I shifted and felt the slide of a splinter slide up and through me kneecap. I winced and that flash of pain was enough to break something loose in me. I grunted, shifting and twitching almost violently. I’d tamped down me panic long enough, it was a ravenous beastie now and wanted out.
I screamed, but the sound were muffled, as though me face had been shoved into a mattress.
“Bluidy hells,” a familiar voice snapped, “I thought you had more mettle than that, captain.”
Gasping for breath, frozen all over, I blinked as my brain tried to desperately process what I’d just heard. It was no possible. This was no—
Suddenly the itchy bag were snatched off me head and though it were night, my eyes instantly teared from the gleam of too bright lights.
Once me eyes adjusted and I looked around, I noted that I was indeed still on me ship. And then I turned and all breath left me body.
The smiling face of my first mate gazed down on me. Lifting a hand, she traced my jaw. Fingers idly scratching at the scruff of me chin.
I shivered all over.
Her eyes were bright green. Sea green I’d always called them. Piercing. Haunting. And so much like her mother’s—the evilest of witches herself, Baba Yaga. And even in the glooming of twilight, they practically seemed to burn like enchanted fire. She were sitting on the edge of a wooden crate, legs spread. Her trusted cutlass rested on her lap. With her unruly red curls she tamed with her black tricorn hat, and the billowing cream-colored blouse she wore, Anne were a pirate through and through. Me heart gave a pang to see it.
She grinned. “Hi daddy,” she whispered and I trembled from head to toe. Desperately wishing and hoping that I’d hear a change, a difference in her tone, see her altered in her looks. But there were none. It was just Anne. Just me Anne. Me pride and joy. Me first mate. And me only child.
I shook me head.
She shrugged. “Oh, c’mon now. I’m only doing what any good pirate does, you should be proud. Really. Mama would have been.”
Without thought, without reason I opened me mouth and spat. Cursing that vile woman. The only good thing that’d ever come of her treachery had been Anne. Me precious Anne.
I shook my head.
She sniffed and pointed over her shoulder. “Look, I don’t have all night and well, neither do ye. The Jolly Roger is now under new management.”
I muttered, tried desperately to speak but the geis holding me tongue mute was still firmly in place.
“Hm?” she leaned forward as she cupped her ear, green eyes glittering with what looked an awful lot like mirth, “What’s that? Oh, right…you’ve been gagged, have ye no?” Her laughter, normally soothing to me soul, was a dark and twisted corruption of what I used to know.
She snapped her fingers and instantly the clamp on me tongue was lifted. I felt the sizzle of that dark magick get eaten away and for the first time I feared. I feared greatly. Me Anne didn’t know spells. My heart hammered in me throat, my tongue were swollen, and me throat as parched as the dead seas.
“Oh, Anne. Oh, dear sweet, sweet Anne. What have ye done?” I murmured, heart galloping a mile a minute in me chest. Fear for me only child eating away at me soul like a cancer.
She shrugged. “I’m embracing the witch in me, daddy. That part of you, ye tried damned hard to stamp out. But I am part mama, and I’m learning awfully quick. Found me a new teacher.”
I shuddered. Dear merciful heavens.
“Anne, if ye be telling me what I think ye are, then ye should ken that black magick always comes wit a price. One few ever— ”
“Too late,” she laughed, but the sound was hollow and full of something that I had no name for, but that I felt like the echo of frost in me soul. I shook me head.
“It’s far too late,” she whispered again, and this time I heard sumthin’ that rattled me to me bones.
A thread of regret in me daughter’s voice. But for me? Or for herself? I didn’t ken.
“Anne. Annie. No,” I murmured heatedly. “This be mutiny, Anne. I can no protect ye from this,” I pleaded, trying desperately to reach through to whatever enchantment had gripped her black soul.
Her grin grew wider, but there were no light in her eyes. “I know it. But no to worry, Da, your loyal men’ll be joining you in Davy Jones’ Locker real soon.”
I shook my head. “Ye don’t be wanting to do this, daughter. Ye don’t ken what the devil ye’ve made yer bed wi— ”
“I ken well enough!” She spat, and stood instantly to her feet. Pacing in front of me like an enraged and restless tigress in a cage. “You tried to deny me my birthright, and I hate you fer it!”
