“Did someone throw you overboard while you were getting undressed?” asks the girl.
“Maybe they threw her overboard because she was getting undressed,” says the boy with the knife.
This is met with laughter from the rest of them.
“Forgive us,” says the prince. “But it’s not every day we find a naked girl drowning in the middle of the ocean. Especially with no other ships in sight. Especially one who slaps me after I save her.”
“You deserved it.”
“I was helping you.”
“Exactly.”
The prince considers this and then pulls a small circular contraption from his pocket. It looks like a compass of some sort, and when he speaks again, his eyes stay pinned to it, voice deceptively casual.
“I can’t quite place your accent,” he says. “Where is it that you’re from?”
An eerie sensation settles in my chest. I avert my eyes from the object, hating how it feels when I look at it. Like it’s staring straight back.
“Untie me,” I say.
“What’s your name?” the prince asks.
“Untie me.”
“I see you don’t know much Midasan.” He shakes his head. “Tell me your name first.”
He switches his gaze from the compass to me, assessing, as I try to think of a lie. But it’s hopeless because I don’t know any human names to lie with. I’ve never lingered enough to hear them, and unlike the mermaids who spy on humans whenever they can, I’ve never cared to learn more about my prey.
With a fierce spit, I say, “Lira.”
He glances down at the compass and smiles. “Lira,” he repeats, pocketing the small object. My name sounds melodic on his lips. Less like the weapon it had been when I said it. “I’m Elian,” he says, though I didn’t ask. A prince is a prince and his name is as inconsequential as his life.
I lean my free hand against the top of the railing and pull myself to my feet. My legs shake violently and then buckle beneath me. I slam onto the deck and let out a hiss of pain. Elian watches, and it’s only after a short pause that he holds out a wary hand. Unable to bear him standing over me, I take it. His grip is strong enough to lift me back onto my unsteady feet. When I nearly topple again, his hand shoots to my elbow and holds me firmly in place.
“It’s shock.” He reaches for his knife and cuts the thread that binds me to the railing. “You’ll be steady again in no time. Just take a breath.”
“I’d be steadier if I weren’t on this ship.”
Elian raises an eyebrow. “You were a lot more charming when you were unconscious.”
I narrow my eyes and press a hand to his chest to balance myself. I can feel the slow drum of his heart beneath my hand, and in moments I’m taken back to Midas. When I had been so close to stealing it.
Elian stiffens and slowly prizes my hand from his chest, placing it back on the railing. He reaches into the pocket of his trousers and lifts out a small rope necklace. The string is a shimmer of blue, glistening like water under the sun. It’s liquid made into something other, too smooth to be ice and too solid to be ocean. It sparkles against the gold of Elian’s skin, and when he opens his hand, he reveals the pendant that hangs from the bottom. Sharply curved edges stained with crab red. My lips part and I touch a hand to my neck, where my seashell once hung. Nothing.
Furious, I leap toward Elian, my hands like claws. But my legs are too unsteady, and the attempt nearly sends me back to the floor.
“Steady on there, damsel.” Elian grabs my elbow to hold me upright.
I rip my arm from him and bare my teeth monstrously. “Give it to me,” I order.
He tilts his head. “Why would I do that?”
“Because it’s mine!”
“Is it?” He runs a thumb over the ridges of the seashell. “As far as I know, this is a necklace for monsters, and you certainly don’t look like one of those.”
I clench my fists. “I want you to give it to me.”
I feel maddened by the Midasan on my tongue. Its smooth sounds are too quaint to display my anger. I itch to spit the knives of my own language at him. Tear him down with the skewers of Psáriin, where each word can wound.
“What’s it worth?” asks Elian.
I glare. “What do you mean?”
“Nothing’s free in the ocean,” he explains. “What’s the necklace worth to you?”
“Your life.”
He laughs, and beside him the large man lets out a good-natured chuckle. I’m unsure what’s so funny, but before I can ask, Elian says, “I don’t imagine my life is worth much to you at all.”
He is so very wrong about that.
