by J G Barber
On the dock, he extracts the tin from its hiding place. I’m going to smoke this whole fucking thing and sleep until Monday. Paul lights up a fresh joint, staring out again into the water where he saw the mermaid Lorelei appear. The effect of the 9 Pound Hammer and his longing grows with each hit. He desires her with every fiber of his being. Pau watches and waits for her to appear. The water does not respond. He finishes half the joint before his lungs succumb to a coughing fit. Paul stows the tin and remains on the dock, listening to Lorelei’s song in his head. Her smell fills his olfactory receptors. All he wants in this moment is to become lost in her emerald green eyes as their groins merge.
Stoned out of his mind, he stumbles back inside the house and visits the bathroom again. It does not satisfy his lust. He heads into his office, pulls out a bottle of wine, and returns to the couch. He finishes the bottle in a few minutes. Bad idea. He lumbers to the kitchen sink and expels it. “This isn’t normal,” he says to himself as the effects of the cannabis and the purging of toxins from his stomach bring him to a moment of perfect clarity. “I saw her in the water as a mermaid. I didn’t imagine that. She’s a siren, and she has me under her spell.”
Paul hears Erik’s voice in his mind. It is time.
“Time for what?” Paul asks, as if he’s conversing with Erik.
I have led you to this moment, Erik explains. We will show you the way to defeat it.
Paul’s THC-infused brain comprehends the truth: he’s been sharing his consciousness with a force of will that is not his own, and he’s interacting with that personality right now. “Who are you?”
Erik explains Paul’s fate. I am Erik. You have met my brothers, Alexei and Dutch. We are siren hunters, same as you. I have tracked the siren Lorelei since my death by her song. This time, we will finish what we started in St. Goar. We will complete our quest, and the sirens will be no more.
Paul collapses onto the couch as a thousand moments from his life flash through his mind. Everything his father did and said—and everything he never said—makes sense for the first time in his life. The stories Paul heard growing up about the sailors in his lineage and how beautiful temptresses stole their wealth. He sees how everything that happened in his life so far has led him to this moment. It’s all too much to process. His mind shuts down, and he passes out.
Chapter Fifteen
Laura parks in front of the 5 Point Cafe, a 24-hour cheap eats joint near the Space Needle. A peculiar choice, but she’s ready to meet Alexei anywhere. She finds him inside finishing a cheeseburger and chasing it with a tall boy Pabst Blue Ribbon. “Alexei?”
He invites her to join him with a smile. “Hello, Laura.”
She pulls out the spyglass, and an object wrapped in a scarf from her bag. He notices the tip of Paul’s fishing knife. She sets Alexei’s business card down on the table in front of him. “How did you become a driver for my husband?”
“It is my profession. Paul’s company hired me.” He sips his Pabst. “I am at your service. Call me anytime.” He stuffs the last bite in his mouth.
Laura points at the eight-pointed symbol on his card. “What does this mean?”
“A symbol from Iceland, many centuries old,” Alexei mumbles. He clears his palate with more beer. “Passed down in my family for generations.” He assesses her. She’s ready to hear it. “It is a warning and a protection against a mythical creature called the nixe.”
Laura pounds her fist on the table. “I was right! Nixe. What do you know about sirens?”
Alexei tells her the oral tradition passed down to Robert, Dutch, and him. “In the twenty-second generation before us, our ancestors first encountered the nixe in the Rhine River of Germany. It began in the villages of St. Goar and St. Goarshausen, across the river from each other. Our great grandfathers were in business with Erik. He was a Norwegian who abandoned his country. It was told that they studied with Icelandic sorcerers to learn the lost ways of the ancients. Erik and our great grandfathers made their fortunes as merchant sailors along the Rhine, as did many other men. Until a young maiden, Lorelei, appeared. She created havoc in the villages. Sailors started disappearing. The villagers believed she would sit on the rocks along the river at night and lure the sailors to their death with her sweet song and immodest display of her femininity. They claimed the Rhine River sirens, a gossip of mermaids, enabled her murderous deeds. Erik was in love with Lorelei and he wanted her for his own. So he struck a bargain. If Lorelei would give him her heart and stop the killing, Erik would betroth all his wealth to their union. His heart longed for her to honor the bargain. In his emotions, Erik wanted to Lorelei to be his woman. Yet deep inside his soul, he knew a siren could not give itself to him. His Icelandic training prepared him for the alternative.”
