Sirens Unbound

by Laura Engelhardt

  Atlantea took a breath, then continued. “But all of these truths must be put aside for the moment. I am in need of your counsel on a pressing matter.” Atlantea paused a moment. “Know you all that I am in possession of a true prophesy.”

  There was a collective moment of shock around the table. Not merely because of Atlantea’s startling change in topic, but because of the topic itself: prophesies were rare beyond measure. There were many mages with the talent for prognostication: predictions about potential futures most likely to result based on existing reality. But a prophesy was different; in a prophesy, the oracle’s prediction of the absolute future was inescapable.

  Because the future seen in a prophetic vision was unavoidable, Cordelia often thought there was no real purpose in seeking one out. And prophesies were dangerous; history was filled with tales of leaders who sought to outmaneuver a prophesy, only to precipitate the inevitable. At a minimum, Atlantea’s announcement had effectively put on hold any discussion about the Aos Sí until whatever was prophesied came to fruition. Cordelia was so frustrated by the truth of that, she had a hard time focusing on Atlantea’s words.

  “The Oracle has prophesied the start of another desert-based mage war. The Danjou Enclave sent one of their mages to obtain a prophesy of the next mage war almost three decades ago. I have been monitoring the situation, and it now appears likely that this war will begin during my reign.”

  Atlantea’s staccato deluge of information was unusually direct, and there was a moment of silence as the courtiers processed her speech. Everyone hoped that the era of mage wars was behind them, or at least that a mage war wouldn’t be fought during their lifetime. When mages battled, the world burned. Even the last mundane world war, when the U.S. dropped an atomic bomb, didn’t come close to replicating the world-wide devastation of the previous mage wars.

  “A war fought in a desert is unlikely to have any impact on us, Atlantea,” a courtier finally opined.

  “Perhaps. But just because the Oracle saw an image of battle on desert sands doesn’t mean that the conflict will be primarily based in a desert. Their vision may simply be of a pivotal battle.” Atlantea replied calmly.

  “What did the Oracle see, specifically?” Zale asked. Cordelia was somewhat surprised to see furrows on Zale’s forehead. He had been Atlantea’s closest confidant since before the War of Succession; if Atlantea had not told him about the prophesy, then she had truly kept this information secret. Her abrupt decision to disclose it to the High Court now worried Cordelia almost more than the substance of the prophesy itself.

  “There is not much that we know; prophesies are tricky to interpret. Queen Sophia of the Mediterranean obtained a personal audience with the Oracle to verify what our spies reported: When asked to predict the next mage war, Delphi saw a scene of battle in a desert shimmering with heat. Humans primarily, with battle mages swirling in color amidst the clashing mundane armies. Weres ranged the field, while aircraft fell from the sky. The Danjou have come to believe that the types of tanks and aircraft described by the Oracle are similar in design to those in use now.” Atlantea had a distant look in her eye.

  Cordelia wondered how accurate the Oracle’s description of mundane weaponry was. Military gear seemed to change every few years. The Oracle, who was always embodied in a trinity, was barely able to communicate clearly with questioners. They were so high on the chemical fumes swirling through the Delphi cavern to enable their visions that the information they provided was really quite limited.

  “What are the other prophesies?” asked Isioma.

  “We don’t know. The Oracle refused to provide any further details to Queen Sophia, refusing even to acknowledge that they did produce other prophesies of the same events for other suppliants. Yet all great magicks run in threes. Queen Sophia was able to confirm with the Pacifics that a prophesy was given to the Cabal, but they declined to share more information. The Mediterraneans told me that Amir Khalid personally visited the Oracle. But no one has been able to break through his barriers to ascertain anything about what he was told.”

  Many courtiers asked questions, and one foolish individual had the nerve to challenge Atlantea outright on keeping this prophesy to herself for so long, but no one had any other insights. The meeting dragged on, with talk going in circles until finally Louisa stood up.

