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Finally, he steps in close to me, so close that I can see tiny flecks of silver and green in his eyes. It’s hypnotizing, the way they pull me under those dark long lashes, and the scent of him, similar to the stuff he’s burning but with something sweet, only adds to the headiness.

“I can fix your back as well,” he says, his voice low, and he stares at my mouth as he reaches back behind me. My breasts brush against his warm chest, my nipples hardening despite the fear and hatred I feel for him, and my breath hitches. His gaze drops even lower now, the corner of his full mouth quirking up as he watches how my body responds to him, how it betrays me.

Then, he finds the wound at my back and presses the herbs on it until I feel that heal too.

“There,” he says with a satisfied nod as he looks me over. “Like no harm ever came to you. I’ll collect more blood in a few days, give you time to heal and recuperate. You’ll get used to the cycle, and the magic should make things easier.”

Magic? My eyes widen, and he notices.

“Yes, magic,” he says. “You seem to know this word? Do you know of us witches? Do you have blood-drinkers? Or is all this new to you? Perhaps you are used to being the only monster around.”

I am not a monster, I want to scream at him. I am doing what I must, what I am made to do. Is that what this is all about? Is this punishment for what I did to those men?

“It should be a pity that you can’t understand me,” he says as he stoops down to pick up the other chalice. I expect him to drink my blood like he did with the other one, but he doesn’t. “But I am used to talking to someone who doesn’t understand me and never talks back.” He glances up at the ceiling, and my gaze follows, expecting something or someone to be there.

“I wonder,” he says, looking back at me, the coldness in his eyes softening slightly, “do you have God under the sea? Do you Syrens worship sharks? Other Syrens? Man itself? Do you ever wrestle with how God could create a horrid creature such as yourself, how they could ever let something like this happen to one of their precious living souls? Have you ever spared a thought for who created you?” He gives me a caustic smile. “What a blessing that would be, to never have to believe in anything.”

Then, he starts to walk toward the door.

He opens it, cautiously looking outside before he turns back to look at me.

“I will be back after daybreak,” he says. “I know you don’t understand what that means. I just want you to know that I will be back, for better…or for worse.”

Then, he exits the room, shutting the door behind him. There is a loud click and rattling of the handle, then nothing.

There is relief in the silence of this room, with only the crackle of the candles surrounding me. My body aches from the position it’s strapped in, my tail starting to dry out a little as I press myself up to get the pressure off my shoulders and chest.

He will be back, for better or for worse, he says.

I know what he means for the worse.

More bloodletting, or some other form of torture.

And there probably isn’t anything for the better.

But he is magic. He called himself a witch. A blood-drinking witch.

I’ve spent eleven years looking for Edonia, the sea witch who tricked my sister into giving up her fins for legs, hoping that, if I found her, she could either tell me where Maren was or give me legs so I could cross the world to find her. My search brought me to Jorge, then across the Pacific, then back to my kingdom of Limonos until the last of our Syrens left. Then, I traveled down here, to the frigid southern oceans, forever searching, unwilling to give up.

And now, I’ve been captured and tortured by this blood-drinking witch who seems to have malevolent plans for me.

But I have plans too.

If he can give me legs, the same way Edonia did for Maren, then I am prepared to give this monster exactly what he wants.

No matter what it costs me.

Chapter Five

PRIEST

Itook a risk leaving the Syren crucified on the cross. Though I had locked the door behind me so she was as secure as possible, both roped and chained, there was always a chance something could go wrong.

But I couldn’t be in there a minute longer. With her blood coursing through my veins, making it harder to control my impulses, I had to separate myself from her. There was a moment there, when I used my magic to heal the wound on her back, that I felt her nipples brush against my bare chest, and I thought my cock would explode. I was hit with the urge to run my lips over her breasts, to bite and feast, to let my hands roam southward. I have no idea what a Syren’s anatomy was like, but I wanted to find out.

I was a monster, I knew, but I didn’t want to be of that kind. Wicked men were like that, those who preyed on women, who defiled them. Perhaps all men have some sort of beast inside them, driving them to do such things, but that was the last bastion of humanity I had to hold on to.

God, help me hang on.