Page 45 of Wicked Tides #1

I nearly fell to sleep in the chair, letting my thoughts wander to places I’d tried to keep them from for years.

Just before I surrendered to rest, I lurched out of the chair, tossed off my boots and my belts, and fell onto the thin mattress on the bed.

I didn’t even pull the covers over myself.

I just let sleep take me and hoped it wouldn’t be plagued with incessant dreams.

. . .

Gus was very aware of how much my time alone meant.

I hadn’t returned to the village and even as the next day passed, I was still in need of solitude to plot our next moves.

And to reflect on all that happened and all that had gone wrong the last few days.

My decisions had been unlike me since Dahlia reentered my life.

The mere fact that she and her sister were still alive was proof of that.

My men were taking notice and some were proving less tolerant than others.

But the tides were changing and the sons had twisted the normalcy of things into something unpredictable.

It was late in the day when I finally decided to take a dip in the lake. It was going to be cold, but when was I not cold? I took my bottle of rum with me, planning to use it to warm my blood.

I walked over barefoot until I reached the gravely edge of the water.

Even just on my toes, it was ice, but the shock would invigorate me.

Runoff from the mountains was usually chilly no matter the season.

I knew that much. I set my bottle down and sucked in a breath before diving right in.

The water was ice on my skin. It took the air out of my lungs, but after a few forced moments of immersion, I relaxed, rinsing my hair and scrubbing at my body with my hands, making sure the salt was being cleaned out of the fibers of my clothes as well.

Lastly, I cleaned my throbbing ear, wondering what the damn thing would look like once it healed over.

Once thoroughly cleaned, I grabbed my bottle and waded further down the bank, sipping on the rum to keep that warm feeling in my stomach fresh.

I found an outcropping of rocks that made a shallow, crescent-shaped landing.

I lifted myself from the water and onto the rocks, finding a place to sit and lean up against some smooth stones.

And from there… I simply stared at the calm, quiet waters and the trees swaying on the opposite bank.

I watched, I drank, and quieted my thoughts.

Night cloaked the sky and still I sat, my clothes nearly dry and my skin icy, but I barely felt it anymore. It was either I froze or I found something I could destroy and destroying things had caused greater problems in the past.

The moon seemed to grow larger the longer I looked at it, framed by a ring of clouds. The gentle sounds of wind whispering over grass and through trees could have lulled me to sleep if I wasn’t beginning to get stiff against the rocks .

On the ripples danced the blue half-moon like a reflection in a mirror and I watched it. It sat mostly unmoving aside from the flutter of wind that disturbed the water’s surface from time to time.

And then a shape moved beneath and disrupted the perfect image.

A long, slender shadow lurked just under the water, hair flowing like silk as she moved.

Slowly, she surfaced. I watched as her head gradually crowned and she opened her near-black eyes at me.

She was entirely silent as she drifted slowly toward the edge of the rocks, quiet as a predator stalking a lamb.

She watched me closely, waiting for a reaction to her siren form up close as if she thought I’d suddenly raise my blade to erase her from existence now that she was with a tail in front of me.

But she wasn’t the same creature she’d been only days prior. The image of her shoving David up from the hold as Collin’s ship took on water flashed before me. I was conflicted, seeing both a monster and an ally looking back at me.

While I did not gasp in astonishment at her form, I could not deny its horrifying beauty.

She drifted to the rocks, lifting her torso from the water.

Her breasts were humble and bare, though mostly covered when her long, dark hair clung to them.

Her skin was pallid but with a silvery undertone beneath the moon’s light.

Every striation in her slim muscles was visible in that form as if she was built to make a man uneasy.

Sharp nails clung to the stone and three slits under her ribs pulsed subtly with each breath as she took in the cool night air.

Behind her was a long tail that swayed slowly back and forth.

It had a slick, blackish-silver sheen to it.

Down her spine was a sharp fin that stretched down to where her knees should have been and at the very end was a flare that cut through the water like a blade.

And her scars. They set her apart from any soft beauty she might have had.

I peered into Dahlia’s black eyes, seeing the slightest glisten of light behind them like a star in the night sky. It was terrifying, like the lure of a deep-sea fish enticing a meal .

She found a flat corner of stone and folded her arms atop it, resting while she watched me. I took another swig of my drink and then relaxed my wrist on my raised knee, swallowing down the satisfying burn of the rum.

“How did you get here?” I asked.

“Most bodies of water lead to the ocean somehow. But I walked, in fact. I can do that.”

A soft breeze whistled through the stones around us, but Dahlia seemed entirely unaffected by the chill.

“And your wounds?”

“They healed, as they always do.”

I nodded, tapping one of my rings on the side of the rum bottle. I watched as Dahlia’s gaze slowly traced over me and paused on my torn ear. I did not expect her to care, so when she reached toward it with her hand, I turned from her touch, furrowing my brows. She drew her hand back with a sigh.