  “War is not to be feared,” Louisa challenged and the room grew silent. Louisa looked around the table, her eyes lingering on those whose questions had hinted at a lack of courage. “We have seen war before. We have fought before. We are ready. We will be ready, whatever comes.”

  “And if the Earth burns, Louisa?” Zale began quietly, but his voice rose in volume and pitch as he pinned her with the sincerity of his concern. “What will we do when battle mages ally with mundane armies with their bombs and drones and tanks? How will any of our powers matter if the humans nuke the Arabian desert into glass? If they flatten the Great Western Desert into radioactive dust that coats the planet in magical ash? How will all of our experience waging war help us then?”

  “It’s a prophesy, Zale. What the Oracle proclaims will happen. That is the nature of prophesy. All of our talk here will not change that,” Louisa said quietly, but her eyes shone with a fierceness that Cordelia had not seen in her before. Suddenly, Cordelia could see Louisa as the great leader she was said to have been during the War of Succession.

  “Louisa is correct. Our talk will not change what will come. But Zale, I will need your help. There is much to consider. Preparations must be made,” Atlantea said.

  “I have always been yours to call,” Zale proclaimed, and others around the table murmured their assent.

  “We will be ready,” Louisa stated with a firm promise.

  Cordelia sat quietly, thinking. This prophesy changed everything … and nothing.

  Unlike mages, who train for decades to manipulate magical energy, mage constructs use their more limited magick instinctually. While additional training can help sirens gain greater control over their powers of fertility transfer and opposite-sex influencing, no amount of training can reduce a siren’s deleterious effect on fertile members of their same sex. Moreover, no one has discovered any means by which a siren can increase or decrease the amount of the ocean’s particular favor, which remains stable from birth or transition. It isn’t clear why the ocean bonds more closely with some sirens than with others, but all sirens are beloved by the sea to some extent.

  – Sirens: An Overview for the Newly-Transitioned, 3rd ed. (2015), by Mira Bant de Atlantic, p. 27.

  Chapter 5

  Cordelia floated in the sea, but didn’t feel at all peaceful. She had come down early that morning after a restless sleep to regain her equilibrium. She knew the Atlantic loved her; even more than most sirens, the Atlantic adored her, and she could usually depend on her daily swim to recharge her optimism. But today, the ocean was agitated. Something is wrong, Cordelia thought, and it probably went beyond the bombshell Atlantea had dropped upon her courtiers last night.

  Cordelia spent at least a few hours a day in the sea, and since other members of the High Court did as well, no one interfered with her communion. It was almost a mark of being a powerful siren, to need the sea. For the sea to need you. But Cordelia admitted privately that it was also a massive self-indulgence. She didn’t need more than a few minutes in the Atlantic to know how it felt. She didn’t need much more than that to know what it knew and cared to share with her. But it was such a relief to be alone with the Atlantic that she always stayed longer, buoyed by its affection and freed from the double-speak and petty deceptions that plagued the rest of her life.

  Today the Atlantic was uneasy, and Cordelia wondered how much of that was a reflection of the courtiers’ own unease. She hoped that her own tension wasn’t leaching out to trouble the water. The Atlantic often reflected and refracted her feelings to such a degree that sometimes she didn’t know if she was instigating the emotions she felt, or if they were pouring into her from t
he sea itself.

  She had gone over the sequence of events repeatedly last night. So close. She had been so close! But Atlantea’s shocking revelation had removed any possibility of prevailing now. At this point, no courtier would be able to focus on anything but the possibility of a mage war in their lifetime.

  Cordelia sank down to the ocean floor to lie upon the sand. The reconciliation movement is dead, she thought. She had two choices, really. She could abandon the cause to which she had devoted the last two decades of her life and move on; or she could try to resurrect it. To somehow persuade people that the looming prospect of a catastrophic war not only didn’t change the necessity of reconciling with the Aos Sí, but somehow made it a more critical imperative.