The waitress appears. Laura holds up a hand to silence her, and points to Alexei’s setup to tell the waitress she’ll have what he ordered. “What happened?” Laura asks.
“Erik made an oath with our great grandfathers. When Lorelei betrayed his love, he invoked an ancient technique to extend his will beyond his body’s death. As Erik died by Lorelei’s song, he imprinted his desire to extinct the sirens on his lineage. And he cursed his son with his rage, his betrayal and his unsatisfied longing. After his death, our grandfathers cursed their lineages by honoring their oath to Erik.” He drains the beer can. “They organized the villagers to form a hunting party. They captured the mermaids… and beheaded them,” he says as he smacks the beer can down on the table. “Only Loreley and Leucosia escaped.”
It’s all starting to make sense to Laura now. “Leucosia is the redhead. We saw her on the old schooner.”
“Yes. It is the original Sirenian that led the Rhine mermaid gossip, and it has survived since before the Great Flood.” The waitress delivers two tall boys. Alexei pops the top on his as soon as it arrives. He continues, “Lorelei has survived by possessing the bodies of young women who bear the Sirenian gene, and imposing her will on the hosts. These two nixe remain together to this day, bound by the trauma of their loss and their love for each other.”
The waitress returns with Laura’s food. She continues talking as she plows into the burger. “So Robert, you, and Dutch. You all inherited this curse?”
Alexei nods. “Our ancestors have traveled to the ends of the Earth, hunting the sirens for five hundred years.”
“Five hundred years of failure!” She needs a drink after that revelation. “I don’t understand.”
Alexei reveals his lingering sadness over the loss of his friend, Robert. “Once the siren has a Douglass man under its spell, it always lures him to self-destruction.”
A wave of fear overtakes Laura. “These women are going to kill Paul?” She empties her Pabst.
He follows her lead, finishing his tall boy. “They will try. This time, they will fail. Because Paul can resist their call. And he has you.” He lets her digest her new reality. “Dutch and I continue the mission. Join us. We will hunt the nixe until they are extinct.”
A torrent of conflicting feelings storm inside Laura. She breathes and allows herself a moment to connect with Alexei and receive his reassurance. His kind, wise eyes win her over.
“I’m in,” Laura says. “Let’s take these bitches out.”
The sound of the front door opening shocks Paul awake. Disoriented, he struggles to compose himself as Laura conducts a cursory search of the house. She finds the empty wine bottle.
He sits up to face her. “Hi.”
Laura withdraws the knife from a sheath attached to her belt. She keeps her distance. “Are you drunk?”
Paul reaches for the water bottle. It’s empty. “No. I threw it up.”
She grabs a bottle from the kitchen and tosses it to him. “But you have been drinking?”
“Yes.” He cracks the bottle open and empties it.
Laura studies him. Paul looks ragged but different. Something has changed. She risks telling him. “I met with Alexei. He told me the truth about your family histor
y.”
Paul leans forward. “Alexei told you about Erik?”
She’s confused. Alexei mentioned nothing about telling Paul the story. “You know about Erik?”
“I’ve been experiencing Erik’s memories, in my dreams.” Paul stands behind the couch to respect her need for space. “A siren named Lorelei has obsessed him for a long time. He’s still pursuing her today. Through me.”
“It’s an ancestral curse. It has afflicted your family for twenty-two generations,” Laura explains. “Robert passed this on to you. Alexei’s and Dutch’s families have passed it to them.” She thinks about what to say next. “He invited us to join him and Dutch, as siren hunters. I say we join him.”
“I’m in.” Paul grabs another bottle of water from the kitchen. “Do you have the spyglass?” She nods. “I think they want it.” He walks under the skylight, pointing up. “Someone came into the house.”
“I’m not surprised.” Laura tells him what she concluded. “That spyglass is the key. Most of the symbols are Nordic runes. How do we decipher the other symbols?”
