Page 9 of Siren Problems

LUNA

T here’s a particular kind of silence underwater.

Not the peaceful kind you romanticize in poems or spa commercials. No, this one’s tight. Coiled. Like the ocean’s holding its breath while you trespass somewhere sacred.

I kick harder, fins slicing through the frigid green-blue as the trench yawns open below me.

“Ten more meters,” I mutter through the comm charm clipped to my ear. Not that anyone’s listening.

Because I didn’t tell anyone.

Because if I told him , he’d lose his mind.

Again.

My scanner pings off a series of sharp ley echoes, flashing in frantic pulses. It doesn’t like this zone— neither do I , if we’re being honest—but I’m done playing safe. Done letting Calder guard secrets like treasure in a drowned kingdom.

The altar’s close. I feel it.

Pressure deepens around me. Not just physical— magical. The kind that squeezes your bones and whispers in your blood.

I flick on the light built into my diving mask. A shimmer pulses ahead, right at the edge of visibility. A pattern, half- covered in sediment, carved into the rock shelf. Not random. Deliberate.

“I knew it,” I whisper, even though my lungs are starting to burn.

But before I can blink, the shimmer moves.

And then the water grabs me.

One second I’m reaching toward the symbol, the next I’m twisted in a vortex of icy current and pulsing magic.

The scanner flies from my grip, vanishing into darkness.

My mask jolts sideways. The ley lines scream , and suddenly I’m not swimming anymore—I’m drowning in something that doesn’t want me here.

I flail, chest tightening, limbs sluggish. Everything tilts sideways.

Then something crashes into me—arms, heat, motion.

A second later, we’re ascending.

Fast.

The world bursts open with air and sound as we breach the surface, and I gasp like I’ve been reborn. Cold wind lashes my face. Salt burns my throat.

And Calder’s voice is in my ear, rough and shaking.

“What the hell is wrong with you?”

He’s gripping me like I’ll vanish. Dragging us toward the boat with fast, jerky strokes. I cling to him, coughing, because I can’t not —because I don’t have the strength to argue yet.

He hauls us up and over the edge of the boat, dumps me onto the deck, and then paces three steps before spinning back, face dark with rage.

“You dived alone ? Into the altar’s ley rift?! Are you trying to die?”

I peel the mask from my face, blinking against the sudden brightness. “I had it under control.”

“You were seconds from being pulled under!”

“I had to see it, Calder! I had to know?—”

“No, you didn’t!” he snarls. “You had to prove a point. You had to poke until something snapped.”

“Well maybe I’m tired of everyone telling me what not to touch without telling me why! ”

That lands like a slap.

He stops.

Freezes.

And for a second, I see it.

Not the anger.

Not the fury.

But the exhaustion.

He sinks onto the bench across from me, hands braced on his knees, jaw clenched so tight it looks like it hurts.

I sit up slowly, limbs shaking. “You knew I’d go anyway.”

His voice is hoarse. “Yeah.”

“You followed me.”

“I always do.”

That’s what breaks me.

“Calder—” I start, but I don’t even know what I want to say. Thank you? I’m sorry? You scare the hell out of me and somehow I still keep diving closer?

His eyes finally meet mine.

And what I see there...

It isn’t rage.

It’s grief.

Old. Bone-deep. Carved into him like the sigils I saw underwater.

“You weren’t supposed to find it,” he says.

“I already had,” I whisper.

Neither of us moves.

I reach for his hand without thinking.

He lets me.

His skin is calloused and damp. His grip doesn’t tighten—but he doesn’t pull away, either.

“You don’t have to keep guarding it alone,” I murmur.

His lips twitch. “I do.”

“No. You’ve just been doing it so long you forgot there’s a difference.”

He stares at the sea.

And for once... doesn’t argue.

The ocean still rolls around us, gentle now—lulling, almost. The kind of calm that only shows up after everything’s already gone to hell.

Calder’s sitting on the bench again, elbows on his thighs, face turned toward the horizon like it’ll tell him something he doesn’t already know. He hasn’t spoken since we surfaced. Hasn’t moved, except to occasionally flex his hand like something aches.

I notice the blood a few seconds before he does.

“Hold still,” I say, pulling the med kit from the bench storage and kneeling beside him.

“It’s fine.”

“You’re bleeding, you emotionally constipated barnacle. Let me help.”

He doesn’t argue.

I take his hand carefully, and it’s warmer than I expect. Big. Calloused. There’s a gash along his knuckle, shallow but angry, probably from where he slammed into coral dragging me out.

I clean it in silence, wrapping it in gauze I enchanted to be salt-resistant. He watches me like he doesn’t understand why I’m doing it. Like touch is foreign. Or forbidden.

I glance up once, catch the edge of something in his expression.

Gratitude?

Fear?

I don’t push.

Instead, I let myself wonder.

What would it be like if he weren’t so haunted?

If he smiled more than once a lunar cycle? If he kissed like he meant it instead of looking like the act itself might unravel the world?

I trace the edge of the bandage with my thumb.

There’s something under all his armor. Something kind. Fierce. Tender.

It scares me a little.

Because I want to reach for it.

I want him .

Not the prince. Not the storm. Not the curse.

Just… Calder.

But I say nothing.

Because we’re not there yet.

Because I’m not sure we’ll ever be.