by Amy Sumida
No one knew what Adelaid was. She had magic, that much was easy enough to spot, but she was born without wings; a clear indication that she wasn't a siren. So, neither Teles nor her witch lover, Balthus, could determine what exactly Adelaid's magic –and therefore her race– was. Not until it became obvious that the songs Addy sang altered reality. Then they knew that Aunt Addy was something special indeed. But still, they didn't know that Adelaid was the first of a new race until her nephew was born, five hundred years later . . . to the day.
Teles's first daughter was sired by the Greek god Poseidon. This siren daughter, Legiea, also had a love affair with a male witch. She got pregnant and gave birth to the second spellsinger, my Uncle Eilener. His birth was shocking both on account of his sex and his lack of those traditional siren wings. By the time he started singing, it had become clear that the offspring resulting from a siren-witch union would be this new type of being: a spellsinger.
They eventually determined that it has something to do with different magics reacting to each other. Sirens are technically demi-gods, daughters of a god. Witches are a race of their own, with magic leaning toward elemental affiliations. Thus their surnames, which are generally associated with their family's element. Much like the Shining Ones and their gemstone affiliations. Anyway, all sirens are my family, and since sirens are the only beings who can produce spellsingers, all spellsingers are also related to me.
It was a strong familial connection which I called upon. The bond flared up inside me, that love which tied us together despite our differences. Family. My people. And someone had taken them. Fury combined with determination, and the spell formed inside me rapidly. It collected with a rumbling, tumbleweed of emotion and surged up my throat. I let the lyrics scream out my love for those lost ones, the powerful melody flying out upon wings of sound to let the sirens know that we would be reunited. That magic and love would find a way. I was coming for them.
The music echoed through the trees, across the island, and then over the sea. I felt it shoot over the waves: questing, searching, leading me on. I sang on, building the chorus up to its powerful crescendo. A determined will crying out in defiance to the heavens; no matter how far apart we were, I would be reunited with those I loved. The ocean surged with my song. The asrai –alerted by Tell– responded to my magic and directed it down their own secret paths. The water-spirits cried out with me, searching the sea with all of their senses, even casting their intent into the water mammals among them. My spell was rocketing to its destination, leading me and my family back together, just as the song promised. I will find you. I will bring you–
I choked on the lyrics as if someone had shoved them back down my throat. My knees buckled as my hands circled my neck and I gasped for air. I could hear the asrai shrieking in terror, right before they broke the connection with me and my song. I dropped to the balcony, the wood echoing hollowly, crying out for me. Torin was beside me in a second: holding me, brushing back my hair, calling my name. But I couldn't reassure him. The spell had hit a wall and then came tumbling back to me. A ricochet of power that had struck my voice directly, like a punch in the throat. My spell had crashed against . . .
“A ward,” I gasped. “There's an elemental ward surrounding the sirens, and it's opposed to my fire ancestry.”
“Gods damn it!” Cerberus swore.
“An elemental ward?” Torin's eyes were troubled. “But that would mean–”
“A witch is behind this,” my father snarled. “We have been betrayed!”
Chapter Fourteen
When you hear the word “coven”, you probably think of a small group of witches –perhaps twenty, maybe a hundred at most. The real Coven of the Beneath is millions strong. Yes, millions; there are millions of witches living among you. Bwahahahaha! Sorry, had to be done.
The great thing about these numbers was that when help was needed, we had them to rely upon. The bad news was: now that we knew it was a witch we were looking for, it became a daunting task to find him. Also, as with any huge organization, there were procedures: steps to take, people to speak to, and even paperwork to file. Accusing a witch of a crime was no small thing, and we didn't even have a name yet. All we knew was that it wasn't a fire witch. That left three other elements and all of their sub-elements.
My father was the one to handle all of these coven procedures, of course. He had left, immediately following my discovery, to contact his elemental leader. They would go up the chain together, collecting higher-ups as they went. It would become a gravity-defying snowball of witches who would hopefully be able to seek out the culprit. But it was a long process, and my family was out there, waiting to be rescued. We had to do something now.
