in particular, in fact, I’m not even sure if his cunning wit quite knows what it will look like, even when it does pass.
However, the looking glass is a gift from the Goddess and after each opportunely timed rendezvous with my older sibling, I feel the quite untamed urge to break it into a thousand pieces. I know the reason why I’m not taking control for myself. I know I need him, but it doesn’t make me want to rip his throat out any less. I wonder if that makes me like our father, I mean, after all, he did shove a bottle into his eldest son’s throat. Maybe it was because he wouldn’t cease voicing his obsession over being the ultimate object of a higher being’s affection. That’s enough to make anyone turn violent, particularly someone with my pleasant disposition.
I exhale, tightening every muscle in my body simultaneously at seeing the looking glass turn foggy. He’s finally decided to turn up. Well, aren’t I special?
“Saturnus,” I say the single word as his bloody tangle of hair and limpet green eyes come into view. He replies in a brisk and slightly bored tone.
“Hello, brother.”
“I have news,” Saturnus smiles, his teeth too white. The glimmer appearance he has going on never fails to make me smile. The epitome of a Goddess’s love, and also a complete lie.
“I assumed,” I cock an eyebrow and his smile drops into one twisted, one real. We set this meeting date every month and he always has some wisdom, some piece of knowledge that makes him superior to share.
“I think I have an answer to your communication problem with the Beast,” he smiles and I feel my ears prick; I am, against my better judgement, intrigued.
“Yes?” I snap slightly and my brother smiles.
“The girl,” his teeth are exposed again, too white and almost snarling with the glee of his latest discovery.
“What of her? She’s merely a child,” I snort, crossing my arms.
“You need not remind me. Need I remind you of to whom you speak?” At this sentiment, of his questioning of my power, of my diligence to our end goal, I find myself trying to supress a giggle of untamed hilarity.
Saturnus, my brother, would be nothing if it were not for me. It had been my teeth at his throat, my blood running in his veins that’s made him what he is. I recall after I had thrown myself to the frothing, dog-like mouth of the ocean from the cliffs of the island on which I had grown, my first thought: family. I had sought out him and Caedes as soon as I was able, as soon as I could make sense of my new body. I had taken them into the arms of Poseidon, I had helped them ascend, evolve.
He may have forgotten that, but I never would.
I sigh slightly, itching my chin with a long, dirtied fingernail.
“So… the girl?” I prompt his frustrated expression and he once again becomes impassioned, loving the sound of his own voice just a little too much.
“She has the ability to absorb magic…”
“Yes… we already know this,” I bite at him and he brings a fist up and moves to punch through the glass. His flesh makes a thud, impacting and causing spider-legged fractures to spread out from the epicentre of his palm. His eyes blaze yellow, his trueness seeping through the glimmer he works so hard to preserve. The fractures disappear in a moment, repairing themselves with threads of ancient, holy magic.
“If you don’t shut up I’m going to terminate this conversation, Solustus. I won’t stand for insolence. Least of all from you, little brother.”
“Fine… fine… proceed.”
“Thank you so much for your permission,” he retorts, droll in both expression and tone. His gold tail sways from side to side, controlled in movement as my own. My hand brushes against Scarlette, his eyes follow my movement, clearly aware of the culling of violent tendencies. He says nothing.
“An old friend, seems to have found a way to cling onto life in this world,” Saturnus smiles slightly and I feel my eyes widen.
“Titus?” I ask him, hopefulness only too evident in my voice.
“Who else? That bastard just won’t die,” Saturnus laughs slightly, finding himself hilarious at lack of a better audience.
“So you’re saying that’s why the girl… that’s why she looks like one of us?” I ask him and he nods, smiling.
“The body of a mer, with the dark power of a Psiren. Lethal, I think you’d agree.” His eyes sparkle with the untold possibilities of such a creature.
“Certainly. You think she can communicate with it?” I query, stroking my chin with long fingers.
“I’d say there’s only one way to find out.”
“She had the power to manipulate electricity for certain. I felt it when she…” I pause, not wanting to admit she had bested me in combat.
“No need for shame brother. The bitch has also used those powers on me. No one person so young should yield so much power,” he admits, shaking his head angrily. His bloody hair moves silently.
“The Goddess… what is she playing at giving such power…” I ponder and Saturnus’ expression turns grim. “You don’t think…” I begin, wondering.
“That the Goddess has finally taken notice of what us mere servants are attempting? It’s possible.” He looks ecstatic at this thought. It wasn’t hard to realise why Saturnus wanted the power of the Necrimad for himself, it was polar opposite to my reasons; chiefly killing mankind’s hold over the land and making them serve the seas for once had always been my intent, I had been born to rise, to right the injustice against those of us trapped in servitude for eternity.
Saturnus on the other hand… wanted to be loved. Our father had torn him from the only woman who had ever loved him, and then that bitch Goddess had put him in second place to the Crowned Ruler. Besotted and hell-bent on making her and any other higher power see his true magnificence; it’s become an obsession, and one that’s only worsened with the Crowning of that fool, Atlas’ son.
“So you want me to give her a little time in the vents. See what happens?”
“Yes, brother. We need answers. I want that seal unlocked, serving under him… that crowned fool, I’m about this
close to ripping throat out,” Saturnus looks grim. He’s brave, at least I don’t have to act. He’s the Occulta Mirum’s greatest kept secret, a Psiren, the Psiren right in their midst. He plays his role as though it were true. I certainly wouldn’t have the patience.
“Speaking of the seal, have you noticed any changes?” I ask him this question in a quick, clipped tone, it’s something I always ask and it repetitively sparks his rage.
“I’ve been sat on top of this damn thing ever since Regus erected the Alcazar Oceania around it over three hundred years ago. Trust me, Solustus, if there had been a change, I’d have already told you about it. Why don’t you do yourself a favour and desist on asking every single time we have these meetings? Incompetence is not my forte,” he narrows his eyes, so damn volatile, it’s a wonder he hasn’t killed Orion yet.
“Apologies, I was just being diligent,” I bow my head, a sign of respect.
“Apology accepted. To be honest, I’m grateful nothing has shifted. The second the seal starts becoming active, my role in all this will become clear. I need the information from the Beast before we can move into the next phase.” I nod at him, twisting my mouth slightly.
I relish the thought of the next phase, when we will shed the blood of the mer and take the city that is rightfully ours. After all, it is built upon the resting place of The Necrimad, Poseidon’s most powerful child. Made from all the darkness he didn’t think I could handle. I shudder, trying not to remember the day his angered expression had come to the forefront of my psyche, screaming at me to desist in the murder. He drained some of my power, giving me my mind, my consciousness back. I hate him for that. These thoughts move through my head at an accelerated speed, my intelligence surpassing that of a mere mortal.
“Where is the girl?” Saturnus asks, suddenly curious.
“Out with Vexus. He’s helping her find her inner demons.”
The Kiss That Saved Me (The Tidal Kiss Trilogy Book 2) Page 22
