by Chris Howard
Seph did a slow practiced fluorescent pucker and snapped a kiss at Alex. "Who's your friend?"
Alex forced himself not to turn around.
"I am Nikasia, Theoxena's daughter of the Kirkêlatides."
Way too many consonants, and Seph shook her head, lips sharpening at the corners, a line of perfect white teeth, almost a laugh in her mouth, "Kirkela—what?"
Nikasia fixed her gaze on Seph, eyes like the sun coming through amber, something feral and murderous behind them. "Where am I?"
"Hampton, New Hampshire," said Rude—Rudolph, but he'd hit you hard if you called him that. He set his board down and stepped out of line to approach Nikasia, comfortable and tanned and still boyish friendly even into his thirties, with wavy dark hair a little too long and stiff with salt. He held out a hand. "Love your eyes. Where are you from, Nikasia?"
As soon as orange-eyes turned her gaze to Rude, Seph gasped for breath after twenty seconds of involuntarily holding it. Then dropped her board and fell to her knees.
Rude's smile faded.
Nikasia looked down at his outstretched hand a moment and then leaned back to study his face. "Rudolph Guilfoyle, son of Tiana and Ellis Guilfoyle. Is your father still alive? I love your eyes." She moved close, slipping one hand along his neck, fingers playing with the wetsuit's collar. "Love your...brown eyes." She looked over her shoulder, pausing as if reconsidering, and he brought his arm in, wrapping her waist, a mechanical movement he was forced to perform.
She turned back to explore him, looked at his throat, the jump of his adam's apple, fingering the shiny steel tab below his chin. Her breathing quickened and she leaned away. "Is this a zipper?" She pulled it down to his waist before he could answer, running her thumb along the thousand perfect steel teeth.
"Don't..." He struggled to get the words out. "...call me Rudolph."
"I will call you what I like, my new surface friend with the brown eyes." She felt the thrum in his body, tuned her senses to the sound, the frequency shifts, the music in his bones. She cleared her throat and sang softly, a lovely twist of notes, pretty and painful, and the arm he had swung around her waist twisted wrong, wrist snapping, something bulging under the neoprene, sharp and stabbing from the inside. His hand clawed feebly at the lacing running up the back of Nikasia's tunic, one finger hooking her braids, yanking her head back.
She laughed, her mouth open to the sky, and she sang louder. Rude's face went white, a scream gurgling in his throat, trapped and ripping at the walls of his throat. The bones in his forearm snapped, jagged fibrous ends poking through the sleeve of his wetsuit, blood pooling in the cup of his hand, dribbling through his fingers to the sand.
Nikasia stepped away, keeping her smile after the last note faded into the sea air. Rude dropped to his knees, holding his ruined arm, panting and sobbing, strings of snot across his gaping mouth, in his hair, slippery trails of it down his chin.
Seph crawled to Rude, her fingers moving tenderly over his back. Jadey slammed her phone against her ear, the volume at max, the dispatcher's voice clear, "...one, one. What's your emergency?"
Nikasia turned to Alex. "You are seaborn. Why should you hide up here on the surface? Let me finish what I need to do, and I will take you home, Alex." Her smile vanished.
He rushed her, a fist already coming around for her face. She stepped into his swing, ducking under his arm, and drove one hand flat into his chest, a thud of bone and emptying lungs. She dug her nails into his throat and walked him backward down the beach into the surf, whispering softly to him.
"I've been trained to fight since I was a little little girl, Alex. I can kill a man with my hands as easily as sing the blood from his ears. I'm going to guess that the same is not true for you?"
The water hit him sharp behind the knees and he went down with Nikasia on top of him, foam and cold saltwater slap across his face. Panicking, he opened his eyes, but only saw her orange fire rage through the roll of the surf.
"Telkhines blood. I taste it on you, Alexander Shoaler, strong and sweet, lord's blood. How is it that you live while the Alkimides have the throne? Is your father alive, Alexandros?"
And he heard her questions and the weird way she said his name with his ears completely under the water. She jumped on him, her knees on his shoulders, driving both her hands between her legs, pushed his head into the sand, fingers around his neck. The sea punched into the back of his throat, an ice cold rush into his lungs.
