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Chapter Seventy-Nine: Aria

The ocean is calm, the rippling over the surface caused by our propulsion of the small boat the only sound for miles. Under the light of the silver moon and the shimmering blanket of stars, an uneasy feeling squeezes my gut.

With our mother leading the way, my sisters and I gather around the vessel, each with a hand on it. Allegra and Sade take one side, Dyanna and Lyre on the other, and I push at the back, my gaze stuck on the woman lying unconscious within. Her blonde hair is fanned out all around her, some of it tainted with what smells like blood. We’re already a few miles off of the shore, my mother insisting we hurry though no one seems poised to chase after us.

My talons scrape along the old wood of the boat, drawing Lyre’s curious gaze from my right. She gives me a quick shake of her head. I don’t know if she’s relaying that I shouldn’t say anything or if it’s more that she doesn’t know what our mother’s plan is, but it doesn’t stop the way that I can practically taste my discomfort. We’ve stolen something— someone —her body passed carelessly to Allegra and Sade just outside of the Spell by a man and woman. Only my mother seems to know who she is, her dark eyes glowing with untampered glee under the moon’s light.

“Who is she?” Sade asks into the silence, making me jolt in surprise.

“You dare question our mother?” Allegra retorts, flashing her teeth.

Sade rolls her orange eyes, then pins them on our oldest sister. “I believe I’m questioning who the knocked-out woman we are transporting over the water is.”

Allegra growls but is interrupted by our mother. “If what the king has told me about her magic is true, then she will prove to be quite useful to our cause.”

“The king?” I ask at the same time Sade says, “Then why are we giving her to him?” At both of our questions, the queen turns around, swimming backwards without breaking her pace to glare at us.

“Yes, the king of the Mortal Realm,” she answers, making Lyre’s eyes nearly bulge out of their sockets. Dyanna looks on with vague interest. “He has made a bargain for our help. He now owes me two different debts.”

“And if he tries to betray us as his ancestors once did?” Allegra asks, disbelief flashing for a second on her stern face before she hides it beneath a sneer.

Our mother chuckles, turning back around with fluid elegance. In the distance, an orange light glows against the black of the night sky.

“He knows not what he has. What she is ,” my mother mocks. “I’ve given him an inkling, enough of the truth that he’ll want more answers, and that will inevitably lead him back to me. However, even if he tries to betray me, I’ve learned from our past mistakes. This woman will only ever be a siren’s call away.”

She says nothing more as we swim closer to the light. The creaking of a ship at anchor, the waves gently rocking it, sends a shiver down my spine. It reminds me of the noises the fallen fae ship had made before the carnage that had taken Mashaka’s life.

We slow our pace, the small boat jostling the motionless woman. What have they done to her? Magic builds at the base of my throat, the urge to use it confusing me. There is no threat, yet as I stare at her, something makes my instincts go on alert.

Male voices sound, and the orange light morphs into a flickering flame attached to a torch, the person holding it going to the side of the ship as we approach. Ropes are thrown down over a roaring lion that is engraved on the side of the vessel. Allegra and Sade tie them to metal loops attached to the small boat we push, my mother heaving herself up onto its edge as she transforms into her mortal form. Her purple braids release into a cascade of curls, the longest ones dripping down past her hips. Her iridescent scales become flush against her dark skin though still shimmer under the moonlight. She holds a hand out to Allegra, who reaches into the satchel she is carrying and drops something into my mother’s waiting hand—the sound of familiar metal clinking making my chest squeeze tightly.

“Wait here,” she commands, shooting a deadly glare at Allegra when she attempts to speak up in protest.

My sister bows her head, swimming back from the ship to where the rest of us wait. With a shout from above, my mother and the woman are hoisted up, slowly rising along the body of the ship until they are brought over and onto the deck.

“I don’t like this,” Allegra seethes as she shakes her head. “We can’t trust any of them.”

My other sisters stay silent, their eyes vigilantly trained on the deck where our mother disappeared. Time moves slowly, the sound of voices dwindles until it’s just one male and one female. Then my mother’s frame appears as she steps up onto the ship’s railing. She stops and says something over her shoulder to the man standing there, his golden crown glinting in the light of the torch he holds, before she dives into the water. We sink beneath the surface to join her.

“What happened?” Allegra asks, Sade joining her at our mother’s side.

Queen Amari, already back in her siren form, smiles victoriously. She holds her hand out in front of her, and glinting on her middle finger is a gold ring, a pearl nestled at its center.

“That’s one of the rings,” I whisper, my stomach bottoming out.

She cocks her head to the side, her smile growing sharper as she examines the pearl-topped ring on her finger. “It is, and one I am saving for another. Soon, daughters, we will rule over land and sea.”