What if Solace has returned? What if there are more of them? Oh, gods.Bile rose in my throat, my jaw frozen shut as fear replaced blood in my veins.
Closer, the object moved, and faster my heart beat until my vision started to blacken around the edges. My breath sawed in pants until it stilled in my chest completely as what I thought was a mirage, crested the water.
A singular thin tail shimmered beneath the moonlight, the colors of the scalesand fin the same as the lights in the sky above. The tail disappeared, only to reappear again seconds later as if something was swimming.
A dolphin? Some other underwater creature?
I frowned, trying to think of the animals native to the waters this far north, but came up blank.
A second tail joined the first, this one with scales as black as night, just before two heads broke the surface not ten yards from the end of the dock.
I blinked rapidly, pawing at my eyes in an attempt to clear my vision.
This . . . thiscan’tbe right. I must be hallucinating.
But the heads—one obviously female and the other male—bobbed closer to me. I started to shake, unnerved and completely fearful of the unknown.
“Who are you?” I called as they came within speaking distance. The woman smiled something terrifying, her mouth wide and full of razor-sharp teeth. The male glanced at her before rolling his eyes and nudging her with his elbow, whispering something in her ear.
She huffed, splashing him playfully, before diving beneath the waves.
I leaned over the end of the dock, straining to see her beautiful scales in the deep blackness and screamed in surprise when she surfaced inches from my nose, clinging to the edge of the dock with her hands.
My scream bounced around the empty docks as I threw myself backward, landing hard on my hands and back.
“You know that’s not fair,uunnasta,” the male admonished in exasperation.
The woman giggled and huffed before swimming backward into the arms of the male.
“I won’t hurt you,” she said. “Though I find it interesting you have no idea who we are.”
“Sirens,” I breathed, eyes wide.
“So youhaveheard of us,” she giggled again, the sound slightly unnerving and absolutely hair-raising.
The male muttered something along the lines of “play nice” into her ear, moving her wet silver hair as he did so.
The female hummed before shrugging from his hold, approaching the dock once more.
“Come closer, I don’t bite.”
I shook my head so hard the beads in my hair rattled and whipped my exposed arms.
She growled with a roll of her eyes. “I’m not going to pull you into the water, if that’s what you’re afraid of. Or eat you. We’ve advanced beyond that. But I can’t give you your gift if you’re way back there.”
Cautiously, I scooted forward on my hands and butt. “G-g-gift?” I stuttered.
The woman smiled that terrifying grin again. “The ocean gave us a gift. Now, we must give it back. It’s the secrets of the waves, Folami. They whisper, and we respond.”
There was too much information to unpack in that statement, though something had the hair on the back of my neck standing to attention.
The siren stiffened imperceptibly, her eyes flicking to the entryway to the docks. She hissed before diving beneath the ocean once more, the male following suit.
Seconds later, they appeared once more, a soggy, naked body clutched between them.
“The Ocean gives just as she takes,” the female siren whispered, depositing the body onto the dock at my feet.
“Our purpose is fulfilled. May Fate bless and keep you,” the male muttered before diving beneath the dark waves once more, the female following shortly after. The sea didn’t ripple as they swam away, leaving no evidence they were even here.