Nikasia got off him, staggered a little in the waves, and walked up the beach to Alex's friends.
Seph noticed the sheer web of skin between each of Nikasia's fingers and threw up. She heaved again.
"What the fuck are you?"
Jadey's lips started moving soundlessly, her breath locked in her lungs. The phone slipped from her hand, the dispatcher telling her, "...patrol car on its way. Stay with me."
As if suddenly remembering Rude's question, Nikasia kneeled, grabbed a handful of his hair, and brought up his tear and snot covered face to look at hers. "I come from the sea, Rudolph. My mother is Theoxena, war-bard to Tharsaleos, King of the Seaborn. I am seeking Gregor Lord Rexenor, the murderer of my father. And you are going to help me find him."
She stood, turning her back to them, made a gentle flaring gesture with one hand, and piped a few notes that finally allowed Rude to scream.
And he did.
Chapter 3 - New Sirens
The old Ford pickup swung into the angled yellow lines of Hampton Beach parking, ramming to a stop against the concrete tire barriers. The engine rumbled loudly and then sputtered out. The weather had not treated the truck well, sand caked along the windows, paint peeling and New England winter rust streaks like blood along a predator's flanks.
An old thin man with gray hair and arms like bones and stretched-over skin shoved the door open, limping around to the hood to dump out a black nylon bag of vials and syringes and injection darts. He pushed a handful of the glass and plastic cylinders back into the bag, selecting a vial of clear watery liquid, letting the rest roll off the hood to the street.
Holding one up to the sky, he shoved a syringe through the cap and pulled. He tossed the vial away along with half its contents, and it shattered against the curb. He picked up one of the injection darts between two fingers, loaded it with the syringe, and limped toward the opening in the concrete storm wall that ran the length of Hampton Beach, leaving the truck's door wide open and the black bag on the hood.
Nikasia heard the sirens long before she knew what they were. She turned to the only standing friend of Alexander Shoaler. "What makes that sound?"
Jadey shook her head, her short blond hair swinging over her ears, her earrings, clusters of gold stars on chains, making a soft metallic plinking.
She didn't want to answer, but Nikasia forced the words from her mouth, horrifying threatening words that sweet Jadey would never have spoken out loud no matter how bad things got. "They're going to get you. Shoot you for what you did to Rude and Seph and Alex. They're going to lock you up, sick fucking bitch."
Jadey's eyes went wide at the harshness in her voice.
Nikasia frowned, mildly perturbed, and answered with a song that made Jadey ram her hand into her own gaping mouth, teeth gouging grooves into her skin. Jadey choked, muffled screaming and wrestling with limbs she didn't control—and Nikasia made sure to work her jaw, molars crushing tendon and bone, a squeeze of blood at the corners of Jadey's mouth, thick coppery taste over her tongue and down her throat.
Nikasia lifted her arms and turned in circles that carried her closer to the ocean, singing softly, preparing for the new threat.
Blood and tears streaming down her arm, Jadey had two of her own fingers chewed off, choking on the knuckles. She didn't even look up when a team of Hampton Police came running down the beach, guns drawn.
"On the ground!" Three officers in body armor circled Nikasia; a fourth holstered his gun to help Jadey.
"Why in all the deep blue sea would I want to get on the ground?"
Nikasia let her gaze stop on one officer, and then she was inside his head, tearing out secrets and killing warmth and giggling. "Lawrence Patteson. I'm going to call you Larry. You look like a very nice man, Larry. Too nice, really. Look what happened to your brother." She paused to pout; a flick of webbed fingers and a few more notes trapped the voices in their throats, made sure she would not be interrupted by any more rude shouting or commands from law enforcement. "Jeremy betrayed you, and after everything you did for him. Don't you get tired of playing hero, Larry? Jeremy's in trouble again, and who bails him out? You. Poor tired, sleepy you." Tears rolled from Nikasia's eyes, wet in her lashes, thin silvery lines on her skin, the pale sun catching each drop off her chin in quick bursts of pain. "Larry, he's using you, and you keep helping him. He's in prison. He let you down, and you write him letters, and you cry, Larry, you shed tears for a brother who owes you nothing, just takes and takes, and you know in your soul, you are so tired. So, so tired. How can you live with his betrayal?" Her lips trembled, a child about to die, lost eternity in her eyes. "You wasted your life, Larry, threw it all away on a brother who betrayed you. You lost, Larry, a failure, and dying is such a release, Larry. Let it go. It's so easy to drop the hold you have on this world and slip away. I will let you, and you won't feel a thing." She smiled, softly at first, and then dagger sharpness at the corners of her lips. "I promise."
