“Steady,” he tells his crew. “Hold her steady.”
He whispers something to himself. A slew of Midasan that I can’t make out, much less understand, and then smiles at the compass and screams, “Torik, now!”
The large man leans his head into the lower decks and bellows at the crew. As soon as the boom of his voice shudders through my bones, a high-pitched whistle tears through the air. I bring my hands to my ears. It’s not so much a noise as it is a blade carving through my skull. A sound so shrill, I feel like my eardrums could explode. Around me, the humans seem unaffected, and so with a grimace, I lower my hands and try to hide my discomfort.
“I’m going in,” Elian calls over his shoulder. He throws the compass to the girl. “Madrid, lower the net on my signal.”
She nods as he pulls a small tube from his belt and places it into his mouth. Then he’s gone. He meets the water with barely a noise, so quiet that I stumble to the edge of the ship to make sure that he actually jumped. Sure enough, ripples pool on the surface and the prince is nowhere to be seen.
“What is he doing?” I ask.
“Playing the part,” Madrid replies.
“What part?”
She pulls a small crossbow from her belt and fixes an arrow in the latch. “Bait.”
“He’s a prince,” I observe. “He can’t be bait.”
“He’s a prince,” she says. “So he gets to decide who’s bait.”
Kye hands her a black quiver filled with arrows and cuts me a guarded glance. “If you’re so concerned, we can always throw you over instead.”
I ignore both the comment and the hostile look in his eyes. Human pettiness knows no bounds. “Surely he can’t breathe for long,” I say.
“Five minutes of air,” Madrid tells me. “It’s what the tube’s for. Nifty little thing the captain picked up a while back in Efévresi.”
Efévresi. The land of invention. It’s one of the few kingdoms I’ve been careful to steer clear of, made cautious by the machinery that patrols their waters. Nets made from lightning and drones that swim faster than any mermaid. Ships more like beasts, with a knowledge and intelligence of their own.
“When the captain comes back up, you’ll get to see something wonderful,” Kye tells me.
“Monsters,” says Madrid, “are not wonderful.”
“Watching them die is pretty wonderful.” Kye looks pointedly in my direction. “That’s what happens to our enemies, you see.”
Madrid scoffs. “Keep watch for the captain’s signal,” she says.
“He told you to do that.”
She smiles. “And technically, darling, I outrank you.”
Kye scratches his face with his middle finger, which is apparently not a flattering gesture, because a moment later Madrid’s jaw drops and she swipes to hit his shoulder. Kye weaves effortlessly out of the way and then grabs her hand midair, pulling her toward him. When Madrid opens her mouth to say something, he presses his lips to hers and snatches a kiss. Like a thief stealing a moment. I half-expect her to shoot him with the crossbow – I know I would – but when he breaks away, she only shoves him halfheartedly. Her smile is ruthless.
I turn from them and clutch the ship ledge for support. The sun boils down on my bare legs and the wind hums softly by my ear. The shrill ringing has mellowed to a faint echo around me, making everything seem too quiet. Too peaceful. Under the sea, it’s never so serene. There’s always screaming and crashing and tearing. There’s always the ocean, constantly moving and evolving into something new. Never still and never the same. On land, on this ship, everything is far too steady.
“Ignore Kye,” says Madrid. She stands beside me. “He’s always like that.”
“Like what?”
“Ridiculous,” she says, then turns to him. “If the sonar cuts again, go belowdecks and give that engineer a piece of your knife.”
“The sonar?” I ask.
“It’s that ringing,” she explains. “Doesn’t bother us much, but the sirens go mad on it. Hits their nerves and disables them.”
Kye plucks the dirt from under his thumbnail with a knife. “It stops them from singing their little song and drowning us all.”
I grit my teeth. Typical humans using their dirty tricks of technology to fight their wars for them. I’ve never heard of something that can take away a siren’s power, but experiencing the awful tearing in my skull makes it easy to believe. I wonder how excruciating it would be to hear it in my siren form. If it would be akin to my mother’s magic.
“I know we look pretty run-down,” Madrid says. “The crew’s normally a lot bigger, but we’re on a bit of a special case. Captain cut us in half for his latest whim.”
I eye her strangely. “I didn’t ask you about your crew.”
She laughs and pushes a curl from her face. Without the bandana, her hair is riotous. “I figured you’d have questions,” she says. “Not everyone wakes up to find themselves on the infamous siren ship in the company of the golden prince. No doubt you’ve heard the best and worst about us. I just want you to know that only half the stories are true.”
She grins at this last part, smiling as though we’re old allies. As though she has reason to feel comfortable around me.
“You can’t be aboard our ship and not know the ins and outs,” Madrid says.
Kye makes a contemptuous noise. “I don’t think Cap wants strangers knowing the ins of any of our outs.”
“And what if she becomes part of the crew?”
“If wearing the captain’s shirt made someone part of the crew, then half of the girls in Eidyllio would be sailing with us.”
“Good,” Madrid says. “We need some more female blood.”
“We get enough of that spilled on the deck from sirens.”
“Sea foam doesn’t count,” she snipes, and the disdainful look Kye had when talking about me disappears in place of an impish grin.
“You like making up the rules as you go along. Don’t you, love?”
Madrid shrugs and turns back to me, inked arms spread open like wings. “Welcome to the Saad, Lira,” she says.
And then Elian erupts from the ocean.
To my instant relief, the sonar dissipates, and though it leaves a ringing in my ears, the pain subsides instantaneously. Kye’s lips draw a smile and, at the same time, Elian draws a breath, sending the ship into a frenzy. From the water, a net claws its way to the surface, turning the ocean to mighty waves. Inside, a creature thrashes and hisses, her tangled fin the only thing keeping her from the prince and his heart.
Elian sits on the other side, knife in hand, and watches the siren. She scratches at him, but the net is wide and they’re separated by at least three feet. Still, Elian looks on guard, one hand gripped in the net to keep himself steady and the other clasping his knife.
“If you’ve got a minute,” Elian calls up to the ship, “I wouldn’t mind coming aboard.”