“You can’t get him out. The Prince. You can’t do it. You will drown in those oceans.” I say, tripping over the words, trying to find the right ones that will save me.
“I can,” she snarls at me.
“You can’t. But I can help you.”
I hum three notes. Just three. It’s so quick and so quiet she doesn’t even notice. Three notes that are all Lirin. It’s a summons, a stroking of his energy, a defiant challenge.
It’s the first time I’ve reached out. But I know they will come.
They appear between us, all five of them focused on me with all the rage in them. Like thunder booming across the sky. If I wasn’t so tired, I might say something sassy. Like ‘good to see you swimming around.’ ‘How’s your pet you tried to feed me to?’ Or maybe even a simple ‘how’s it swimming?’
That ought to stir them into a murderous fury.
Despite everything, feeling them is a relief and a balm to the loneliness that is plaguing me. Their song crashes into my world and brings me back to those happy moments on that stupid island before I found out that I was ear marked for death.
My stomach cramps so violently that I almost drop to my knees.
“I propose a deal!” I rush out and say, hating everything and that I’m here, helpless to do anything but reach out to my enemy for survival.
They’ll accept.
I know they will.
They won’t pass up a chance to kill me again. Slowly and painfully.
But maybe if I’m clever, I can find what I need to survive.
Chapter 4
Mei
The Present- OR
Three months after Mei made the deal to become a captive of the Sirens and then escaped
“I have been here for too many moon cycles to count, but I fear this shall be my last. Hunger has driven me out into the open, and who knows what evils I might find to amuse myself with.”
The mouse, unperturbed by my dramatic mutters, ignores me and continues to scurry on its way past. I really should eat it, but it’s become my only friend.
“Though this fortress has been my sacred hiding place, I fear it is safe no longer. Tonight, we break the cage, escape if we can, or die trying. No Siren will keep me chained.”
I should probably stop listening to the TV that they keep blaring, but picking up on human speech patterns wasn’t all that difficult, after all, my mother was from here. Also, I have nothing else to do. Sure, I stumble over some words and meanings, and I have an accent, but it’s language, and it’s another connection to her.
The stupidity of thinking that it would be different here is how I got into this situation in the first place. No, I got into this position because I don’t want to die, and if I stayed out there, struggling in this most hostile of places, I would have. Earth is not what I thought it would be. At all.
I unfurl from my motionless stillness and creep out of my hiding spot. I must go up the stairs of creaking doom, through the doorway of cold winds, and out into the place they call home.
“Good morning, beautiful night,” I sing to myself.
At some point, I really need to pat myself on the back for finding such an amazing hiding spot, dangerous though it is. Three months ago, I made the agreement with the sirens in order to save the Frost Prince for his omega. And then, I promptly disappeared because sticking around to be tortured and tormented? I don’t think so.
I’ve been hiding.
In plain sight, right under their noses. Technically, I have fulfilled my end of the bargain, they just have no idea.
If any of those Siren bastards had used a brain cell between them, they’d have realised I was still here. The genius of it took a fair few nights to wear off, but there’s one huge issue with hiding in this house I didn’t anticipate. I can’t fucking get out. I like that word, fucking. Humans say it a lot on TV when they are mad. Fucking this. Fucking that. It comes out of the mouth well, and I deserve a moment to be angry with the world and my existence.
I’m sick of being prey.