And Larry brought his own gun to the side of his head, fingers twitching, sweat beading up on his face.
"Do it. Wouldn't it be so easy to end everything, Larry? Go on," she whispered. "End the world, Larry. I won't watch if you don't want me to. Death should be private. I can make everyone turn around, give you a little peace at the end. Finally, Larry, some peace." She put a finger across her lips. "Shhh. Don't try to speak. This is your time. Don't waste it with words. Quiet, darling."
Larry's lips shivered, stretched thin, trying to form words, and the pleading moved into his eyes.
"That's right," Nikasia nodded. "The time has come, Larry, dear. It's time to—"
She blinked. Something sharp poked her in the shoulder. She reached up and pulled out a funny little feathered stick with a needle on the end. She turned...and the dry surface world kept turning, a dizzy spin of the Thin, blur of clouds and a gush of black ink unconsciousness.
Her knees buckled. She hit the ground, and she tasted sand in her mouth, grit under her tongue. She tried to sing, tried to open her eyes; an ache like hollowed bones started in her neck and spread into her shoulders, down her spine.
There was a gust of wind and sand, a sharp thump like canon fire; a blue smoky blast ring expanded up the beach like a vaporized roll of the Atlantic. A battering ram of blurry moisture hit the officers, throwing them into the air, tossed like leaves, arms and legs twirling, bodies tumbling over each other, and the only one left standing was Jadey with her back to The Wall—far enough up the beach, sobbing and shaking and staring at what was left of her hand.
The skinny old man with gray hair stepped across the sand, a casual stride, over the police officers, to Nikasia of the Kirkêlatides. He crouched, lifted her into his arms, and carried her to the ocean.
Water bled dark blue up his jeans, the untucked tails of his shirt slapped wetly against his stomach and back, clinging to his ribcage. He was up to his elbows in seawater when seven seaborn, three of them in silvery-green scaly armor, stood up out of the Atlantic. Two of the soldiers waded forward to take Nikasia's limp body from him, bowing.
The third in armor, an old soldier with a braided gray beard, nodded. "Mr. Fenhals, the king wishes you well."
"Sympheres." Fenhals acknowledged him, but let his gaze scan the others in the party. He jutted his chin at a balding seaborn in a black cape looking thing that—out of the water—clung to him like folded wings. He stood well back from the others, panic in his eyes, obviously uncomfortable in the Thin. "Who is he?"
Sympheres didn't turn, just let a sharp smile touch his lips. "Her lawyer."
"The king allows this?"
"She is a Kirkêlatides," he said resignedly, and then lifted his chin, fingers playing with the braids. "Was Lady Theoxena like this when she was young, I wonder?"
"Just the same," said Fenhals. "Right up to Lord Epandros' murder. That sobered her up."
"Sobered?" It was a strange word.
"Her husband's death brought her soul around to serious things, protecting the king and throne." Fenhals looked at the ripples, a slow circular flutter in the Atlantic's surface where Nikasia had been pulled under the waves. "It is a shame that she gets her mother's bleed, has so much of it already, and we will have to manage a new Kirkêlatides all over again. In some ways sad that their line has not died out."
"Truly," said Sympheres, pushing back in the waves but gazing up at the sky, looking for the proper farewell. "Good...day to you, Mr. Fenhals."
"The tides are yours, sir." Fenhals waved and turned up the beach, the sea running out of his jeans and over his pale bare feet.
He glanced down at the bodies, dark uniforms like indigo smudges of ink against the sand. He pushed his old legs harder, the limp from an old wound throbbing. He didn't want to be here when the officers came around.
Mr. Fenhals ignored the blond girl standing against the seawall, sobbing and shivering, blind with fear. He walked right past and she didn't even see him.
The fog crept in fast, rolling over the gray sea, blanketing Hampton Beach, swallowing all sound, dulling the sun, gray mist twilight and the pulsing blue glow from the patrol cars on the other side of The Wall.
