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Chapter Seventy-Two: Aria

It takes two more days before the city of Lumen comes into view. In that time, I had minimized my stops as much as possible. Stopping means remembering who isn’t here with me. Stopping means I have to restart with a momentum that I don’t think I have.

Stopping means reliving my failures.

It’s early morning, the sun not quite breaking through the surface of the water yet. I know that I should go straight to my mother and give her the rings, but there is a tugging at my gut that leads me to the seamounts instead. They loom ahead of me, a dark horizon in the water that grows larger as I near.

An ominous quiet washes over me as I swim through the valley cut between the mounts. My chest rattles with the beat of my heart, my ears straining to hear any sound or movement from the sirens that live here. From the offspring. However, as I move into the heart of the mounts, sunlight finally casting it in a subtle glow, I find them completely empty.

I poke my head in and out of the caves carved into the dark rock, finding evidence that suggests the sirens did not just pick up and move. Their homes remain intact and full of items. Food caught long ago rots on tables, and items from woven eel grass bags to jewelry are scattered all over. It’s as if they had to abandon this place in a hurry.

“Or like they were ambushed,” I say quietly with bitter cold realization. My body begins to tremble, shockwaves of sadness and regret drowning me as if I wasn’t a being made to live beneath the water. “No,” I whisper, shaking my head as my hands fly up to cradle it. I am too late . All those lives, young and old… They all died because of me . “No!” I scream, pounding my hands into the rock, my braids floating around my head and blocking out the rest of the world.

My attention is narrowed down to this place—this defeat —as I scream. Magic tickles my throat, blending into my voice. I wish I could use it to stop all this cruelty, all this bitterness that stems from the siren queen herself. I just want it all to stop. My screams grow long and high-pitched while my talons dig into my palms. When dark blue blood mingles with the water and an ache sharp and fierce pulses in my hands, I finally stop. Leaning my head against the rock, I let my wails quiet until only I can hear their sounds. I wait one more moment, digging deeply into my memory to pull up the list of things I need to remember to be when I enter the palace. Jaw and shoulders relaxed, lips flat, spine straight, and attitude vicious.

Pushing away, I turn from the rock and immediately freeze. Two legionaries stare at me, their glinting silver weapons partially drawn from their shell-armored bodies as if frozen mid-strike. My mouth opens and closes without a sound as blood rushes in my ears. Time feels suspended, stretching between the three of us like a taut rubber band until it finally snaps. Eyes of turquoise and garnet narrow predatorily as the legionaries lurch for me, their talons digging into my arms.

“Your mother has been expecting you,” the garnet-colored siren says, though she blinks rapidly like she’s confused by the statement.

I don’t get a word out in response before they are hauling me between them and towards the shining pearlescent palace. I glance back only once to the seamounts, but as before, only hollowness remains.

The hallways of the palace are as cold and unwelcoming as I remember them to be.

The sirens holding me captive usher me into the throne room, drawing both my mother’s dark gaze and Allegra’s. The latter sneers at me, the move unsurprising, but it’s my mother’s smile—a genuine smile —as she looks at me that causes me to stop moving for a moment. The colored crystals embedded into the columns lining the walkway up to her dais make the space glow in a rainbow of colors, yet it’s what is positioned on the dais next to her ghastly throne that gives me pause: the Siren Queendom’s Mirror. In my entire twenty-one years, I have never once seen my mother use it. Shells of every color and variety make up the entire back of the oval-shaped Mirror, while its edges are wrapped in never-dying seaweed and adorned with permanently blooming water lilies.

I stop at the bottom of the dais and bow.

“Aria, you may rise.” I do, dragging my gaze up the steps until they meet the nearly black ones of my mother where she floats next to the Mirror. “Tell me you’ve acquired what I asked of you?” I reach for the bag tied around my body and open it, grabbing the rings and holding them out to her in my palm.

Allegra’s sapphire eyes glance behind me as she finally realizes who is missing. “Where’s Mashaka?”

“He—” I falter over the words before clearing my throat and trying again. “We were attacked by rogue sirens. He did not make it.” I wait for any hint of sadness to pass over Allegra’s features. Not much, but enough to show that her favored animal, her companion for years, actually meant something to her.

But she rolls her eyes, annoyance obvious in the gesture of her hand as she waves it in front of her. “If he was too weak to fight them off, then he had no business being at my side. Good riddance.”

My mother chuckles as she makes her way to me, her hand snatching the rings from my own. “You made it home early. I’m impressed, Daughter.”

“Early? But…” I let the thought die as my mother’s smile turns menacing. I have to force my hands to stay open, but I can’t stop the way my fingers strain. She killed them . I had been early, had done what she asked, and she still killed them.