  Cordelia pondered as she let the currents take her further from shore, propelled by the ocean’s desire to pull her into deeper water. She drifted deeper, untroubled by the change in pressure, and let the Atlantic breathe for her. Cordelia admired the multi-hued colors of the water as she glided through the different temperature bands, hoping that if she sank far enough, the Atlantic would provide her with better insight.

  But enlightenment was not forthcoming. Perhaps she was too consumed by her own turbulent thoughts to open fully to the water. The ocean simply provided no peace today, and Cordelia shot back to the surface, propelled by the nervous agita that bled through the Atlantic and multiplied her unease. She simply didn’t know what to do.

  Cordelia started floating slowly back to shore, watching the streaks of clouds surround the dim glow of the sun, and tried to clear her thoughts. Despite her best efforts, she was unable to calm herself, and her slow return only amplified her feeling of being penned in. I shouldn’t have spent so long worrying in the water, she thought as she drew closer to Atlantis and saw how the ocean churned around her in reflected agitation.

  Unlike her brother Thomas, Cordelia would never be content merely attending court events and visiting the fae preserves from time to time. Long before campaigning for a spot on the High Court, Cordelia had come to accept that she would not be happy living that kind of life — even if many thought she was moving too quickly into a role that most sirens only sought after their own offspring had transitioned.

  Maybe it was her mother’s influence. Mira seemed so impervious to her own success. Cordelia fantasized about doing something as important to the sirens as writing a textbook, but her mother sloughed it off as if it had been nothing, that it was no big deal; all she had done was to write down what the experts told her.

  But of course it was a big deal, and her obsession with making transition safer had saved so many sirens in all the oceans; the transition survival rate had almost doubled since publication of her first edition! Then there were her older mundane sisters, who had also achieved remarkable success in the mundane world. Look at Amy, about to accomplish another once-in-a-lifetime achievement. What had Cordelia to show for her efforts? Her latest attempt to accomplish anything real was floundering on the back of an oddly timed announcement.

  Atlantis’ beaches were not meant for relaxing, and Cordelia picked her way carefully up the stony shore, drying off instantly as she emerged. The limestone had been polished into smooth round rocks, but would never be pulverized into sand by an angry sea. Storms didn’t destroy a siren’s home, and there were almost 250,000 sirens living on Atlantis. Their island was situated roughly halfway between Paraiba in Brazil and Sierra Leone in Africa. While supply ships came regularly, Atlantis remained unknown to most humans. The ships’ crews didn’t want word of their lucrative trade route to reach competitors, and in any event, were compelled to silence by the port officials.

  One of Atlantea’s guards appeared on the walkway surrounding the beach, and started down towards Cordelia. While she had expected to be observed, she hadn’t expected to be greeted. Cordelia gathered up her discarded clothes, pulling on her robe and bending down to put her on shoes.

  How quickly things can change, Cordelia thought, tying her sneakers. Perhaps she was being overly optimistic, but she couldn’t really see how a mage war fought in or over a desert would impact them. Only the barest edge of the Sahara, on Arabia’s African frontier, even drew close to the Atlantic coastline. But her own lack of imagination wouldn’t stop other courtiers from developing all sorts of plans to keep them out or pull them more deeply in, depending on their ambitions.

  Cordelia had generally floated above the fray by virtue of her relatively low profile. She didn’t maintain her own court, but was always welcomed at — even actively solicited to attend — other courtiers’ events. She supported their pet projects, at most offering what she thought were well-thought out improvements or mild criticisms that didn’t block them. She had spent years acting as the supporting player. A valued supporting player, she had thought. Yet all her efforts to build a foundation to challenge the status quo and finally break the Aos Sí free had been a waste of time.

  Cordelia had barely gotten her shoes on by the time the swiftly walking guard was close enough to greet her. The only official uniform worn by Atlantis’ guards was their visible weaponry, though most generally wore red, a color rumored to provide some disguise from mage sight. This guard followed the typical pattern, wearing a red shirt over loose red pants, with an M4 carbine in a shoulder sling and a silver-and-steel mokume-gane sword holstered at her waist. The mixed-metal blades were only really used by the Atlantics, who worried about both were and fae attacks.

