“Get moving!” Torik bellows to the rest of the crew. “I want that damn net up here five minutes ago.”
Kye rushes to his side and twists the rope that is hoisting the net up to them. He leans back so his entire body is balanced against it. He is breathless with the weight in moments. Below, the siren screeches so venomously that I can barely make out the Psáriin on her tongue. She’s bleeding, though I can’t see from where. The red seems to cover so much of her, like paint against her skin. As the net is drawn back to the ship, she continues to thrash wildly and the whistle sounds again. I clench my hands by my sides to keep from bringing them to my ears. The siren is maddened. Her hands fly to her face and she tears her nails through her cheeks, trying to rip the noise out. Her screams are like death itself. A sound that makes my newly formed toes curl against the ship.
Kye pulls the rope harder, his arms dripping with sweat. When the net finally reaches the top, he hands the rope over to another crew member and then rushes to his prince’s side. Within moments, the net is untangled and Elian is pulled free.
Kye and Madrid clasp his elbows and drag him out of harm’s way. As they do, I see that his arms are cut. Slashes so similar to the day the mermaid tried to steal his heart from me. Quickly, Kye tears his sleeve and grabs Elian’s hand. It’s punctured with deep, dark holes. The blood is black red and nothing at all like the gold I’ve heard. The sight of it gives me pause.
“Are you mad?” Kye yells. He uses his shirt as a makeshift bandage. “I can’t believe you got into that thing.”
“It was the only way.” Elian shakes his hand as though shaking off the injury. “She wouldn’t be lured.”
“You could’ve nicked an artery,” Madrid says. “Don’t think we’d waste good stitches on you if you were going to bleed to death anyhow.”
Elian smirks at her insubordination. Everything is a game to him. Loyalty is mockery and devotion is kinship in place of fear. He is a riddle, disguised as a ruler, able to laugh at the idea of disloyalty as though it would never be an option. I can’t fathom such a thing.
“If you’re gonna keep this up,” Kye says, “we should invest in some safer nets.”
I look to the net in question and almost smile. It’s a web of wire and glass. Shards weave into one another so that their twisted metal can make a nimble cage. It’s monstrous and glorious.
Inside, the siren wails.
“She’s clever,” says Elian, coming to my side. “Normally the noise confuses them so much that I stand by the net and they fly in. She wouldn’t have it though. Wouldn’t go unless I did.”
The crew gathers with their weapons at the ready.
“She was trying to outsmart you,” I say, and Elian grins.
“She can try to be smarter, but she’ll never be quicker.”
I scoff at his arrogance and turn to the creature he has caught in his web. I’m almost eager to see the siren stupid enough to fall for such a trap, but at the sight of her face, an unfamiliar feeling settles into my stomach.
I know her.
A sleek charcoal fin that smudges across the deck. Cold black hair stringing over her cheeks and nails carved to shanks. She snarls, baring her fangs and slapping her fin violently against the wire. In the background the whistle hums, and whenever I think she might sing, she whimpers instead. I take a step closer and she narrows her eyes. One brown, the other a mix of blue and blood. Curdled by a scar that stretches to her lip.
Maeve.
“Be careful,” Elian says, his hand hovering by my arm. “They’re deadly.”
I turn to him, but he’s looking at the siren, seaweed eyes sharper than her nails.
“Aidiastikó gouroúni,” Maeve growls.
Disgusting pig.
Her words are a mirror of the ones I spoke when Elian saved me from drowning.
“Be calm,” I tell her, then grimace when I realize I’m still speaking Midasan.
When the siren’s eyes meet mine, they’re full of the same hatred we’ve always shared for each other. It almost makes me laugh to think that even as strangers, our animosity can be so ripe, stretching beyond the bounds of knowing.
Maeve spits on the deck. “Filthy human whore,” she says in Psáriin.
Instinctively, I lurch forward, but Elian yanks me back by the waist. I kick violently against him, desperate to get at the defiant girl in front of me. Siren or not, I won’t let the insult stand.
“Stop.” Elian’s voice is muffled by my hair. “If you want to get yourself killed, one of us can do the job a lot tidier.”
“Let her go.” Kye laughs. “I want to see how that ends.”
I writhe against Elian, scratching at his arms like the animal I am. “After what she just called me,” I say, “it’s going to end with her heart on the floor.”
Maeve cackles and uses haw a Psáriin circle on her palm. When my eyes widen at the insult, she only laughs more. It’s a symbol reserved for the lowest beings. For mermaids that lie dying as their fins are stapled into the sand in punishment. For humans unworthy of a siren’s presence. To make that gesture to the royal bloodline is punishable by death.
“Kill her,” I seethe. “áschimi lígo skyla.”
“Human scum!” Maeve screeches in return.
Elian’s breath is hot on my neck as he struggles to keep ahold of me. “What did you say?”
“Filthy little bitch,” I translate in Midasan. “Tha sas skotóso ton eaftó mou.”
I’ll kill you myself.
I’m about to break free, but the second Elian releases his grip on my waist, his hands clamp down on my shoulders. He twists me around and I’m thrown against the door of the lower deck. When he leans over me, the scent of black sweets is fragrant on his breath.
I dismiss him and make to move past, but he’s too quick, even for me, and blocks my path, pushing me back against the varnished wood. Slowly, he brings a hand to the paneling beside my head, closing me in.
“You speak Psáriin.”
His voice is throaty, his eyes as dark as the blood that seeps from his hand. Behind him, the crew keeps a watchful eye on Maeve, but every moment or so they shoot surreptitious glances our way. In my madness, I forgot myself. Or perhaps I remembered myself. I spat my language like it was the most natural thing in the world. Which, to a human, it would never be.
Elian is close enough that if I listened, I’d be able to hear his heartbeat. If I stilled, I’d be able to feel the thumps pulsing through the air between us. I look down to his chest, where the strings of his shirt have loosened to reveal a circle of nails. My parting gift.
“Lira,” he says. “You better have a damn good explanation.”
I try to think of an answer, but out of the corner of my eye I see Maeve still at the mention of my name. Suddenly she’s squinting at me, leaning forward so the net pierces through her arms.
I hiss and Maeve scrambles back.
“Prinkípissa!” she says.
Princess.
She shakes her head. She was ready to die at the hands of pirates, but now that she stares into the eyes of her princess, fear finally dawns on her face.
“You understand her,” says Elian.