Allegra holds our mother’s gold and diamond trident out to her, the tips sparkling under the filtered sunlight.

“I have another job for you. One that I expect your bleeding heart will enjoy.”

A low growl from Allegra washes over my skin, disquiet creeping in the longer my mother lets the silence between us grow. Finally, she tips her trident in my direction, letting the sharply cut diamonds imprint on my chest.

“Someone tipped off the sirens at the seamounts that the Queen’s Legion was coming for them. They were able to escape shortly before we got there.” She presses the trident harder, drawing blood as I wince. Her dark eyes take on a murderous glint when she leans in closer to me. “I want you to find them and tell me where they are hiding.”

“But Y-Your Majesty, what makes you think that I can find them?” I stutter, my throat narrowing.

My mother tilts her head faintly, not enough to bare her neck but enough to relay her displeasure with my question. “Don’t ask questions you already know the answer to, Daughter . You will work to find them, just as you worked to befriend them behind my back.”

“But—”

“Do not disappoint me, Aria,” she cuts in, silencing me with more pressure of her trident on my chest. “If you fail in this, if you embarrass me and my royal legacy any more than you already have, I will destroy everything you love and hold dear. Everything , Aria.”

The seconds tick by as her words and the insinuation behind them settle between us. I have no one important to me, no one I love dearly… except for Lyre . When my realization becomes evident, the queen simply sends another sharp look of disappointment my way.

“You will join a group of sirens going out tomorrow to hunt for ships.” That’s all she says before she and Allegra leave, the throne room left in horrific silence. I stay there, my injured tail fin slowly swishing the water as I hold myself afloat. Find the missing sirens? It is an impossible task. Impossible.

Grinding my teeth together, I do the only thing I can when being in this palace—this court—becomes too much. I head to my cave.

I don’t spot any of my other sisters as I exit the palace though I’m only really looking for Lyre.

When I finally reach the cave’s hidden entrance, I carefully part the sea kelp gently rocking in the current and enter. I catalog every shelf and corner, confirming that all is as it should be, and finally let some of the tension ease from my body.

“Aria.” I turn with a gasp as the familiar voice sends my heart into a furious beat.

“Nia?” I rasp, backing farther into the cave when she pushes past the sea kelp, her lips twisted somewhere between surprise and fury. Her short blue braids float smoothly around her head when she comes to a stop in front of me.

“Well, what do we have here?” Nia observes me for a moment before pushing past to study all the items I’ve collected.

“How did you find this place?” I ask as my body trembles.

“I’ve been following you since I spotted you at the seamounts. Your little display of anger was quite impressive to watch. It almost made me think you were the one who tipped us off that the Queen’s Legion was coming, but then I remembered hearing whispers of you being gone for weeks on a mission for your mother. What did the queen send you out for?” She keeps her back to me as she slowly inspects the treasures of the dead, sometimes lifting one up to examine it more closely.

“Nia, you can’t tell anyone about—”

“No,” she interjects, finally turning to face me. Her pace as she moves towards me is slow and calculated, and she waits until she’s close enough that I can see the freckles on her cheeks before she speaks again. “You do not get to issue the commands here. It seems I’ve stumbled onto something quite forbidden, wouldn’t you say?”

I shake my head, ready to plead with her to keep this quiet. Maybe if I tell her what she wants to know, she’ll leave with the promise to not say anything. “My mother sent me to the Northern Island to retrieve a set of spelled rings. I don’t know what her plan is for them; she never told me. Please, Nia, I swear that is all I know,” I plead, showing her the palms of my hands.

“Let me see your bag,” she demands. I untie it, handing it to her and watching as she riffles through it. The only thing in there now is the dagger I found in the early days of the trip. Nia tosses both to the ground, deeming them worthless, as she turns to look all around the cave. “How long have you had this little space?”

I hesitate, unsure if her knowing the truth would be better or worse. Her head snaps towards me, her blue eyes flaring in warning. The truth, then. “A few years. I started collecting items from the males who were felled by our song.”

Nia lifts a brow and smirks. “Morbid. And nobody else knows of its existence?”

“No. I swear it. It serves no purpose other than for me to have a space of my own.”

“Not anymore,” Nia says under her breath, her gaze tracking up to the hole in the rock above us.

Fear keeps its fingers wrapped tightly around my throat as I prepare to keep pleading, but Nia, with a move faster than I expect, punches me directly in the face, right below my left eye. I let out a yelp, my body propelled backward until it slams into the wall. Nia is there, sending another closed fist into the other side of my face. I try to cower behind my raised arms, but she pins them to my sides before leaning in towards me.

“That was for agreeing with your mother to keep us doomed to the seamounts.”