“Ellen’s got all those books. Shouldn’t she be able to translate them?” Paul’s smartphone vibrates on the kitchen counter. It’s a text from Lorelei with instructions to meet her at the airport for an evening flight to L.A. He bolts to the bedroom.
Laura pursues. “Where are you going?”
He packs his travel bag. “Art is meddling again.” Paul sighs out his anger and frustration. “I will not let Art or these sirens steal my ten years of hard work, I can tell you that much. I will close this deal and we will move on from this madness.”
“We shouldn’t separate.” She blocks his return from the bathroom with his toiletries bag.
“These sirens are a bunch of sluts who use sex to manipulate men,” he says. “It won’t work with me.”
She eyeballs him. “Then Lorelei has been trying to seduce you?”
He tells her the truth. “Yes, and one of her friends, Monica. I won’t lie to you, Laura. They are two of the sexiest women I’ve ever met in my life. But my heart belongs to you.”
She studies his demeanor and body language. She sees he’s telling the truth but there’s also something he’s hiding. “You want to.”
Paul thinks about his answer. No point in lying. “Yes, I was tempted. I had to find the strength to say no. I am Odysseus, strapped to the mast.”
“This thing between Erik and Lorelei started five hundred years ago. You need to understand what you are dealing with.” Laura probes his eyes. She’ll have to use a Krav Maga move to stop him.
He sees that look in her eye, the one that ended with him being slammed against a wall one time, and having a knife in his throat the other time. “I need to know you’re safe,” Paul says to disarm her. “We have the advantage right now. Let’s exploit it. Stay with Ellen. Figure out what the spyglass says. Let Alexei know where you are.”
“Don’t go to L.A. with her, Paul. Please.” She grips his hands, allowing herself a moment of feeling for him.
“I got this. I love you, Laura.” He kisses her and heads out the door.
Chapter Sixteen
Paul parks the Hummer at Boeing Field. Before he left the house, Laura tried to convince him to call Alexei for a ride and a pre-trip consult, but Erik told him he will need the vehicle when he returns.
He walks out onto the tarmac. The door to the MaverickONE is open. He climbs the stairs into the aircraft and finds Lorelei inside, settled in, waiting for him. She checks him out, head to toe. “How you holding up, Sailor? You look tired.”
Paul stows his baggage and sits facing her. “I’m rested and ready to go.” He checks her out. She’s dressed in plain business casual clothes and nerd-girl glasses. It’s the first time he’s able to see her as more than a sex object. He takes a moment to appreciate her beauty.
The jet taxis onto the runway and lifts off as Paul and Lorelei spend the time looking into each other’s eyes, each assessing the other. He breathes through the fear of losing himself as allows himself to look through the window to a soul unlike any he has encountered before… except for his own. He’s overcome by a wave of feelings. No way. I’m not in love with her.
She smiles, as if she heard his thought. “Why don’t you lie down on the couch?” she asks in an innocent, song-like voice. “You need a therapeutic massage.”
Paul scans her for seductive intent and does not see any. He takes off his vest jacket and lies face down on the couch. She kneels next to him and goes to work on his neck and back, singing as she kneads his tense muscles. Her song vibrates through his entire body. Her voice and touch relax him to a depth beyond anything in his experience. He exhales tension he’s held for years. In that moment, she owns him.
Lorelei focuses on his neck, repeating a circular motion from front to back, as the tone of her song morphs into something at once holy and sinister, an ancient invocation. Paul feels that tightness around his neck again. The translucent image of a snake collar becomes visible underneath her hands.
The sensation triggers Paul’s fight-or-flight instinct. He wrestles his way free from her and rolls onto the floor. “Is that another one of your siren tricks?” He pulls at his throat as if something is choking him.
“Oh, my dear Sailor. Relax.” They lock eyes. “I heard you. Sex is not your thing. There are other ways to express our desire.”
“This is not an expression of desire.” Paul returns to his seat. “This is a business partnership.”
“Everything in this plane of experience is an expression of desire,” she says in a siren song cadence as she takes her seat facing him.
He tries the direct approach. “I know you’re a siren, Lorelei. Let’s stop pretending.”
