“Your Majesty.” I bow just low enough that my eyes never leave her.
“Lira.” Madrid shakes her head, betrayal soaking her voice. “It can’t be true, right? You’re one of us.”
The Sea Queen’s laughter bubbles like water. “You’ll soon learn that my daughter has no allegiance.” She twists her eyes to Lira’s. “She’s nothing but a traitor.”
“I knew it,” Kye says, though there’s no satisfaction in his voice. “I knew we shouldn’t trust you and I did anyway. You were playing us this whole time?”
It’s a question, like he can’t quite believe it. Like he won’t, despite all of his suspicions, until Lira confirms it for herself. But she doesn’t answer. Whether it’s because she doesn’t care enough to or because there’s just too much to say, I’m not sure. But she doesn’t look at him, at any of us, at me. Her eyes are fixated on her mother. Roaming over her. Whenever the Sea Queen moves, Lira’s shoulders twitch toward us.
“You have something of mine,” the Sea Queen says.
The crystal thrums in my pocket. “Don’t worry. I plan on returning it.”
The Sea Queen inclines her head downward, arms out in a goading gesture. “Then by all means,” she says, “let us begin.”
I surge forward.
The Sea Queen slides out of my line in one sleek movement, and once she’s out of the way, her horde ascends. Sirens spill from the water, leaping onto my crew and screaming as their nails and teeth dig into whatever flesh they can find.
Lira dives to the side, and a tally of my crew rushes after her. I try to keep her in my focus, but there’re too many swords and bodies, and it’s only seconds before I lose sight of her.
I can see the queen, though. She hovers in the center of the moat on a line of frost that breaches the water like a small island. With the Crystal of Keto in my possession, she’ll let her sirens do the dirty work. Watch as they sacrifice themselves for her treasure, never once risking her own neck for it.
If I can just get close enough to her, then I can use the crystal to send her back to the hell she came from.
I dart in and out of leaping sirens, my crew hot on my tail. We slice our swords into them, careful to avoid the sprays of acid blood. Kye yells something, and I turn just in time to see him crash to the floor, a siren skewed on top of him. Madrid kicks her off before the blood has time to do damage, and hauls Kye back to his feet.
“Keep going!” Yukiko yells, gesturing to the queen with her sword. “We’ll hold them off.”
She is the epitome of a Págese princess in that moment, above the holds of jealousy and bids for power. A pure, raw warrior, like each of her brothers and the kings and queens before them. She swoops her sword over her head, circling it through the air with enough force to create a storm. She’s ready to kill.
“Come on!” Kye roars.
He thrusts me onward, Madrid shooting cover fire behind us. The sound of gunfire and screaming rattles the mountain. With every step we take, another member of my crew branches off to wage war on an attacking siren. They are everywhere, springing from the water and slithering along the ground like snakes. I run past so many bodies, my boots slick with ice and death, until a legion of devilish shrieks stops me dead.
A group of six sirens leap from the water, their nails shining like daggers. They land like cats, fins bent in the middle and hands arched to claws.
“Watch out!” Kye yells, and Madrid grunts from beside him.
“I know,” she says, peppering the deadly creatures with arrows. “I’m not blind.”
The sirens pounce out of the way, deceptively agile even on land. Their gills expand against their bare ribs, revealing the raw flesh beneath.
“You sure about that?” Kye asks, and Madrid elbows him in the side before thrusting the crossbow to the ground and unsheathing her sword.
We attack with more brutality than ever.
I go for the throat before any one of them can open their mouths to sing. Around us lullabies crash and echo alongside the cries for mercy, but there’s too much noise for it to have any effect past dizziness. Too much death for their songs to take shape. Still, I won’t risk it. One note and they could send us into a frenzy.
I lash out with my sword, slicing across a jugular. And then another. They come thick and fast and like the heads of the Hydra. Whenever I leave one siren severed on the floor, another leaps out in her place.
