Page 127

“No. No, I asked him if he had ever taken a mermaid who was a mother,” I manage to say.

“And what was his answer?”

Not that I know of.That’s what he said. It wasn’t a lie. He didn’t even know I was a Syren at the time.

“I see,” she says, reading my face. “No matter. What’s done is done and you’re lucky that I’m on your side.”

Her hand shoots out and the book that’s been floating in the water comes straight over to it, the pages flipping until she holds the tome in her hand and stabs the pages with her finger.

“Ah, here we go. How to reverse a spell,” she says. “Though I should let you know that there are costs that come with this reversal. They’re necessary so that I don’t spend all my days undoing what is asked of me. The cost of doing business, as they say. Though perhaps it would be better to tear out the page entirely.”

“What costs?” I ask, then I shake my head. “No, I don’t want it, it doesn’t matter.”

“The cost,” she goes on, tearing the page out from the book, “is that you will get your fins back, like you never lost anything at all. You will return to the way you were in every way possible. Isn’t that what you’ve wanted? These last ten years, isn’t a return to the girl that you were, isn’t that all you dreamed of and wished for?”

“It was,” I admit, my heart hammering in my chest. “But I don’t think I can go back to her. I don’t think I want to.”

“Oh you do. You know you do deep down. And I will give you that. A return to yourself in all ways…all except one.”

“Which is?”

“I remain in possession of your soul.”

“You never had my soul to begin with!” I tell her. True, I often thought and said I sold my soul to her but that was always just a figure of speech.

Wasn’t it?

She gives me a dry look. “Semantics, my dear. But I will thoroughly possess it now.”

And at that she waves her fingers at me, ink shooting out from her palms and making the world go black.

CHAPTER39

Ramsay

One momentI’m staring at Sam as the Kraken stabs the heart right out from her, the blood of a fellow Brethren spilling onto the deck.

The next moment I’m watching as the Kraken grabs Maren like a hook, hauling her off the ship and into the air.

I’m moving toward her before my mind has a chance to catch up, racing with my broadsword drawn, ready to slice the Kraken’s tentacle in half and free my love, but the tentacle retreats back into the sea, taking Maren with it.

“Maren!” I scream, watching as they disappear into the deep, waves closing over them.

“Ramsay,” Cruz says to me, his voice low and poignant. I turn to see Thane on his knees with Sam’s head in his lap, the blood spreading out from under her like an opening rose. She stares up at the sky, lifeless, gone.

For a moment I don’t know what to do. The Kraken—I’m assuming there are more than one of them now—is attacking the other side of the ship still, its tentacles smashing theNightwindin places, though its movements are weak and sloppy, and Lothar and Matisse are working hard with their swords to keep it at bay.

Sam Battista is dead, my dearest sister-in-law, my brother’s beloved wife, and I know he’s in such immense shock and pain that there is no coming back from this, not for a very long time. I’ve been there, I know the journey that lies ahead.

And I know I can’t do anything for him. Just as no one could do anything for my losses. I can’t do anything but avenge Sam’s death now, as well as Hilla’s, and go and get Maren before she becomes like them too.

“I will get our justice, brother,” I announce to Thane, holding up my sword. “I give you my word.”

He looks up at me, tears streaming down his anguished face, and my heart breaks with the loss. He nods.

I don’t wish to abandon my crew, but Maren needs me and it seems like everyone is holding their own, thanks to her blood. I am eternally grateful that she decided to go against my wishes and follow her own will. I will never try and prevent that again, though even if I did, she still wouldn’t let me. One of the things I that I love most about her is her tenacity.

If she’s even alive, I think and the idea strikes me to the core.