“Humans are so fragile,” she whispered, regarding me like I was a riddle.

“Yes, we are,” I muttered, my thoughts wandering back to Agnes.

“What did she mean to you?” Her voice barely cut the silence and it took me a few moments to realize what she was asking about.

It was as if she could read my mind.

I didn’t know how she even got that information. Perhaps Meridan had relayed something she overheard as we sailed for the Widow’s Smile. Or perhaps Dahlia listened more thoroughly than humans ever could. Both were likely.

“The boy’s mother,” she continued. “She must have meant something for you to be losing yourself in drink.” She paused, resting her chin on her arms. “Did you love her?”

“I suppose in a way I did. Not the way she wanted me to.” My eyes wandered for a moment before meeting hers again. “Not the way he wanted me to love her.”

“The boy? In what way did he want you to love her?”

“Like his father should love her. But I am not his father. ”

“Where is his father?”

I took a deep breath. “Your mother and her sisters killed him on that island. He’d just been born.

Never knew him.” I saw nothing in Dahlia’s face that said she felt anything for that statement.

I didn’t expect her to. We’d felt more pain than most and knew how to swallow it.

It was a pattern that no longer surprised us.

“Jack was like an uncle to me. So when I returned, I promised myself I’d take care of his family.

His wife and his young son. Most of the other crewmen didn’t have families. ”

“Did you not have family?”

“I had a mother.” I took another small drink. “She left the coast behind and headed inland.” I glanced at Dahlia again, watching her gaze drift off into a memory. “David is my family like my crew is my family.” I swallowed, finding the will to say what I wanted to.

“Then you drink for them, too. They will all die on the sea if you do not give up your ship and this life you have.”

“Is that a threat?”

“It is a warning. I will die in the sea, too. It is only a matter of time.”

There was no malice in her voice. Her words seemed suspiciously genuine.

“This is the second time you’ve told me to stay off the water,” I said. “You said the same thing to me as a boy.”

“I was a fool. I still am,” she scoffed. “A fool for trusting you after what had been done to you. Naivety is not just a human trait, I’m afraid.”

“What made you unlock my cage, Dahlia?” I said.

Her eyes crawled up to mine, gray and pleading as if she did not want to answer.

“If I tell you, you will use it against me,” she whispered.

Perhaps I would. I couldn’t lie and tell her there was no chance of that. When she did not answer, I decided to offer something in trade. Something that might reveal one of my weaknesses.

“Thank you. For getting him out. ”

She blinked, taken aback by my gratitude.

Straight faced, she said, “I don’t know why I did it. I suppose the way he looked when Sakari died said he was not like them. Not like us. Not yet.”

“I’m doing my best to keep it that way. He makes it hard.”

“It is good you have him. All sirens are family. Until they’re not.” Her fingers lightly feathered over her throat. “When my blood sister found out it was my fault my mother and her sisters were killed, I was cast out.”

I ran a finger across my neck, indicating her scar.

“And that?”

“Her way of banishing me. They all hoped I would die and I nearly did. But hate can keep you alive and it did that for me. Whether I wanted it to or not.”

I took a deep breath and let it out, lifting my other knee to perch my other elbow.

There was a cloud of regret hovering over both of us.

It was thick and heavy and stirred emotions that we’d been stifling for years.

I could feel it on my skin like an oil slick and something told me Dahlia could feel it, too.

We were a pair of broken things being held together by thin, cotton sutures that were soon to break.

“I long for it to stop,” she whispered.

I glanced slowly her way to see her gaze drifting far off again.

“I long for relief,” she continued. “I believe I’m at the end of my rope, you might say.

I long to answer for my failures and my mistakes and yet Lune has not seen fit to let me die yet.

She dangles chances before me that I cannot reach and then steals them away, filling my heart with more pain than I ever thought I could bear.

But I am a dam waiting to burst and all in my path may perish.

” She took a couple long breaths before continuing.

“I let that girl die. I tried to save her and they killed her. And now Ahnah’s been stripped of something she will never get back.

I let my sisters get swept away by the sons.

I let my family get slaughtered by a young boy.

” Her eyes met mine again. “I freed you because neither of us wanted to be there and only one of us was in a cage. I watched you for days as my mother killed all those men and I felt… wrong. I thought I could let you go and they would all think you’d escaped. But you came back.”

She took a few more deep breaths, her brows knitting with uncertainty. “We created something that day. Something awful, in each other. It grows more venomous every day. I am the storm,” she whispered. “And I fear the destruction I will bring if someone does not stop me.”

“How does one stop a storm?” I muttered softly.

“We both know you cannot.”

I watched her turn and duck back into the water.

Her long shadow curled around and then swam back out into the lake just as rain began to gently pelt the surface of the water.

She left me there in that empty silence with her words echoing in my mind.

So much pain laced her tone. So much longing and desperation was hidden under her words and as I sat there mulling it all over, something deep inside me desired to be that relief she spoke of. Not just for her, but for me.