Unfortunately, we were all at a loss. We brainstormed for hours after my father left, and we came up with nothing substantial. Finally, my mother declared that we all needed some rest, and we retired for the night. That was hours ago.
“Let's have a drink,” Cerberus padded silently through the open sliding-glass door, joining me on my bedroom's balcony.
Torin was asleep in my bed, dwarfing the full-sized mattress. It had made me smile at first, but sharing the bed with him had been a struggle. I like my space, and Torin takes up a lot of it. Plus, I'm a roller –you know the type: we toss and turn all night. Yep, that's me, and it's difficult to toss and turn when your boyfriend is lying there beside you like a massive, sexy statue: frozen and dreaming like a fairy princess –kind of ironic actually. Add to that the huge weight of worry on my shoulders, and it was nearly impossible for me to fall asleep. I had come out onto the balcony to stargaze instead.
“Cerberus, it's like 3:00 AM,” I huffed.
“Yeah. So . . . Tequila?”
“Yeah, alright,” I muttered as I climbed out of my cozy chair.
We snuck out of the bedroom without waking the sleeping princess. You know, that term may be more appropriate than I'd originally thought; the guy was gorgeous when he slept. Hell, he was gorgeous all the time. Damn fairy. Anyway, we crept downstairs to the living room and headed straight for the liquor: the cocktail cart, as my mother liked to call it. It was stocked with all our favorites; we didn't believe in keeping stuff we didn't like just in case company wanted it.
Cerberus pulled out the Tequila bottle and two shot glasses, then we went to sit on the couch. He set them down on the coffee table, filled them, then pushed a glass my way. We didn't speak until we'd done five shots, one after the other, and were just a teensy bit trashed.
“I love you, Ellie,” was the first thing Cerberus said. He was an I-love-you drunk.
“I love you too, Cer.” I was pretty used to this routine.
“Maybe we should get together.”
“Nope, bad idea,” I slurred. I was used to this as well. Our drunken conversations had become pretty much automatic over the years.
“Yeah, you're right.” Cer nodded and took another shot. “Look what happened with Freya.”
“Yeah . . . wait. What?” I perked up. That was not his line. Cer had just deviated from the scheduled program. “Did you just say 'Freya'? As in the Norse goddess? Cerberus, did you date a Norse goddess? A cat goddess!”
“Yeah.” He sighed. “I suppose it was doomed from the start.”
“Well, you are a three-headed dog-shifter.” I tried to sound wise, but that's really hard to do when your lips don't want to obey your brain. They were a bit wobbly, like the rest of me. So, I think instead of wise, I just sounded like a smart ass.
“But Freya”–Cerberus plopped back onto the couch, sort of melting over it–“sweet hellfire, she's beautiful. She's got this hair”–he waved a hand around his face–“and eyes . . . oh does she have eyes.”
“Yep, they're hard to resist when they have hair and eyes.” I nodded in complete –and utterly serious– agreement. “Torin's hair is so shiny. It looks blue in the light –blue! Just like his eyes . . . oh, eyes. I love eyes.”
“You always understand me!”
; “I do.” I nodded sagely. “And you get me, dude!”
“I do!”
“So, she's the one, huh? The one who broke your heart?”
“Yeah, that was her.” Cerberus took another shot. “That'll teach me for chasing after pussy instead of bitches.”
“Not funny.” I grimaced.
“Yeah, it is. It's totally funny; Freya's a cat goddess and I'm a dog god, and so–”
“Yeah, dude, I know why it should be funny,” I cut him off. “The thing is; it's rude. Or maybe it's crude. Something ending in 'ude'. Lewd . . . no, wait, I think that's spelled with 'e-w-d' not 'u-d-e'. Still, it fits, maybe we can make an exception–”
“Shut up.”
“It is rude. I'm offended.” I held my serious expression long enough for Cer to look nervous, then I burst into laughter.
“You're an asshole is what you are,” he huffed.