“Mine then,” I say.
And I mean it, because that necklace is the key to finding my way home. Or at the very least, calling for help. If it can’t lead me back to my kingdom as a human, then it can at least summon Kahlia. She can speak to the Sea Queen on my behalf and beg her to rescind the punishment so I won’t have to.
“Your life,” Elian repeats. He takes a few steps toward me. “Careful who you tell that to. A worse man might hold you to it.”
I push him away. “And you’re a better man?”
“I like to think so.”
He holds the seashell up to the sunlight. Blood against sky. I can see the curiosity in his eyes as he wonders what a castaway is doing with such a trinket. I ponder if he knows what it’s even for, or if it’s just something he has seen on the necks of his murdered sirens.
“Please,” I say, and Elian’s eyes dart back to me.
I’ve never used that word in any language, and even though Elian can’t possibly know that, he looks unsettled. There’s a crack in the bravado. After all, I’m a half-naked girl being held prisoner and he’s a human prince. Royal by birth and destined to lead an empire. Chivalry is in his veins, and all I need to do is remind him of it.
“Would you like me to beg you?” I ask, and Elian’s jaw tightens.
“If you just tell me why you have it, then I’ll give it back.”
He sounds sincere, but I know better. Pirates are liars by trade and royals are liars by blood. I know that firsthand.
“My mother gave it to me,” I say.
“A gift.” Elian ponders this. “Passed through your family from how far back? Do you know what it does or how it works?”
I grind my teeth. I should have known his questions wouldn’t end until he ripped the truth from me. I would give it to him gladly on any other day, but I’m defenseless on this ship without the music of my voice to sing him into submission. I can barely even stand on my own. The seashell is my last hope, and he’s keeping it from me.
I lunge for it once more. I’m quick, even as a human, and my fingers close around his fist in an instant. But Elian is faster somehow, and as soon as my hand locks on to his, Elian’s knife is on my neck.
“Really.” He presses his blade firmly against my throat, and I feel a small slash of pain. “That wasn’t so smart.”
I tighten my hand around his fist, unwilling to let go. The cut on my neck stings, but I have felt and caused far worse. His face is roguish when I sneer up at him, nothing like the sweet and gentle princes I’ve taken before. The ones whose hearts are buried beneath my bed. Elian is as much a soldier as I am.
“Captain!” A man emerges from the lower deck, his eyes wide. “The radars spotted one!”
Quickly, Elian looks to the knife-wielding boy. “Kye,” he says. Just a name, just a word, and yet the boy nods abruptly and jumps the length of the stairs to the decks below.
In an instant Elian tears his blade from my throat and sheathes it. “Get in position!” he yells. He loops my seashell around his neck and runs for the edge of the ship.
“What are you doing?” I ask.
Elian turns to me, a glint of mischief in his eyes. “It’s your lucky day, Lira,” he says. “You’re about to meet your first siren.”
16
Lira
I WATCH THE HUMANS jumpin
g from one end of the boat to another, pulling on ropes and yelling words and names I don’t quite understand. At one point the boy with the knife – Kye – trips and slices his palm. Quickly, the tattooed girl rips the bandana from her head and throws it to him, before running to the wheel and lurching it left. The ship twists too quickly for me to stay steady, and I collapse to the floor again.
I screech in frustration and search the decks for my captor. Prince Elian leans over the edge, one arm tangled in rope, the other holding the mysterious object up to the light.
“Steady,” he tells his crew. “Hold her steady.”
He whispers something to himself. A slew of Midasan that I can’t make out, much less understand, and then smiles at the compass and screams, “Torik, now!”
The large man leans his head into the lower decks and bellows at the crew. As soon as the boom of his voice shudders through my bones, a high-pitched whistle tears through the air. I bring my hands to my ears. It’s not so much a noise as it is a blade carving through my skull. A sound so shrill, I feel like my eardrums could explode. Around me, the humans seem unaffected, and so with a grimace, I lower my hands and try to hide my discomfort.