I tried to stand, but the enchantment hadn’t been lifted completely. I was held fast to the ground. I shook me head. “Daughter. Listen to me. Listen ta me, ye don’t understand. I protected ye, lassie. Yer mother, she made a deal wit the devil and— ”
“Oh, feck off!” She pointed a finger at me. “I’m so tired of yer damned excuses. We’re masters of the skies. Kings of the seas. And all we do is steal things.” She spat by my knee, that I now saw had gotten more than a mere splinter shoved through it. There was a piece of metal about the size of me pinky finger poking out of it and there were blood, everywhere.
I swallowed hard. She would no threw me into the ocean full of terrible beasties coated in me own scarlet, would she? It would be a foul and gruesome death, only reserved for the likes of traitors and pedos.
I glanced up at me daughter and she snorted, eyes trained on the blood with almost gleeful delight.
“I’m done merely stealing things. I wish to rule. As is my right. I will make all of them pay for daring to deny me. Starting with you! Get up!” She snapped her fingers and suddenly I was moving. Walking, but no because I willed it. Rather, because she had.
And that’s when I knew. My daughter hadn’t merely flirted with the darkness in her soul, she’d embraced it. Fully. An’ she didn’t ken what she’d done. She was naught but a babe. A child. Foolish and ignorant, unable to begin to grasp what she’d done.
“Anne, now listen ta me,” I tried one last time as she walked behind me and took my wrist in her hands, yanking me forward with a sharp upward tug that made me rise high up on me toes and hiss. Me head grew dizzy with the sudden rush of blood and I had to shake it to clear the spiderwebs. Me lips felt numb and swollen. But I stuttered on anyway. “Ye… ye think ye ken the truth of it, Anne. But ye don’t, lassie. Ye don’t. Yer mother were a trickster. A bitch. She were a— ”
A fist came crashing down on my temple and I saw stars. I staggered, nearly falling flat on me face as I struggled to remain upright. I shook me head, several times. Ears ringing and knowing I sounded drunk as I slurred, “It’s no too late. Stop this, Annie. Stop.”
She yanked me back, I slammed into her chest and her warm breath whispered into my ear. “You never knew me, Da. You never knew me at’all.” Then she kissed me whiskered cheek and a terrible cry worked up me throat.
She shoved me forward. We were walking with some urgency toward the bow.
“Cap’n. Cap’n!” Those cries belonged to me men. Some I knew well, some I didn’t.
I looked at them, ten in all. Loyal to the bitter end. They’d go down with me. I shook me head.
Pirates of the air or the seas weren’t an overly loyal bunch, but that I had ten willing to lay down their life with mine spoke volumes. Though me heart broke to think of Anne’s betrayal, me men and I would haunt the seas together. I would not be alone in the next life. And there was some comfort in that.
“What has been done here?” One, named Rufus—a swarthy skinned fellow with a jagged scar that ran clean from his temple down his right eye and toward the corner of his mouth stared at me with only the one eye. The left eye was gone. Snatched out of his head years ago by a hungry and bloodthirsty fae he’d lost a game of bones too.
I shook me head, silently telling me mate to keep strong. To hold hisself and his dignity together. His lower jaw trembl
ed, but he dipped his head once and then notched his chin high. No one else spoke.
Me fate were already sealed and I knew’d it. But traitor or no, Anne were still me baby. And always would be.
“I dinna blame ye for this, my sweet girl. The bitch tainted yer blood. But ye are still half mine, and someday ye will ken it. Whatever ye do, sleep wit’ one eye open. And dinna raise the dead, for if ye do, ye will be doomed to walk the lonely sands forever alone.”
She laughed. “Fairy tales, bah!” And then she cried out. “Come, my boy!”
I turned, eyes going wide when I saw the shadow step away. And all breath left me body when moonlight struck the face of the one she’d spoken to.
He was tall. Handsome. And had a silver hook for a hand. But his eyes. His eyes were dead, just like him.
I cut my gaze away, stomach heaving within me. “Dear gods, what have ye done, Annie. What have ye done?”
