I flinch away from the light that pours in from the large, ornate windows in the main cabin. Three orange shell lamps add to the radiance, glistening off the trinkets on the desk and accenting the golden embroidery on blankets. The gears of the hanging clock spin and click rhythmically.
Two humans stand in the midst of it all.
Both of them are broad of shoulder, with chests like mine, flat but with more muscle. The braided silver ring on the nearest one is something I’ve only seen worn in the right ear by the version of human they call a she. Her skin reminds me of the blotches of a flounder, patches of light and dark. Her straight black hair pools from beneath a broad-brimmed hat. The fluffy, blood-red feather tucked into the hat’s ribbon bounces as she moves, matching her swirling cape and tight waist cinch.
“Get out,” I tell her. I use the language of my kind, the words part vocal and part expression, with as much body signaling mixed in as I can manage, bound as I am. The humans understand nothing of it, but it feels good to speak in my own tongue. It’s a language where you sing your soul bare, where words are concepts you define with your whole being.
Her thin eyes narrow as she looks me over, curving like dolphins in mid jump. “That bastard kept one,” she mutters in the human speech, so rough and verbal and diminutive.
“I think you should close the cabin door, Simone,” her companion adds.
Simone leaves my view, heading toward the front of Kian’s quarters.
The one who remains must be a he, his earring on the opposite ear and made of something shiny and brown. His skin is the color of the wooden wall I’ve been staring at for weeks, a million little dark spots coating every bit I can see. Around his face, a mess of hair spirals in all directions, forming coppery, stormy waves.
He’s tall for a human, but his light blue coat still caresses the back of his knees, the dark, rippling patterns on the edges contrasting with the deep golden vest beneath it. On his silken, brown belt lies both a pistol—which Kian once proved is good for three shots at close range—and a thin sword.
He whistles, standing in the doorway. “A live siren—can you believe it?”
My heart thumps like a fleeing fish and I hate it, but I can’t force the terror away. What does he want with me? What could he want, but to do to me what Kian has already done? Or worse.
The main cabin’s locking mechanism chimes and Simone returns. She leans against the wall at the other human’s side. “They’re smaller than I imagined. What do you think this one is, about eight feet long at most?”
“Their carcasses come in all different sizes,” he replies with a dry grin. “But a live siren, Simone. Captain Kian was a lucky bastard.” He steps into the little room.
I jerk away from him until the metal cuffs bite my skin. The bruises Kian left this morning show the reaction is worthless, yet some part of me still believes it will help, no matter how many times I’m proved wrong. But he doesn’t move to touch me. Instead, he steps back.
“Find a corpse, would you? I think I’ll be needing some entrails.” A salty smile hangs from his words, a cutting sort of amusement.
Simone snorts, her nose wrinkling. “It would be a pleasure, Dejean.” She sounds as though she means the opposite, but she makes her way back toward the door all the same.
“You’re the best first mate!” Dejean shouts after her. “Never replacing you.”
I stare at him. These are strange humans; Kian would have thrown a knife at her first mate on his way out. I shake the thought away. Dejean must not have enough blades to spare. Or maybe he’s saving them for me.
As he creeps across the room, I draw a great hiss up the back of my throat, wishing with everything I have that I could sing. But my gills clamp to the sides of my neck like barnacles, dried to a crisp. “I told you to get out.”
“It’s all right, pearly, I’m just gonna sit here. No need to be angry.” Dejean plops onto the floor, leaning against the wooden wall.
He doesn’t reach for me, not with fingers or fists. But he’s up to something. I don’t trust him.
“Sneaky, vile human,” I say. “What’s your game?”
“What should I call you?”
“I don’t want your nicknames.” I have many already, all given to me by other sirens. But the humans won’t comprehend them any more than they could understand the rest of my beautiful, melodious language, and I have no desire to be labeled with his rough jabber.
“Right then. How does Perle sound? You do shine like one.”