One of them stabs Kye, her nails sliding into his knee. Her finger goes so far through, I half-expect the rest of her hand to follow, but he presses a pistol to her temple and when she falls lifelessly to the ground, he pulls his leg out from her grip without so much as a wince.
“Go ahead!” Madrid yells, slinging Kye’s arm over her shoulder. She plunges her sword into the mouth of a siren. “Get the queen!”
I sprint, rolling to the floor in a duck as another siren leaps toward me. I can feel my skin sizzling underneath my shirtsleeve when I stab her. Siren blood, eating its way through. I rip the fabric away and heap snow onto the charred skin before continuing on.
Bullets cascade around me, shooting through the air like fireworks. The water is riddled with them, alongside the floating bodies of sirens. I hear the battle cries and death cries. My crew is dying, the sirens are dying, and I can’t seem to tell which screams belong to who.
I gasp a breath when I finally reach the fork of land in the water. My feet pound across it, but I barely have the chance to get close enough to the Sea Queen before something slams into me, lifting me off the ground. My cheek cracks on the ground.
It’s not a siren. It’s a merman.
The creature flips back into the water and roars with the splintered teeth of a shark. I choke a little, but when it attacks again, I’m ready. I’m a tornado of steel and fury, slicing clean into its rubber flesh, across its branded chest and deep grooved stomach. But the merman doesn’t relent no matter how much it bleeds.
It grabs me by the throat with a webbed hand and roars loud enough to split my ears. I drop my sword. The edges of its spiked fingers puncture my neck and it lifts me off the floor with one muscular arm. I scramble, fumbling blindly as I gag for breath. When my hands latch around the screaming blade, I don’t waste time.
I slam my knife through the base of its chin, driving the blade up until the handle slams against bone. The power surges back through the steel, like no kill before. It is pure animal and instinct and as my knife drinks it up, I do too.
The creature falls to the floor by my feet and the Sea Queen’s nostrils flare.
“Tha pethánete,” she barks.
“Sorry, I rub a hand over my throat. “I don’t speak bitch.”
The water boils in fury around her. “When you die,” she says, “do you think my daughter will weep?”
I lift my knife. “Kill me and find out.”
39
Elian
I KICK MY SWORD up off the floor and catch it, holding both blades before the Sea Queen.
She hisses. “Just like a human, to rely on weapons to make a kill.”
With a raised hand, the Sea Queen hoists a body of water up and sends it thrusting toward me. I dive out of the way, but the edge of the great wave clips my ankle and sends me spinning through the air. I land with a skid, ice burning through the fabric of my leg.
She regards me with an impish look of satisfaction and then raises her hand once more. I ready myself for the impact, but the hit never comes. Instead she sends a hammer of water toward a line of half a dozen of my men. It envelops them instantly and then drags them into the clawing pit of sirens.
I snarl and throw my sword in her direction, but it bounces from her glass skin.
“Fool,” she spits. “Ilthia anóitos.”
“You’ve lost already,” I tell her, heaving myself to my feet. “I have the Crystal of Keto. Lira couldn’t take it from me.”
But even as I say the words, I’m unsure. The crystal may have been humming before, but if anything, it feels l
ike dead weight in my pocket now.
The Sea Queen recoils at the sight of the crystal in my hand.
“I’ll make sure Lira is punished for that when this is over,” she says, sliding backward. “In fact, I think she already is.”
I follow her line of vision and freeze.
Across the way, Lira is fighting Yukiko. The princess shoves her roughly against a pillar of ice, and Lira lurches forward to slash her sword against her chest. I don’t have to hear them to know Yukiko is laughing. Lira may be a killer in the ocean, but Yukiko is a Págese warrior, and on land and on snow and especially on this mountain, that means so much more. The Págese are trained to be merciless, and to Yukiko, Lira is just another siren. Only now she’s easy prey.
A few members of my crew surround her, their blades eager to take a stab at the traitor. I’ve lost sight of Kye and Madrid, but even if they were near, I don’t know what they would do. If they would help Lira or Yukiko.