“Perhaps,” I agreed, “but I'm neither a pussycat nor a bitch, so there's that.”
No, you're a spellsinger,” he said. “Heir to a rare lineage. Able to weave words”–he waved his hands–“words . . . words –you know what I like about words?”
“They're like grunting but with meaning?” I asked.
“Grunting has meaning.” He made a huffing sound which conveyed his disbelief and also made his point. Then he scowled. “What were we talking about?”
“Freya,” I said. “What happened with her?”
“Ah, Freya.” Cerberus closed his eyes and let go of his shot glass; it rolled across the couch and onto the floor. The sound of it hitting the wood jolted him upright. “Freya! Fuck me!”
“Yes, you told me how much you love her hair.” I rolled my eyes. “You don't have to get crude about it. See? It is crude! I knew it was an 'ude' word!”
“No”–Cer blinked some sobriety back into his eyes–“I mean, I think Freya might be able to help us find the sirens. She has a network of spies who obey her every command.”
“She does?”
“Cats, Ellie-Girl”–Cerberus gave me a huge grin–“the woman can communicate with cats, and those fucking felines go everywhere. They see everything. Used to drive me bat-shit crazy. All those shiny eyes watching me in the dark.”
“Well, damn”–I sat up–“she really might be able to help.”
“Yeah, but she won't be pleased to hear from me.” He sighed and sat back against the couch.
“What did you do to her?” I gave him an annoyed look.
“I may have done something a little too canine for her to deal with.” Cer sighed.
“You hump her leg or something?” I teased.
“No.” He rolled his eyes. “I marked my territory; it's a cat thing too, she should have understood.”
“You did what?”
“I pissed on her petunias.” Cerberus huffed. “I peed all around her yard. It was instinctual. There were all these Norse gods sniffing around her, so I thought I'd give them something else to smell.”
“That doesn't sound so bad,” I said.
“Well, it wouldn't have been, except for all of her cats,” Cerberus said. “Turns out, the piss of a three-headed, dog-shifter god can be a powerful deterrent to other animals. All of her cats ran off, and it took her weeks to remove my scent enough to get the kitties to come home again.”
I pressed my lips together, trying my best not to laugh, but a few giggles managed to escape.
“It's not funny, Elaria,” Cerberus scolded me. “She told me I was barbaric; a savage who couldn't control his base instincts. Which I suppose is kinda true, but at the time, I was so damn insulted, I said some nasty things back.”
“How nasty?”
“I told her I hated cats.” Cerberus gave me sad, puppy dog eyes.
“Oh, Cer.” I shook my head.
“I know,” he groaned, “that's the worst thing you can say to a cat lover. I might as well have just told her to fuck off and die.”
“That's exactly what she said to you, isn't it?” I asked. “She told you to fuck off and die.”
“Oh, so you've met Freya.” He grimaced.
“Do you think she'll talk to me?”
“I don't know.” He considered it. “Maybe you could offer her a song or something in exchange for her help. She loves a good bargain.”
“Alright. So, how do I get in touch with her?”
“Oh, that's the easy part.” Cerberus chuckled. “Freya has never been a subtle goddess. She likes to shine.”
“How shiny are we talking about?”
“Vegas.” One word and one wide smile said it all.
Chapter Fifteen
The Vegas Strip is an electric paradise for humans; a place where you can buy everything and anything your little heart desires. For gods, the Strip was a second chance at divinity. They could be reborn in Vegas, into a new godhood of glitz, glamour, and glory. They could be worshiped again.
This was what had attracted the Norse goddess, Freya, to the Nevada desert. Freya had abandoned the frigid climate of her homeland for the more balmy temperatures of the ultimate mecca of hedonism; Las Vegas, Nevada. There she had established herself by buying up three of the biggest casinos in Vegas and making them even more glamorous than they already were. No, I'm not telling you which casinos, you'll just have to guess. Freya then paraded herself across the stage; in all three of her casinos. Gods were all showmen at heart; the original superstars –in some cases, quite literally. They knew how to work a crowd like no one's business.
