“Hello.” Her cheery voice brought a smile to my lips. “You are new here.”
“Yes, I am. My name is Jewels.” I stopped and bent down to be closer to eye level with her.
“What are you, Jewels?” Her curious eyes looked over my body, observing every detail.
“I am a witch.”
She crinkled her nose and stuck out her tongue while pretending to gag.
“Yuck. I don’t like witches.” She continued to watch me intensely. I could feel her eyes boring into my soul. She seemed perplexed. “But I like you.”
“Thank you. I like you too. What is your name?”
“Bree.”
“Nice to meet you, Bree. Why are you in the trench?”
“I don’t like the land. The water is my home, so the warden lets me stay here instead of in a cell. Even though I was bad.”
“Do you ever come to land?”
She shook her head, sending sprinkles of water onto my legs.
“Well, if you ever decide to come to land, come by and see me.” I pointed to my cellblock. “My cell is in there. My cellmate is a mermaid. Lorelei.”
“Oh, yes, I like her. Sometimes she’ll swim in the trench with me. Most of the merfolk won’t swim in the trench and save their yard time for the cove. But Lorelei plays with me.”
“If you change your mind about the land you’re welcome to come visit us anytime.” I smiled, but Bree made a gagging face.
“Will not happen. But if you decide to come into the trench I can show you all sorts of secrets.” Bree held a finger to her lips and sank down beneath the surface of the water. A flash of red zipped beneath the gently flowing current and then she was gone.
Such an odd mermaid. Or maybe she wasn’t that odd. I guess I don’t really know that much about what is normal so how can I judge? I moved from the water and proceeded to my cell. When I arrived, Lorelei was sitting in the corner on the floor, facing the cell door as if she was just waiting for me. She waved me over and I sat across from her. She didn’t say a word, just simply held her hands out in front of her, palms up. When I didn’t respond she snapped her fingers and held her palms out again. I slowly placed my hands on top of hers.
Touching amplifies our telecommunicating ability. Once we get good at this, we will be able to talk all the time without anyone knowing. Even without being in the same room. No need for enchantments.
I’m still not used to this. You being in my head feels pretty invasive.
Lorelei frowned. This is a gift. Embrace it. I won’t invade your thoughts when you don’t want me to. But the same rule applies for you!
Deal. Especially considering I don’t even know how.
She rolled her eyes. You will figure it out. It takes time. I don’t really understand how to access it without touching. I have no idea how it happened earlier.
I see why you took me to that class. I now feel more screwed than before. The more I learn, the more I realize that a lot of people don’t want me around. God only knows what The Blood Coven, mermaids and witches will do when they find out I’m a crossbreed . I interlaced my fingers with hers and squeezed. She gave a slight smile.
It won’t be as bad as you think. Well, The Blood Coven is as bad as you think but not the others. Our focus should be on The Blood Coven for now.
I nodded in agreement. At least I don’t have to worry about being a Siren.
Lorelei tilted her head to the side and squinted her eyes.
I know my magic is more powerful than average, but that’s probably from being from a first family. I can’t do any of the Siren abilities Mr. Jenks talked about and he said there has never been a Siren that was a crossbreed.
Lorelei leaned back against the wall and removed her hands from mine. She pulled a package of peanut butter crackers from her pocket. She reached around behind the sink and pulled a stone from the wall. From inside the wall she pulled out a small bag of red liquid. She opened it and brought it to her lips. When the liquid touched her tongue she grimaced, but that didn’t stop her from drinking it. She handed it to me and shoved a peanut butter cracker in her mouth. She rested her hand on my knee.
It’s some wine that a few shifters made. Tastes awful. But gets you buzzed.
I swallowed the sour liquid and my stomach burned as soon as it hit it.
You may be right about not being a Siren. But you are a Siren Descendant. Everything lines up. Your powers breaking through a binding, your necklace, your mysterious birth mom.
I nodded and took another drink before passing the bag back to her.
Maybe I should join The Blood Coven, you know for protection. I think the warden is their leader or at least in it.