She merely laughed. “Toss the rabble to the kraken.”
The cries that went up from me men would haunt me forever, even in death. The sounds were terrible, unholy things to behold. The one who’d once been Hook walked over to me men. And now his face gleamed like the devil’s unholy light. He stabbed me men through their hearts with his hook hand. Blood dripped like black tar to the deck.
Not a one made a peep. Only grunted as the light left them. Gathering like a blue haze in the sky before gradually fading back to the soul flame which ha’ made it.
One after another I heard the splash of their bodies as they were flung overboard. And with each death me soul shriveled within me. No more fear in me. I was too old, too grizzled to fear Death’s kiss, nay, me sadness were for another.
Annie turned. Blood red hair writhing in the wind like a nest of fanged serpents. She wore a broad smirk.
“Any last words, old man?”
I almost said nothing, but dark as her soul was, Annie were still part me. An’ always would be. Wetting me lips I looked down at my feet. The sun were slowly starting to make its way up.
Soon the day would be ablaze with its fire. I’d always loved a good sunrise.
I looked at her. “Ye are young, I were young once too. An’ sometimes that fire that makes us who we are, also kills us. Guard yer back, sweet girl, fer I fear ye dinna ken the devil ye’ve made yer bed wit.”
For a minute she stood still and, for a quiet and brief but intense moment, I saw something in her eyes. Light. Truth. Fear. Me girl was scar’ret. She might not ken it fully yet, but she already knew all was not well.
“Kill him,” she said without inflection.
I had no time to prepare for it, Hook’s hand rammed through me gullet, tearing through me organs and shredding me up from the inside. I grunted, coughing as that hot stream of blood began to work its way up me throat.
He never said a word. Never batted his eyes. He stood there. Like a thing not wholly dead, nor wholly living neither.
I gasped, struggling to stand a’right. Anne’s hands were suddenly on me shoulders. She would toss me o’erboard. But for just a moment, it were me girl looking down at me. Not the darkness. Not the blight that were her mama.
But then the light were gone and I were falling, falling, falling. When I hit the cold waters I instantly felt the brush and slide of a suction, the smoothness of muscle wrapped around me heel.
I looked up at the sky once more. Ablaze wit the colors of fire and in me heart, I forgave her.
Then I remembered nothing more save for the touch of the kraken’s silky glide.
CHAPTER 19
DETECTIVE ELLE
“WINGED-FAE BITCH!” I hissed, staring down at Caytla’s mean, soulless eyes.
The fanged sprite only smirked back at me, looking like the cat that ate the canary. But the sprite wouldn’t be smiling if she weren’t currently hiding behind the might of the queen of the winged folk, Titiana.
Titiana’s bloodred eyes narrowed into thin slits, and I shivered despite myself, clutching onto the golden pearls so hard I was seconds away from crushing them to dust in my hand.
The queen was dressed in full fae regalia. Her gown was a gossamer wave of morning dew that hid all the naughty parts, and her crown was made of spiders’ silk. Her curly blond tresses tumbled down her back and were threaded through with miniature rosebuds and blooming sprigs of baby’s breath.
Titiana sat within a golden acorn chariot that was harnessed to a platoon of buzzing, angry-looking bees. Beside her were her guards—all men, I thought. Hard to tell with how eternally youthful fae faces were. They were dressed in vines of ivy with breastplates fashioned from thorny oaks.
They might be small, but the fae had a taste for flesh of all sorts, and they were just as skilled at entrancing their victims with their particular brand of blood magick as I was with song.
Behind the ostentatious pomp hovered Caytla, my latest nemesis in a ridiculously long string of them. I just knew she was behind all of this somehow, the traitorous little cur—not that I could prove it. But I didn’t have to. Her smug smile was proof enough so far as I was concerned.
I ground my front teeth together, fighting the anger raging through every square inch of me. I was going to be late for work, and that was not okay. None of this was okay.
I took a deep breath, telling myself not to give in to fits of temper since it would do no good and there wasn’t a jury in the world that would come against the fae, not with the amount of magick and wealth the faery lands brought into all the realms.
By the hells, I wasn’t one who cared for groveling, but I was stuck, and I knew it.