Vegas loved Freya; a billionaire with the body of a . . . well, a goddess. She alternated between entertaining the masses with surprise performances (humans would drop everything and flock to wherever Freya made an appearance) and sauntering through town with an entourage that would make P Diddy proud. All to collect her worship. If she wasn't so talented at making humans believe that she was human too, the Beneath would have risen up against her and shut down the Freya Show.
But she wasn't the only god in Vegas, and the humans who frequented the town were accustomed to such displays. What may have shocked the average American town into rioting, barely lifted an brow in Las Vegas. I knew this about Sin City already. So, when we rolled into town, I wasn't surprised to see a billboard of Lakshmi, the Hindu goddess, advertising her latest concert. Then there was the electric marquee showcasing Raphael's (that would be the Archangel Raphael's) magic show at the Venetian hotel, and another letting the humans know that Pele, the Hawaiian volcano goddess, was performing her fire dance at 8:00 PM at the MGM Grand. According to the billboard, it was the hottest show in town. Faces of gods were everywhere. So, it wasn't at all shocking when Thor strode by me, on my way into the Bellagio. What was surprising was that Thor stopped, mid-stride, and doubled back to us.
“Torin?” Thor hurried over to my boyfriend with a huge smile on his face.
The Norse God of Thunder was wearing a gray Armani suit and had his trademark long hair cropped short, into a sleek, modern cut. I still recognized him immediately. That bright red hair and chiseled jaw were hard to miss, as was his ridiculous physique; like a body-building giant. I mean seriously, the man needs to lay off the hammer curls.
“Thor?” Torin broke out into a grin and took the thunder god's hand. “Well met, Northman.”
“Yes, indeed.” Thor's stormy gaze slid over to mine, then up to Cerberus's. “You're keeping some interesting company these days, Onyx King.”
“This is my consort, Elaria,” Torin introduced me.
“Yes, I believe we've met.” Thor held his hand out to me. “You're a spellsinger, correct?”
“That's right.” I frowned. “Sorry, I don't recall us being introduced.”
“You were a little inebriated on dark elf wine at the time.” Thor grinned. “It was at a party in Svartalfheim.”
“Oh! Yeah, I remember that.” I sifted through my hazy memories. “Weren't you wearing a dress? And make-up?”
“I lost a bet.” Thor laughed.
“How's it hanging, Th
underbolt?” Cerberus interrupted our reminiscing with a smirk.
“It's hanging just fine”–Thor smirked back–“when it isn't thrusting . . . inside Freya.”
“You're a dead god!” Cerberus roared, causing the thick crowds to back away. Cer launched himself at the chuckling Thor as Torin and I tried to hold back my bestie. “I'm going to shove that hammer of yours down your throat and use it to pry your carcass open. Then I'll gnaw on your bones and suck out the marrow!”
“Yeah, I've heard you like to suck things”–Thor chuckled–“but, sorry, I'm not interested. I don't swing that way, sulfur-breath.”
“That went bad rather fast,” Torin noted.
“What the fuck is your problem?” I got up into Thor's face as I continued to try and restrain Cer.
“Your friend here thought it was funny to steal my hammer and leave it in the middle of Tartarus,” Thor growled. “Well, now I've stolen something he loves, and I'm going to play with it in the middle of a wasteland; just like he did with Mjolnir.”
“A hammer is not comparable to a woman,” Cerberus snapped.
“That hammer is,” Thor ground out.
“Then why don't you go fuck yourself with it!” Cerberus shouted.
“Everyone just take a deep breath,” Torin instructed, casting pointed looks to the security guards who were cautiously heading our way. “Thor, it seems that our reunion will have to be postponed. I'm here on important business concerning Elaria's family. We can't be detained by a quarrel between you and Cerberus. Still, it was good to see you.”
“Elaria's family?” Thor went serious immediately, waving off the security team, who miraculously obeyed him. “Which side; the witches or the sirens?”