Hell no, you won’t join them. If Blu is a member it wouldn’t surprise me. He’s sneakier than a crab scavenging a fish trap. There’s a reason they want you so bad and I don’t think it’s just because you’re from a first family. They may know that you’re a Siren Descendant. They want to use you for something.
I can’t really fight it if the most powerful person in this whole prison is on their side. What could they want from me?
I’m not sure and that’s what scares me. Don’t get on Blu’s bad side, okay? Just stay off his radar as much as you can.
Fat chance of that happening. I’m already firmly superglued to the center of his radar.
We finished off the crackers and awful wine just as the dinner bell sounded. The room spun as I stood up and I braced myself against Lorelei for support. We carefully made our way to the common area, giggling the entire walk in the same way sorority girls on their way to a party act, earning some stern looks from the few guards that lined the hall. We got our trays and sat at our usual table. Our friends soon joined us.
“So does anyone know what that mermaid in the trench is here for?” I asked. Everyone went silent. Food fell from Flynn’s gaping mouth.
“You met Bree?” Lorelei asked.
“Yeah, we talked a bit earlier today.”
“And she really talked to you instead of killing you?” Teal asked, wide-eyed.
Becky elbowed her in the side. “What Teal is trying to say is Bree isn’t a fan of anyone not mermaid. Like at all.”
“Like, murdery to everyone but mermaids,” Flynn said as he picked up the bits of food that had fallen from his mouth and tossed them back in. He had to have an iron stomach. “Bree was kidnapped by a bad group of shifters who she had made friends with. Turns out they had a taste for mermaid flesh. She watched them flay and eat her sisters. They were going to eat her. But she got the upper hand and killed them all.”
“That seems like self-defense to me.”
“It would’ve been if she had stopped there,” Flynn said.
“The whole experience caused her to go a little crazy. She started hunting down any shifters that were near the water and killing them,” Becky added.
“Yeah, nearly dying because someone you thought was your friend screws you over could drive anyone mad,” Teal said with her eyes fixated on me.
Flynn was the only one to notice and shot me a questioning look. I turned my attention to Becky.
“She’s basically a badass. A mermaid that can take down shifters is pretty impressive. It took witches, fae, and shifters working together to capture her,” Becky said.
“But why is she in the trench instead of a cell?” I asked.
“Since she watched her sisters die on land she refuses to come onto it now. And when they forced her, she lost it, hurt herself and a bunch of other people. So, they let her stay in the trench now,” Lorelei said.
“Let’s change the subject.” Flynn finished off the last of his second hamburger and Becky handed him half of hers.
“I heard The Blood Coven gave Jewels an ultimatum. When were you going to tell us about that?” Becky propped her elbows on the table and rested her chin on her interlocked fingers and glared at me.
“Is it safe to assume you know about Teal’s and my little trip through the portal?” I asked
. My stomach churned, threatening to expel the subpar food I just inhaled. Becky nodded.
“Care to fill in the rest of us?” Flynn asked.
Teal told our friends the condensed version of our near-death experience. I could sense Lorelei glaring at me and I made a point not to look at her. She was going to rip me a new one back at the cell. I was keeping so many things from my friends. It wasn’t fair, but telling them everything was too risky. It could cost them their lives and I couldn’t be responsible for the death of anyone else I cared about. My dad’s warning echoed in my head. I really didn’t know who I could trust. As much as I wanted to confide in all of them, the only person I knew I could truly trust was Lorelei.
“What did you tell them?” Flynn asked.
“I didn’t get a chance to answer.”
“Then you need to stay near somebody for the next few days at least. It will be harder for them to hurt you if you’re not alone.” Flynn shifted his gaze to the food on Becky’s tray and she slid it over to him.
“There’s more to it than that,” Lorelei said. I jerked my head up to face her, but she avoided looking in my direction. “She’s not going to tell you and I understand why. But you all need to know.”
I slapped my hand down onto her arm and felt our connection click into place like a circuit board that just got power.
Lorelei, no!
They need to know. They will be putting themselves in greater danger by helping you than they realize and they deserve the right to make the choice to do that or not.