  “Welcome back, Courtier,” the guard said in a high voice. She would be a coloratura, Cordelia thought.

  “Thank you,” Cordelia replied.

  “Atlantea has requested that you attend her this afternoon. Word was also left in your rooms, but I thought you might appreciate more advance notice.”

  Cordelia looked more closely at the guard. This was an unexpected kindness. “I’m sorry; I’m sure we’ve met before, but I can’t remember your name.” Cordelia started picking her way across the stones.

  “I’m Helen,” the guard replied. “We sat at the same table at one of the Reconciliation Group year-end dinners a while back. I wouldn’t expect you to remember me.”

  Cordelia felt a flash of embarrassment that she couldn’t even master the basic skill of remembering her supporters’ names. Some politician she was! But she shook off the feeling: seeing a fellow Reconciler in person helped her regain some of her lost equilibrium. While she knew objectively that reconciliation was significantly more popular among the broader Atlantic population than among the courtiers, it was still uplifting to see a supporter in person. Cordelia used that mild boost to suppress her gnawing worry over Atlantea’s summons.

  “I’m grateful for the early warning. Has there been any talk about last night’s Court session?” Information disclosed in high court meetings was supposed to be kept in confidence by the courtiers, but something always leaked. Cordelia wondered if there had been enough time for rumors of the prophesy to make the rounds among the guards. If anyone should be made aware of a possible war, the guards should be first in line.

  Helen stopped, looking directly at Cordelia in a way that made Cordelia certain she must know. “No one has said anything, but it isn’t only the Atlantic that is troubled.”

  Cordelia glanced back at the sea. Despite the lack of wind, white-capped waves pulled at the stone shore. Ugly gray foam was left among the rocks as each wave receded. “I can’t thank you enough for meeting me like this. I’ve spent the night and most of this morning trying to decide whether my priorities should really change. I wonder what you make of it.” Cordelia continued walking back up the rocky shore towards the path that wound its way up to Atlantis House.

  Helen walked next to her in silence for a moment. Finally, she said, “I’ve been guarding Atlantis since I came of age,” looking straight ahead. “I focus on the enemies I see, and not on those who haven’t yet materialized.”

  While Helen’s sentiment was practical, it was also somewhat short-sighted. If no one was on the lookout for
possible dangers, they could all be blindsided when new enemies emerged. While that was the role of Atlantea and her High Court, not the guards, Cordelia agreed with Helen in this particular case. There were too many unknowns with the Oracle’s prophesy — they only knew that another mage war was coming. They didn’t know who, where, why, when, or how. There were too many possibilities obfuscating the real problem that remained directly in front of them: the imprisoned and dying fae.

  Cordelia shook Helen’s hand American-style as they parted on the path that led up to the castle entrance. Helen’s perspective had been more clarifying than Cordelia’s swim, and she continued to ponder the matter as she moved through the courtyard. A coming mage war only made it more imperative that they resolve the Aos Sí issue! Their continued imprisonment remained an obstacle to the Atlantics’ relationship with the powerful Pacific and Indian communities. Perhaps the need to repair those relationships before a mage war started would be sufficient incentive for the High Court to take action now.

  Cordelia acknowledged the gate guard with a vague nod as she entered the private wing. All courtiers had rooms in Atlantis House, which had been built after old castle was destroyed during the War of Succession. Those who’d known the old castle claimed that the new structure’s modern conveniences more than made up for its lack of old-world charm.

  While Cordelia didn’t have any basis to make the comparison, she thought the current castle was rather charming in its own right. It had been fashioned in a style similar to medieval castles, with walls of bleached limestone topped by turrets and walkways. The main difference between Atlantis House and a medieval castle (and in Cordelia’s mind, the main improvement) were the large glass windows that enabled you to see the Atlantic from almost every room.