She’s not interested in being direct. “Everything we do here is an expression of pretending.”
Paul laughs. He’s not buying it. “Then you’re pretending to be an investor and dealmaker?”
“Of course I am. I’m great at it, too. Aren’t I?” She grins.
“OK. Then I’m pretending too.” His demeanor changes to the siren hunter. “Fear the soul that hunts the nixe,” he threatens in Erik’s voice.
“There he is! I was wondering when you would show yourself again, Erik.” She gives Paul a deep, passionate kiss. “So good to see you again, my love.”
Paul realizes her mouth did not move when she spoke. His head spins. Overwhelmed by the cognitive dissonance, he collapses in his chair. Lorelei sits to face him. “Oh Sailor, you think you’ve figured this all out, don’t you? I assure you, Jerry was right. You really don’t have the slightest clue.”
“How did you know Jerry said that?” Confusion sets in. The confidence and determination Paul felt when he was with Laura disintegrates into paranoia. “What’s your game, Lorelei?”
“Paul, relax. We’re a team. We want the same thing. Let’s close this deal and make a shitload of money.” She watches him figure out she’s been in his head all along. “Let’s just say I have advanced knowledge that gives me an insurmountable edge in business dealings. I know the secret of how to make deals happen. I wish you could trust me.”
He demands an explanation. “What’s the deal with you and Erik?”
“Erik loves me, that’s all.” She indulges in memories from the past. “When it was his time to transition to the next plane, he just wouldn’t let go. So Erik comes around every now and again, and we dance our little dance together.”
Do not be fooled by its sorcery, Erik warns Paul. It exists as I do.
Paul thinks through Erik’s thought until it makes logical sense. If they are the same, then there’s a person like him coexisting with Lorelei. “I see.”
Lorelei’s demeanor changes to all business. “Enough of this banter. We need to prepare for New Century. What’s our plan for Jerry?”
He dismisses her. “Let me handle it. I have a lot of experience righting the ship after Art’s meddling.”
“I think you’re looking at
this all wrong, Sailor.” She folds her arms, exhuming confidence. “You see that I have this whole situation under my control. There’s only one thing missing.”
Paul waits for it. She makes him ask. “What’s missing, Lorelei?”
“The secret.” She lifts her breasts with her arms, making her nipples visible. “My offer stands. I’ll show you how we can close the deal in Art’s time frame. One powerful choice by you is all it takes. Don’t you want to know the secret, Paul?”
Her breasts are so firm, he hadn’t noticed before she wasn’t wearing a bra. “I already know the secret.”
“We’ll see, Sailor. We’ll see.” She grins, admiring his arrogance, certain it will lead to his inevitable self-destruction. Lorelei sings the inaudible tone. The snake collar around Paul’s neck oscillates and tightens.
Paul grabs at his throat, trying to find something his fingers can’t touch. His awareness of Erik and everything important he was just talking and thinking about dissolves from his mind. Paul knows he just realized something important, but thoughts of the upcoming New Century meetings and seeing Monica again overwhelm his mind and emotions, crowding out everything else.
Laura lies alone in her bed at home, consumed by anxiety and unable to sleep. She’s not happy about the fact she let Paul go to L.A. alone to face temptations by Lorelei and Monica.
A faint song tickles her ears. As the volume grows, she sees Leucosia’s emerald green eyes and fierce, lovely face in her mind’s eye. The song intensifies, at once calming her and vibrating down her body, from her crown, third eye, throat, heart, solar plexus and gut, coming to rest in her pelvis. The vibration awakens a primal desire, building and intensifying until she’s consumed by a wave of multiple orgasms that continue for ten minutes. With the final release, Laura exhales, at once thrilled, exhausted, and more satisfied than she’s ever felt in her life.
Feeling wetness on her skin, she gets up to change the sheets. Laura peels off her clothes and replaces the bedding. She pauses in front of the bathroom mirror to examine her tiny baby bump and swollen breasts. Leucosia’s face appears in the mirror. Her eyes penetrate Laura’s soul. What is happening to me? Laura asks herself as she turns on the shower to wash off the after-effects of Leucosia’s song.