“I’m going in,” Elian calls over his shoulder. He throws the compass to the girl. “Madrid, lower the net on my signal.”
She nods as he pulls a small tube from his belt and places it into his mouth. Then he’s gone. He meets the water with barely a noise, so quiet that I stumble to the edge of the ship to make sure that he actually jumped. Sure enough, ripples pool on the surface and the prince is nowhere to be seen.
“What is he doing?” I ask.
“Playing the part,” Madrid replies.
“What part?”
She pulls a small crossbow from her belt and fixes an arrow in the latch. “Bait.”
“He’s a prince,” I observe. “He can’t be bait.”
“He’s a prince,” she says. “So he gets to decide who’s bait.”
Kye hands her a black quiver filled with arrows and cuts me a guarded glance. “If you’re so concerned, we can always throw you over instead.”
I ignore both the comment and the hostile look in his eyes. Human pettiness knows no bounds. “Surely he can’t breathe for long,” I say.
“Five minutes of air,” Madrid tells me. “It’s what the tube’s for. Nifty little thing the captain picked up a while back in Efévresi.”
Efévresi. The land of invention. It’s one of the few kingdoms I’ve been careful to steer clear of, made cautious by the machinery that patrols their waters. Nets made from lightning and drones that swim faster than any mermaid. Ships more like beasts, with a knowledge and intelligence of their own.
“When the captain comes back up, you’ll get to see something wonderful,” Kye tells me.
“Monsters,” says Madrid, “are not wonderful.”
“Watching them die is pretty wonderful.” Kye looks pointedly in my direction. “That’s what happens to our enemies, you see.”
Madrid scoffs. “Keep watch for the captain’s signal,” she says.
“He told you to do that.”
She smiles. “And technically, darling, I outrank you.”
Kye scratches his face with his middle finger, which is apparently not a flattering gesture, because a moment later Madrid’s jaw drops and she swipes to hit his shoulder. Kye weaves effortlessly out of the way and then grabs her hand midair, pulling her toward him. When Madrid opens her mouth to say something, he presses his lips to hers and snatches a kiss. Like a thief stealing a moment. I half-expect her to shoot him with the crossbow – I know I would – but when he breaks away, she only shoves him halfheartedly. Her smile is ruthless.
I turn from them and clutch the ship ledge for support. The sun boils down on my bare legs and the wind hums softly by my ear. The shrill ringing has mellowed to a faint echo around me, making everything seem too quiet. Too peaceful. Under the sea, it’s never so serene. There’s always screaming and crashing and tearing. There’s always the ocean, constantly moving and evolving into something new. Never still and never the same. On land, on this ship, everything is far too steady.
“Ignore Kye,” says Madrid. She stands beside me. “He’s always like that.”
“Like what?”
“Ridiculous,” she says, then turns to him. “If the sonar cuts again, go belowdecks and give that engineer a piece of your knife.”
“The sonar?” I ask.
“It’s that ringing,” she explains. “Doesn’t bother us much, but the sirens go mad on it. Hits their nerves and disables them.”
Kye plucks the dirt from under his thumbnail with a knife. “It stops them from singing their little song and drowning us all.”
I grit my teeth. Typical humans using their dirty tricks of technology to fight their wars for them. I’ve never heard of something that can take away a siren’s power, but experiencing the awful tearing in my skull makes it easy to believe. I wonder how excruciating it would be to hear it in my siren form. If it would be akin to my mother’s magic.
“I know we look pretty run-down,” Madrid says. “The crew’s normally a lot bigger, but we’re on a bit of a special case. Captain cut us in half for his latest whim.”
I eye her strangely. “I didn’t ask you about your crew.”
She laughs and pushes a curl from her face. Without the bandana, her hair is riotous. “I figured you’d have questions,” she says. “Not everyone wakes up to find themselves on the infamous siren ship in the company of the golden prince. No doubt you’ve heard the best and worst about us. I just want you to know that only half the stories are true.”
She grins at this last part, smiling as though we’re old allies. As though she has reason to feel comfortable around me.