I promised my dad I wouldn’t tell.
You’re keeping that promise. I’m the one telling.
“Jewels is half mermaid.”
Flynn’s mouth hung open and his eyes grew wide. Teal and Becky exchanged a look but didn’t say anything.
“Whoa. That’s some heavy shit. I’ve never met a crossbreed before.” Flynn kept his voice low and ducked his head down as he talked.
“That isn’t all. She’s a Siren Descendant and I’m pretty sure she wears The Siren Jewel.” Everyone froze at the table and stared at me in disbelief.
My dad is going to kill me. That’s if The Blood Coven doesn’t first.
No one said anything after Lorelei dropped the bombshells of information on the group. Teal stormed from the table and Becky followed. Flynn awkwardly gathered his remaining food and left the common area. Anger filled my chest and I just wanted to walk away from Lorelei. Being a part of our little friend group was the only normal feeling I had and now it had been taken from me. I left the common area without Lorelei and started making my way back to our cell when I realized it would be the first place she’d look for me. I changed direction and turned down the first hall I came to that didn’t have a guard on it. I walked until the hall ended and realized I was at the big windows that overlooked the cove.
They were covered in water droplets from the ocean spray. The sea was choppy and dark. Black clouds loomed overhead and flashes of lightning broke through them like jagged glass. I pressed my hands to the smooth surface and my necklace did its little dance on my chest. It seemed to miss the water too. I wrapped the starfish in my hand and squeezed. Could it really be the lost Siren Jewel? If it was, that without a doubt confirmed that Alure was my mom and I would officially be a Siren Descendant. The only person who truly had the answers, I couldn’t even talk to. Not that I thought he’d tell me the truth anyway. After all he had eighteen years to tell me and he never did.
I swept my hand across the glass, leaving streaks in the condensation as I went. The water that had accumulated on the opposite side of the glass followed my hand. Every droplet rolled its way to my palm. Soon there was a floating puddle on the outside of the glass level with my hand. Each new drop sprayed onto the windows from the ocean slamming into the jagged rocks quickly migrated to my hand.
I visualized the water shaping into a ball the same way I had with the flame. The water curved itself up into a perfect sphere. I imagined the ball rolling and it rolled across the glass. I removed my hand from the window, but the water continued to follow my silly commands. The water ball floated from the glass and twirled while sucking in the all droplets from the air around it. It grew bigger and bigger until it expanded the entire length of the windows, completely distorting my view of the cove.
“Jewels?”
The globe of water outside the window burst like a water balloon. I spun around and Evan stood there. I pushed past him and ran. I heard him call out to me again, but I didn’t dare turn around. When I arrived back at my cell Lorelei was asleep on her bunk with her back to me. I climbed into my bed as the guards announced lights out. The cell door lowered from the ceiling until it met the floor. The lock clicked into place. I shuddered. I’d never get used to being locked in. If The Blood Coven wasn’t sure about my mermaid status before, they would be once Evan told them what happened at the windows. I really fucked up.
Lorelei was gone when I woke up the next morning. She didn’t even wake me to go to breakfast. I slept too long and realized I was almost late for my shift in the laundry room. I changed clothes and hurried to my work detail. Flynn was inside folding sheets when I arrived and thankfully Lorelei was nowhere in sight.
“Hey, Jewels,” he said.
“Good morning. What do we have today?”
“Bedding mostly.” He pointed to a bin. “That one is ready to be folded.”
“I’m surprised you’re talking to me after what Lorelei said yesterday.” I took a spot near him and started folding the tan, rough blankets we all had to sleep with here.
Flynn shrugged. “We all have secrets. A past we don’t talk about. I’m not in any place to judge. I was just shocked.”
I nodded and continued to fold. I sorted out a few blankets that needed mending into a separate pile. I waited for him to speak again, but he didn’t. The makeshift laundry area wasn’t nearly as spacious as the last and it didn’t take long for the heat from all the machines running to cause beads of sweat to form on my forehead.
“Since everyone has secrets. What’s yours?” I asked.
“Let’s save that for another day.” He smiled. “How are you?”