I growl, leaning as far away from him as I can.
Dejean ignores the protest, humming. “Worth more pearls than I’ve ever seen in my lifetime,” he mutters under his breath.
Baring my teeth, I hiss again. I’m no treasure to be hoarded or traded, no matter what Kian thought.
The scruffy copper hairs that ride over his eyes lift. “You know some of those words, don’t you?”
“I’m not an animal.” But it matters little what I say; he’s just as dense as the rest of his barbaric kind. He’ll never understand me.
Kian’s cabin door opens with an ominous creak that makes me flinch even after watching her flee. The strong scent of blood precedes Simone’s entry. She’s pulled back her sleeves to her elbows, but scarlet from the fresh meat in her hands soaks the edges of them and drips along her breeches, staining the sandy fabric in splotches.
I’ve never felt so hungry before in my life.
“This is the most disgusting thing I have ever done. I do hope you’re happy.” She hands Dejean a liver.
He grips the organ with one hand and draws out a small blade with the other.
“He deserved it.”
“And the grave robbing expedition you took in search of cultist metal implants?”
“Skeletons don’t bleed.”
Simone huffs, moving out of view to bang around Kian’s room. “That was a personal grudge and shouldn’t be counted.”
“Fair enough.” With a shrug and a quick slice of his blade, Dejean cuts off a piece of the liver.
My mouth waters, and my stomach makes a noise I’m ashamed of. But when he shifts closer I jerk away, hiding my face.
“You can eat it. It’s all right.” His words are softened into what the humans seem to perceive as soothing.
I would much rather sink into a bottomless chasm, but I peek at him. He dangles the bit of liver just within my reach. It kills me to smell it, one snatch of my jaws away, but held by a human. I stretch my mouth toward the meat, so slow and cautious it’s agonizing. The metal cuffs dig into my wrist as I lean farther. I catch the liver between my teeth and yank the food from him.
It saturates my mouth with a jolt of everything I’ve been craving these last months and more. I devour it, far too ravenous to savor the sliver of blood-slick meat. I need the rest.
Dejean chuckles, cutting off another slice and scooting closer. He holds it out. His fingers look tempting, but there’s not much chance I’ll be offered anything more if I bite them off. I take the liver out of his hand as delicately as my insatiable hunger will allow.
Oh merciful tides, it tastes divine.
Dejean scoots forward another fist-length, nearing the edge of the tub. Whatever his game is, he can keep playing it, because his offerings are the first fresh meat I’ve had in so very long. I should be embarrassed that a human could buy my trust with so little, but my stomach is larger than my brain will ever be. Most marine creatures are like that.
I savor the next piece, holding it in my mouth for a moment before scarfing it down like the rest. Dejean places a hand on the side of the tub. A hiss rises in my throat, and my subconscious screams for me to hide before he can hit me. I hide my face in my shoulder, a tremble running down my back.
“Perle?”
He doesn’t sound as close. Forcing myself to look at him, I find he’s leaned away. He holds a bit of liver over the center of the tub, though. I take it from him slowly, catching the juice and blood that’s accumulated. It holds a different tang this time, as though mixed with the blood of another human. Cuts run along Dejean’s fingertips.
I stare at them, the red slits thickening until a drop of scarlet trickles down. My teeth must have nicked him earlier, yet he hadn’t made a sound. How odd. This is a very strange game, and Dejean is a very strange human.
He rises slowly onto his knees. I glare at him and fight the instinct to hide, but his gaze fixes on the metal around my wrists.
“Simone, you find a key yet?” he asks.
“Found eight keys.” Simone pops her head back into the little room. “What sort are you looking for?”
“Small. Brass or bronze. I’m thinking two bits, maybe three.”
“Here.” She tosses him one that’s the same color as my tub.
I flinch as he catches it, and it takes all my concentration just to steady myself. Whatever he needs the key for, I don’t want to be caught off guard.
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