My flowing tears mix into the seawater as I stare at her. “I am only one person, Nia. And the least influential one at that. It would have changed nothing. ”

Releasing my arms, she slams my head against the rock, wrapping a fist tightly into my long braids. Her figure blurs in front of me as I grip her wrist and try to right myself.

“They’re just excuses, Aria. Pathetic, weak excuses. But you have the opportunity to make it up to me—to us. All you have to do is let us meet here.”

My ears ring, my focus waning with the dizziness in my head. “What do you mean?”

“The cave.” She gestures with her chin. “When we were tipped off last week about your mother’s impending raid, we were able to get the children and older sirens out to Eersten before the Queen’s Legion came, but we lost a lot of our weapons and gear that we had slowly been stockpiling. With this cave, I can safely coordinate meetings with the sirens I send out to spy on the Legion. We’ll take our weapons back and store them here until the time is right.”

“Nia, please ,” I cry, squeezing my eyes closed. “This is the only place I have that is safe—”

“And what a fucking luxury that is, you spoiled, stupid brat. You claim you want to help us, that you are only one person , yet when I ask you to give me access to the one thing that could help us, you selfishly try to keep it. No . If you want the queen left unaware about this little spot, you’ll do as I ask.” Her forearm presses into my neck, forcing my eyes to open and look into hers. “You will help me find where your mother has hidden the weapons they stole from us and then bring them here. Do that, and I won’t let anyone else know about this place. When it comes time to end your family’s line, I will allow you to keep your pathetic life. Do you understand?”

Not knowing what else to do, I nod my throbbing head in silence. Nia eases up her hold on me, prowling around the cave one final time before looking at me over her shoulder.

“Pleasure talking with you, Your Highness.” She pushes through the sea kelp and leaves.

I sink against the wall, my hands cradling my head, as the weight of what I’ve agreed to drags me farther down into darkness. The irony of being asked to help Nia find weapons my mother took from her mere minutes after my mother has commanded that I find the sirens of the seamounts has me biting down hard on the inside of my cheek. I am not a spy. I am not some sort of clever sleuth. I cannot do this.

Gently rubbing my eyes, I swim to the center of the cave that is no longer my own and curl in on myself, burying my head in my arms.

Every time I manage to close my eyes, I think of all that has happened to me—all that still awaits—and find that I’d much rather be awake. When a familiar, gentle set of knocks rouses me from the glass art I’m working on, I nearly knock it over in my rush to the door.

Lyre lets out a small laugh as I barrel into her, squeezing her tightly to me. “Where have you been?” I ask, my mouth muffled in her lavender hair. I had been home for days and hadn’t seen her in the palace or out on hunts. Her arms wrap around me once before she forcefully draws back, her gaze going to the hallway.

“I’m sorry that I haven’t been able to see you until now.” She offers no other explanation as nervous energy rattles her body. When I back up into my room to beckon her in, she shakes her head. “We’ve been summoned by her.”

I follow Lyre down the hall from our rooms, bypassing the throne room and heading towards the palace exit. “Do you know what is happening?”

“It could be one of a number of things,” she responds quietly. After feeling the weight of my stare on the side of her face, she sighs and adds, “None of which I believe are good.” My lips draw down in a frown as I fully take in my sister. While appearing on the outside as lovely as she always has—her light purple scales glistening against the phosphorescent lights that glow from the plants on the ocean floor—there is something draining her that wasn’t there before I left for the Northern Island.

Shaking off my feeling of unease, we join my mother and the rest of my sisters outside the palace. Allegra ignores me, her gaze sharp in the direction of the Continent’s shores. Sade’s biceps flex as she ties her orange braids back, her sunset eyes finding mine with a short linger before she diverts them. Dyanna, her pink-colored scales glimmering against her dark skin, twirls a piece of seaweed in her hand, looking more bored than anything else. My sisters and I have never joined my mother like this outside of the queen’s assemblies.

“Daughters, it is time to begin the first act of my grand plan to bring us back to the surface.” My ruby brows raise in surprise as I glance around our small group to gauge everyone else’s reactions. While Lyre shares my confusion, Allegra, Sade, and Dyanna do not. Our mother offers no other explanation as she turns to face north, towards the Continent. “Let us rewrite history.”

We swim for a while, the full moon at its highest point in the sky our only source of light. When my mother diverts towards the surface, we all follow, breaking through the water one at a time. I eye the length of the shore in both directions, trying to surmise how far west we’ve gone.

“Look!” Lyre whispers, pointing straight ahead. My gaze narrows on the darkness beyond the water when there’s abrupt flashes of color—green and yellow, perhaps also blue—before it goes dark again.

“It’s time,” my mother declares before taking off towards the beach.