Yukiko raises a hand to keep my crew back. Signaling that she wants Lira for herself.
Lira twists her arm up to punch, but Yukiko dodges and then backhands her hard across the cheek. I can almost feel the impact. Lira spits, and in the next moment, Yukiko grabs her roughly, ripping the material across her shoulder. Lira kicks out, but when Yukiko hits her this time, she slams to the ground.
The Págese princess removes a pistol from her holster and the Sea Queen makes an admonishing sound. “See,” she purrs. “Just like a human.”
The lack of concern in her voice shocks me more than it should. It’s a game to her. Everything from this war to her daughter’s death. She would let Lira be killed so I could carry the guilt of it. She would refuse to save her so I could be disgraced when I did.
I’m hurtling toward them before I think of a solid plan, and the Sea Queen lets me abandon her in the watery depths. I don’t need to glance back to know she’s watching me with a satisfied smile. Grinning as I do her dirty work, like another one of her subjects.
I arrive too late.
Something crashes into Yukiko, sending her skidding ten feet across the snow. The siren growls, yellow hair curling in front of her eyes. She arches her shoulders, licks her lips, and then springs once more. Shots fire out, but the beast is too fast for bullets to keep up.
Ribbons cut across Yukiko’s body, and I choke back a gag as the siren snarls and presses her hand against the princess’s chest, poised to take her still-beating heart as a trophy. I fist my sword, breathe in a low rumble, and ready for the killing blow.
“Kahlia!” Lira screams.
The siren slashes around to face me, red droplets on her face and hair.
Lira jumps between us like a lightning bolt. I’m barely able to stop the blade before it slices across her neck. I widen my eyes, arm shaking as I keep the sword hovering unsteadily by her throat. Daring myself to let her live again.
Lira swallows – the movement knocking against the steel – but she doesn’t back down. Her cheek is hashed pink and I struggle to look away from the mark.
“Not her,” she says, angling herself between me and the siren.
Furious, I advance until my shadow looms over her face. “You think I won’t kill any of these things because you tell me not to?” I ask. “It just tried to kill the princess of Págos.”
Lira casts a backward glance at Yukiko. “She looks alive enough,” she says, and spreads her arms out from her sides, shielding the siren. “The princess was the one with a gun to my head.”
“I don’t care.”
I make to move past her, but Lira presses her hands to my chest. It’s almost a shove, but when I stumble back a few steps, she follows, her palms still flat against my shirt. The connection sets off a storm in me.
It’s not skin on skin, but it might as well be. I feel the cold echoing from her and the confused warmth it brings. I want to reach out and pull her closer, save her just like we saved each other on Rycroft’s ship. But that instinct is the problem, and the fact that she would try to use it against me – the very weakness she created – makes me seethe.
I look down at Lira’s hand, pressed flat against my heart.
“Are you insane,” I say. Not a question.
“Elian,” she whispers. “You can’t.”
I throw her hands from my chest and glare. “Wrong.”
I go to shove past her again, but she grabs me in desperation, fingers slipping into mine like it’s the most natural thing in the world. I seize.
“Elian,” she says again. Her pulse strums against mine. “She’s my cousin.”
I recoil.
When I look at the siren again, I see she can’t be more than fifteen, with one eye the same milky yellow as her hair, and the other a perfect match for Lira’s. Cousins. She looks up at us questioningly, but it’s not my sword, or the stone clenched in the same fist, that seems to hold her interest. But my other hand, threaded wildly into Lira’s. Her thin brows dimple over wide eyes and suddenly she looks far more girl than demon.
I back away, my hand falling from Lira’s.
Lira reaches out for me again, but I square my jaw and open my palm to reveal the Crystal of Keto. A warning, I think, though I’m not sure if it’s for me or her.
Lira shakes her head, undeterred, and takes a determined step forward.
The crystal sears against my palm as she nears. Pounding as furiously as my heart.
“Stop,” I demand, and my voice cracks.