“The deal was…” I repeated for the third time, swallowing down the snappy retort I really wanted to give. “One golden pearl for two days’ worth of water.”
I’d never been accused of being a particularly patient sort of siren, but considering that I was dealing with one of the highest-ranking members in all of faery, even I knew when to shut up and dance.
“Aye.” The queen smirked. “And so it was. But ye want a week’s worth of water, for what… three pearls?” She held up three fingers and snorted. “Bah!”
“The price was never an issue before,” I said slowly, my words nowhere near as tempered as I knew they should be. I was coming to the very end of my extremely fragile hold on what remained of my patience.
Tiny golden spiders crawled from out of the webbing of the queen’s hair. I had to tamp down my revulsion at the sight.
“And what would King Triton do if he discovered we were continuing to aid the very daughter he struck from the history of her very own peoples?” Her words were a silky threat, and I couldn’t help but grin, but there was nothing funny about any of this.
Titiana licked her tiny fangs, eyeing my body up and down, and I doubted very much she merely wished to play bed sports with me.
If I blew up, as I so desperately wanted to do, things would go south for me quickly. As much as I hated to admit it, the queen was right. The fae were my only work-around for my father’s cruel banishment.
I inhaled deeply, biting down hard on the tip of my tongue. The hag was playing dirty pool, and she knew it, which let me know this had never been about the damn pearls at all. Titiana wanted something else, and I just had to try to be patient to figure out whatever the hells it was.
Screwing on a tight smile that I knew didn’t reach my eyes, I dipped my head in acknowledgement of her words. “The queen is, as ever, most wise,” I said silkily.
“Or, you know”—she shrugged delicately—“we could always just ask him.” She tapped one long black-tipped nail against her chin, almost thoughtfully, as she stared unflinchingly at me. The stupid little bees buzzed their wings harder, the sound menacing and chilly.
I pinched the bridge of my nose and grunted. That would spell doom for me. I’d be an outcast in truth then, and that was a fate worse than death. That was more than enough incentive for me to strangle the ill will I felt toward her.
“If I might ask, Queen Titiana, what d
oes my father suddenly have to do with any of this? You’ve always known who I was, not that I tried to hide it. You never cared before, so why now?”
“True.” She dipped her head. “But King Triton has recently reached out to me, expressing concerns about his wayward progeny.” She rolled her wrist as she mused aloud. “The king has discovered we’ve been aiding his pariah. And to say he’s unhappy is, well, an understatement, to say the least. So tell me, Elle, why should we continue to render you aide?”
I bit my bottom lip so hard I tasted a well of blood. Heart hammering, because that was the last thing I needed in this situation, I licked it up and wouldn’t open my mouth again until I was sure there was no blood left to scent.
Titiana’s bloodred eyes glittered with avarice.
“We get so very little out of this arrangement, Elle, I’m thinking that perhaps we should just— ”
“Bloody hells,” I muttered and the queen’s mouth pinched tight. “Not you, obviously.” I flicked my fingers at her. “Tell me, Queen, what can be done to get what I need?”
Her grin was cruel and full of wickedly sharp-looking silver teeth. “Quid pro quo—isn’t that what you detectives call it? Fish?” Her bloody eyes flashed with a flicker of fire at their center.
Gods above, I hated the fae.
Cheeky little bastards, they were.
I refrained from rolling my eyes but just barely. I was standing in the sand, feet tingling with pins and needles because unlike most of my kind, shifting was less than fun for me. In fact, most times, it was a bloody nuisance and hurt like the two hells. I was also naked. And though I might be a siren, and they fae, I had once been the princess of the deep. I knew my appeal and felt the raking, lecherous perusal of her guards like tiny little blades against my flesh. They wanted me. To screw or to eat, it was hard to say, but want me, they did.
Whenever one made a deal with the fae, one had to pay very particular attention to every unspoken nuance of what wasn’t said. Dealing with the fae was tricky at best and lethal at worst. I had absolutely zero desire to enter into another arrangement with them, yet they knew as well as I did that I had very little position of power from which to haggle. I was almost entirely reliant upon their mercies, and they damned well knew it.
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