“You can’t be aboard our ship and not know the ins and outs,” Madrid says.
Kye makes a contemptuous noise. “I don’t think Cap wants strangers knowing the ins of any of our outs.”
“And what if she becomes part of the crew?”
“If wearing the captain’s shirt made someone part of the crew, then half of the girls in Eidýllio would be sailing with us.”
“Good,” Madrid says. “We need some more female blood.”
“We get enough of that spilled on the deck from sirens.”
“Sea foam doesn’t count,” she snipes, and the disdainful look Kye had when talking about me disappears in place of an impish grin.
“You like making up the rules as you go along. Don’t you, love?”
Madrid shrugs and turns back to me, inked arms spread open like wings. “Welcome to the Saad, Lira,” she says.
And then Elian erupts from the ocean.
To my instant relief, the sonar dissipates, and though it leaves a ringing in my ears, the pain subsides instantaneously. Kye’s lips draw a smile and, at the same time, Elian draws a breath, sending the ship into a frenzy. From the water, a net claws its way to the surface, turning the ocean to mighty waves. Inside, a creature thrashes and hisses, her tangled fin the only thing keeping her from the prince and his heart.
Elian sits on the other side, knife in hand, and watches the siren. She scratches at him, but the net is wide and they’re separated by at least three feet. Still, Elian looks on guard, one hand gripped in the net to keep himself steady and the other clasping his knife.
“If you’ve got a minute,” Elian calls up to the ship, “I wouldn’t mind coming aboard.”
“Get moving!” Torik bellows to the rest of the crew. “I want that damn net up here five minutes ago.”
Kye rushes to his side and twists the rope that is hoisting the net up to them. He leans back so his entire body is balanced against it. He is breathless with the weight in moments. Below, the siren screeches so venomously that I can barely make out the Psáriin on her tongue. She’s bleeding, though I can’t see from where. The red seems to cover so much of her, like paint against her skin. As the net is drawn back to the ship, she continues to thrash wildly an
d the whistle sounds again. I clench my hands by my sides to keep from bringing them to my ears. The siren is maddened. Her hands fly to her face and she tears her nails through her cheeks, trying to rip the noise out. Her screams are like death itself. A sound that makes my newly formed toes curl against the ship.
Kye pulls the rope harder, his arms dripping with sweat. When the net finally reaches the top, he hands the rope over to another crew member and then rushes to his prince’s side. Within moments, the net is untangled and Elian is pulled free.
Kye and Madrid clasp his elbows and drag him out of harm’s way. As they do, I see that his arms are cut. Slashes so similar to the day the mermaid tried to steal his heart from me. Quickly, Kye tears his sleeve and grabs Elian’s hand. It’s punctured with deep, dark holes. The blood is black red and nothing at all like the gold I’ve heard. The sight of it gives me pause.
“Are you mad?” Kye yells. He uses his shirt as a makeshift bandage. “I can’t believe you got into that thing.”
“It was the only way.” Elian shakes his hand as though shaking off the injury. “She wouldn’t be lured.”
“You could’ve nicked an artery,” Madrid says. “Don’t think we’d waste good stitches on you if you were going to bleed to death anyhow.”
Elian smirks at her insubordination. Everything is a game to him. Loyalty is mockery and devotion is kinship in place of fear. He is a riddle, disguised as a ruler, able to laugh at the idea of disloyalty as though it would never be an option. I can’t fathom such a thing.
“If you’re gonna keep this up,” Kye says, “we should invest in some safer nets.”
I look to the net in question and almost smile. It’s a web of wire and glass. Shards weave into one another so that their twisted metal can make a nimble cage. It’s monstrous and glorious.
Inside, the siren wails.
“She’s clever,” says Elian, coming to my side. “Normally the noise confuses them so much that I stand by the net and they fly in. She wouldn’t have it though. Wouldn’t go unless I did.”
The crew gathers with their weapons at the ready.
“She was trying to outsmart you,” I say, and Elian grins.
To Kill a Kingdom Page 9