To not end this war now would put humanity at risk. The sirens have shown they can’t be trusted or bargained with. To let their murderous race continue would be an affront to everything I believe in. And to let the Princes’ Bane live . . . of all the things I’ve done, that would be the worst. To put so many people in danger would be monstrous. And yet, one look at Lira’s pleading eyes, and I know that’s exactly what I’m going to do.
I drop my hand and look to the ground, disgraced.
By falling for a monster, I have become one for her.
“Anóitos.”
The Sea Queen’s voice is clinical as she descends into my line of sight. Beautifully grotesque. Rage simmers through me, and just seeing her leaves me overcome with the need to plunge my knife into her cold black heart.
“Lira.” The Sea Queen’s head cracks toward her daughter. “Párte to apó ton.”
Lira watches me carefully, her eyes like magnets on mine. When she shakes her head, it’s slow and barely noticeable. She doesn’t look at her mother.
“I won’t,” she says in crisp Midasan, letting me know that she’s not just talking to her mother. She’s talking to me. To the crew she became a part of. To the army of her kin that stare onward from the water. Disobeying whatever order she has been given so everyone can hear.
The Sea Queen arches a high brow. “You love this tongue more than your own?” she asks. “Perhaps I should cut yours out, then?”
A tentacle strikes out at Lira’s back, flinging her forward. The sound of fin against skin cuts through the air like a whipping, and I lurch toward Lira. I grab her before she hits the ground, skidding to the floor in her place. My leg burns against the snow, ankle twisting as my arms catch her waist.
Lira’s hand curls around my neck and she slumps on the hilt of my knee. “You’ve got good reflexes,” she says, and smiles in a way that detonates through me.
I tighten my grip on her. “You don’t.”
The Sea Queen snarls and whips around in a flourish to address the rest of her subjects. Everything she does is a show, every threat disguised as a spectacle. She is a performer as much as she is a queen.
Around us, the war comes to a pause.
“See how these humans can turn even my most loyal against me,” the Sea Queen says in Midasan, so even my crew can understand. “My daughter has fallen prey to lies and charm. So much so that I have to sully myself with this language to even get her to listen to me. You see now how the humans can kill us with more than just spears and knives? This prince” – sh
e points a finger at me like a loaded pistol – “must die at the hands of the siren he has bewitched. And so I will restore her to her former glory.” She turns to Lira with a serpentine smile and raises her trident in a toast. “Long live the Princes’ Bane.”
It happens in seconds.
The Sea Queen pushes her trident toward the sky, and when her arms can’t stretch any farther, it ascends without her. Hovering over her head, then spinning so rapidly that the glare from the ruby becomes a perpetual ray of sunlight, blinding us all. And then just as suddenly it stops.
Lira rips my arms from her and pushes me away. I fall back just in time for the light to shoot like a spear from the trident into her chest. And then explode.
Lira is on her knees and her arms burst like wings from her sides.
An inhuman scream rips free from her throat and suddenly Kye is beside me, hand clamping brutally around my wrist. It’s only then that I realize I’ve pitched forward. That I was about to run to her again. That even now, with his hand gripping me so tightly that my bones crunch, I can’t take my eyes off her. I can’t let her out of my sight.
The light comes in a blast, but once there’s no more scream left in her, it curls down her body. Lira convulses, stiff and shaking all at once. Her eyes roll back and then close, and I can practically hear her teeth grinding together.
Everyone stops. My crew pauses in horror. The sirens watch fervently.
Some let out songlike breaths in anticipation, jaws hanging hungrily open. Others watch on in uncertainty, their eyes narrowed to slits and their fangs clamped across the edges of their lips. The siren from earlier – Kahlia – watches Lira’s every shudder. When her cousin’s neck snaps back, she blanches.
All the while, the Sea Queen salivates.
Against the crushed ice, Lira’s legs sew together. The skin melts and mingles until scales erupt from her feet and medley up to her waist. It’s a color I’ve never seen before, flecked with so many shades of orange, it’s like caught sunlight. It blends flawlessly into her hips, just below the curve of her belly button.
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