“Stay under the water,” I whisper. I did not come all this way just to lose my mother to death.
At first nothing happens. The ships anchor themselves and wait.
Until a man is thrown overboard.
I didn’t see it happen, but I heard the splash and then spotted the man in the water. Did they draw straws? Or did Father pick some unknowing victim, lure him over to the side of his ship, and push?
All is silent for a moment. Nothing but the pirate stirs in the water.
And then a song can be heard, faint at first. Then overpowering. I assume the poor sod in the water can’t hear it, because he doesn’t dive down toward it. Instead I watch as graceful arms grasp onto him before pulling him below.
The water stills once again, but not for long. Several more songs rise to the surface—the most beautiful, glorious songs I have ever heard. They’re all different, coming from many sirens at once, but somehow the melodies do not clash. They rise and fall together in cadences that pierce my heart.
My men are unaffected. Their ears are uncovered, the wax probably stolen by my father during the attack, but it is of no matter. True to my mother’s promise, the sirens are not pulling the four men left in my crew under their spell.
They sing to all the other pirates, inviting them to join them in the invigorating water, promising them love and warmth and acceptance. Heads full of luscious hair breach the water’s surface, mouths open in song. They move tantalizingly, trying to entice the men into the water.
It’s odd how clear the sound is amidst the exploding of gunpowder.
Battle cries carry to us on the wind. Sirens shriek and hiss.
Many men hold harpoons, waiting until the right moment to fling them into the sea at targets I can’t see clearly. Others point cannons or muskets directly into the water, firing and reloading as quickly as possible.
The water turns rapidly in multiple currents—the currents of swimming sirens. Luminescent bodies float on the surface of the water in a tangle of rich hair and blood-stained skin. And some of the sirens turn to songs of grief instead of those of seduction.
While the men on the ships remain unharmed, some do not get to fight from safe heights. Many are forced into rowboats to fling harpoons from a shorter distance. Others on the boats point their guns at the water, but they cannot reload them quickly enough. As soon as they’ve deposited one round into the water, arms in glistening hues, from ivory to golden-brown to midnight black, break the surface and drag men under. One siren flings herself out of the water, leaping over the boat as a dolphin might, and plummets into an unsuspecting pirate, knocking him into the sea below with her.
She had a beauty that was almost painful to look at with hair the color of white starlight, strung with pearls and shells. It clung to her body as she thrust herself out of the water, reaching clear down to her knees.
The sirens look so very similar to human women. If it weren’t for their sharpened nails and teeth, and exquisite beauty, one wouldn’t be able to tell the difference.
Even without the lull of the sirens’ songs, the pirates stare, mesmerized, at the water. It costs many of them their lives.
It’s a strange thing for me to see firsthand the brutality and beauty of my own kind. So much of what I am makes sense. The ruthless killer in me might be part of my nature, rather than my upbringing.
A head of red hair appears above the ocean’s surface.
“No! Get down!” I scream the words as loud as I can, but they cannot be heard over the distance that separates us, over the cannon fire and gunshots.
There’s pointing and shuffling in the ship nearest my mother. Guns are immediately replaced with nets.
It takes some time; the siren queen is a formidable creature. At least a dozen men lose their lives.
But they catch her. I watch as she’s transported to the Dragon’s Skull. Watch as the rest of the sirens left alive retreat to below the surface. Now that their queen is gone, there is nothing they can do without her direction.
He will question her. Torture her, until he has all the information he wants.
And I can do nothing while stuck in yet another cell.
The ocean returns to calmness, as though a fight never happened. Night hits the water, and the pirates go to sleep.
*
I try shouting for Tylon. Maybe now that the sirens lost the battle, the men won’t have their ears covered.
But as the night goes on, I’m forced to accept that none of them can hear a damned thing. They don’t respond to my yelling. They don’t venture down to the brig. They’re probably sleeping in our bunks over on the other side of the ship.
I slump to the floor, arms resting atop my bent knees. What can I try next?
Riden moves around in the cell next to mine. He presses against the bars, where he can get a good look at me.
“Come here,” he says.
I edge as close to the bars as I can get. Several quiet conversations have broken out over the crew. Ours probably won’t be overheard.
“I want to tell you something.”
“What’s that?” I whisper.
“Sailing with you and your crew was the first time I ever enjoyed being a pirate.”
I laugh, the sound loud and awkward. “Don’t try to make me feel better. I lost two friends today, and Niridia is injured. I don’t want to laugh.”
“You need to keep your spirits up. We’ll find a way out of this. He hasn’t won yet.”
But the longer we sit here quietly in the dark, the more I start to think that he has won. We’re trapped. He has my mother. It’s only a matter of time before he has the treasure, too. We’re locked in this brig with two corpses. My heart is breaking from how much I’ve lost on this journey. More death and torture are all that await us once we get back to the keep.
I don’t see how anything will change with time.
“Captain?” A whisper floats through the brig—and not from one of the cells.
Chapter 21
“ROSLYN!” I WHIRL AT her tiny voice.
Her grin exposes a loose tooth bent slightly out of place. “I’ve got something for you.” She holds up a ring of keys.
“I knew you’d save us,” Wallov says, a father’s pride glinting in his eyes.
How could I have forgotten little Roslyn? Stowed away all this time in her hidey-hole up in the crow’s nest. “How did you get the keys?”
“I had to wait for the girly-looking fellow to fall asleep,” she says apologetically. Riden gives me a look that says, Didn’t I tell you? “It was a good thing his ears were covered the whole time because the keys jangle so.”
“Sneaky little thief,” I exclaim proudly.
She steps in front of her father’s cell. “The next time you’re cross with me, Papa, I want you to remember this moment.” She inserts the key into the lock. “Oh, and Captain?”
“Yes?”
“I want to fight with the crew in six years’ time.” Her voice changes slightly, as though she’s trying for a more adult tone. She could never mask the chirp of a six-year-old girl, but it’s something adorable watching her try.