Jadey looked up, a tight pull on her skin, and the gnawing pain in her hand faded away with a cool rush of water up her arm. She smiled at a woman's face, a cold and serious face even for someone who was probably as young as she was. She recognized that face, but it was only a hint, and her memories still weren't coming in clearly.
"Your hand is fine, Jadey." The voice grew insistent. "Look at your hand."
Jadey dropped her chin, smooth tan fingers, all five, still trembling, and a chill buzz in her skin. She flexed them, pulling them into her palm, straightening them out, but couldn't bend her elbow because the strange cold woman held her arm rigid with one hand like a vise around her wrist.
Jadey's breath caught in her throat when she noticed the lines of brown scar tissue between the woman's fingers.
There was dry soft laughter like sunlight and flower petals. "Yes, I come from the sea. I used to have webbing. My grandfather, the king, had it cut away when I was a baby."
Jadey's body shook, a burst of fresh tears, knees weakening, her toes digging into the sand. "On—only to hurt me again."
"Shhhhh. Calm, Jadey. I won't. You know who I am—we never hung out, but we went to school together. It's me, Kassandra."
Jadey pointed unsteadily at the ocean. "Sh—she...she..."
"She will never hurt you again. I will find her, and I will hurt her."
"Rude?"
"Rude is fine. His arm's fine. And Seph is taking care of him. See, they're right there, sitting on the steps."
"Alex?"
Kassandra released her and turned to the ocean, scanning the rest of Hampton Beach. "There are only three of you." She looked down at the police officers, three of them out cold, one groaning, trying to rub the sand from his eyes. Her gaze swung back to Jadey. "Alex who?"
"Shoaler. She said Alex came from the sea, and then she stuck his head under the water...and then she drowned him."
Kassandra didn't look back to see if Jadey could stand on her own, striding toward the surf, whispering to herself. "That's what drew me to you. I felt your last breath of air, Alex Shoaler."
Jadey watched her glide toward the ocean, braids whipping in the wind.
At the sea's edge, Kassandra lifted out a tall spear of metal she'd planted deep in the sand, the top of it lost in the fog. It was only when she tugged it free and swung it around to rest over her shoulder, that Jadey noticed it was much taller than Kassandra—and it was capped
with a crossbar and three sharp spines.
Kassandra walked into the waves and the Atlantic played around her ankles while she poked at the sand and turned lumps of rock with her trident, singing over the roar of the surf, "Where did you go Alex Shoaler. Come to me."
Chapter 4 - Alexandros
Alex breathed seawater, thick and cold in his mouth, heavy in his lungs.
He flipped around in the shallows, onto his stomach, struggling to get back to Jadey and Seph and Rude—Rude with his twisted shattered arm bones, but Nikasia had trapped him there, under the water.
Every time he lifted his body into the air, he went lightheaded, felt consciousness creeping away, a suffocating drag on his muscles. He kicked into deeper water to catch his breath, pulling more of the sea inside him before kicking back into Hampton Beach to try again.
He climbed to his knees, into the air with the Atlantic pushing at his back, the sand eroding under his legs. He couldn't breathe. His lungs were full of seawater and didn't seem to work in the air anymore.
Panicking, he went under, rolling on his back, kicking deeper.
Then he felt animal motion in the surf, other things in the water with him, human shaped smears of scaly green, and he kicked harder to get away from them, angling back half a mile up shore at the North Hampton Beach line.
The sand gave way to a bed of sea-rolled rocks and shells. He clawed through them, climbing above the tide line on his hands and knees. He blinked trying to focus, fog everywhere, the whole beach blanketed in thick cloudy gray.
Then he retched all over the rocks in front him, his body heaving, a burst of water from his lungs, his stomach, a sour burn up his throat, into his mouth.
The ocean ran off his body, cold on his neck, in his ears. He sucked in a breath, and then coughed up more water, saltwater tickle in his throat and a gurgling wheeze deep in his lungs.
He crawled away from the surf, fingers digging into the sand, a raw torrent of noise in his ears, a sensitivity to sound he had never experienced before. He felt the sound in his bones. There was a serrated cutting resonance in his jaw, teeth buzzing until he clamped them shut.