“I don’t know how to answer that question anymore. Ever since I pissed off The Blood Coven I’m constantly terrified that someone’s about to kill me. I’m endlessly trying to hide who I really am while simultaneously learning who that person is. It’s exhausting. I’m a little relieved that you guys know now. That’s one less thing I have to worry about.” He filled up a cart with folded sheets and pushed it to the side before pulling over a new batch of freshly dried ones.
“I know a thing or two about fucked up families. Me and my twin brother Dylan are the bastards of an Alpha. He won’t claim us and our mother was kicked out of her pack, so we are packless, which is basically the worst thing you can be when you’re a shifter. Our mom drank a lot, so we were on our own most of the time. Dylan tried to keep me out of trouble, but I always managed to find it anyway.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be. When I get out of here in a couple years Dylan and I are going to get our shit together and be something. Pack or not.”
“I have a little brother. His name is Ben.”
“He the one you brought back to life?”
I nodded.
“Honestly, what Lorelei said about you, the whole descendant thing, makes a lot of sense. If you can do magic like that by accident, you’re not an ordinary which.”
“I’m worried about that. It’s like I have a target on my back. My dad warned me not to tell people about my, you know, mixed up genetics, before I came here and I feel like everyone knows.”
“We aren’t going to tell. Teal, Becky, and me. I know we acted like asses last night, but that’s just because we were surprised. You can trust us.” He smiled. His shaggy hair hung in his eyes. He brushed it to the side with a flip of his head and kept folding. He paused and pulled a package of gummy bears from his pocket. He dumped some into h
is mouth, then tossed the package to me. I took a few red ones, the red were always the best, and popped them in my mouth.
“Where is Dylan?”
“At college. He is the good one. He hopes to be a lawyer. He says he needs to be one with a brother like me.”
“Wow, that’s pretty impressive.”
“He’s pretty impressive. I miss him a lot.” Flynn tossed back the last few gummy bears into his mouth and then crumbled up the package and tossed it into the trash can. Just as he sank the shot, five men walked in and made a beeline for Flynn.
“Look, boys, it’s the bastard wolf without a pack,” a tall, lanky man said. He was deep into his thirties and the obvious leader of the group. A low growl emanated from Flynn’s throat. The others growled in response and pushed out their chests. “You could always be our bait wolf. Our youngins need some practice ripping into real flesh. If you survive, we may even accept you as a pact member… eventually.”
The group of men chuckled and flanked us, trapping Flynn and me between them, the wall of dryers, and the folding table. Flynn grabbed my hand and pulled me close. He made eye contact with the leader and his growl grew louder as he moved in front of me.
“Oh, we will let the Little Witch go. The Blood Coven has already set a claim to her and we don’t mess with witch business. Although she does look fun to play with.” A few of the men stepped to the side, leaving an opening for me to get through to leave the room, but I didn’t budge. “This is your cue to run, witch.”
Flynn nudged me to the door, but I had a death grip on his hand.
“I’m not going anywhere,” I hissed.
“This is pack business. Nothing of your concern.”
“Flynn isn’t packless.” I took a step forward so I was next to Flynn instead of behind him and I stared the lanky wolf in the eyes. “He is my pack.”
My necklace vibrated against my neck and for the first time I felt the power from it surge into me. Before I realized what I was doing I had the water from every washing machine and sink spouts pouring into the growing spheres at my hands. The wolves’ growls intensified. One from each side lunged forward and I thrust a hand toward each of them, sending the balls of water at their faces. The water engulfed their heads like a fishbowl and when they opened their mouths to scream bubbles flowed out of their mouths. I kept my hands raised and pushed the water into their open mouths and down their throats. The water filled their lungs, replacing every bit of air that had once been there. As the water around their heads seeped into their lungs panic entered their eyes. I filled the fleshy lobes until they grew so distended that they couldn’t stretch any further. A booming pop spread throughout the room as the waterlogged lungs ruptured inside their chests. The men fell to the floor. Water and blood drained from their mouths.
The Siren Jewel: Spellbound Prison Saga Page 12