Can you scent that? The scent of death that will give you life.
The ocean whispered in Asta’s ear, caressing her jaw with a wispy current.
Sweet, warm blood. They wait for you above, sea beast. Superior species. They are yours to harvest.
Asta clenched her fists and turned to Kaid who was weaving pieces of seagrass together in a plait. Was he experiencing the same calling she was? How did he always look so calm? They hadhardly spoken since escaping the finfolk territory and she was carrying that heavily in her heart.
Asta’s gums throbbed as she looked up toward a ship at the surface, its presence so silent underwater. No one else acknowledged the ship, their resistance to cravings much more fortified than hers. That’s it, she could not take it anymore.
“Soren, that story was about you, right?” she asked the orange-finned siren who was once again applying salve to the minor abrasions on the kelpies with injuries. It made sense now, why she felt so at ease with Soren. He was turned like her—not a born siren.
Soren nodded, his attention remaining on his wound care. “I know what you’re going to ask, Princess.”
Asta’s back stiffened. His assumption made her defensive. “Oh, and what is it you think I’m going to ask?”
“It’s the same question anyone turned siren would ask first,” he met her eyes and smiled. “How do you make the cravings stop? Am I correct?”
Her face heated and she began cracking her knuckles. She looked to Kaid who was still focusing on his seagrass but clearly curious. Sirens had preternatural hearing, so there was no way every member of the group wasn’t listening.
“Yes,” she whispered. “It feels as though someone is digging twigs into my gums; as though I’ve never eaten once in my lifetime.”
Soren chuckled—actuallychuckledat her suffering and insecurity. She had been starting to like him before this moment; now, she was aggravated. Or was that the intense hunger speaking?
“You’ll adjust. You just need to start feeding on other sources and eventually the sea gets the message and stops taunting you. Though, you’ll always sense when humans are near. Like right now, I could tell you that there is a crew onthe ship above us containing twenty-nine females and thirty-seven males. Eleven are ill in the infirmary and not good feeding sources. Thirty-one are in their prime of life—the ripest harvest for us. A draining of one of them would likely last you weeks. Well, since you’re newly turned, maybe about a week as you need to feed more frequently. It never goes away. Your tolerance naturally builds up over time.”
Asta blinked hard a few times, her takeaway from this conversation an understanding that she needed to feed soon. Just not from a human.
“And what about…” Asta observed Kaid from the corner of her eye and watched his gaze dart between her face and her cracking knuckles. “Why doesn’t he feel the urge?”
Somehow, Asta knew Kaid was awaiting the answer as well.
“I’ve been pondering that, actually,” Soren tapped his index finger to his lips, “and the only answer that makes sense is that it is somehow related to his protection spell he lived under until now. The spell wouldn’t have diminished his cravings, but smothered them since his siren side was locked away.”
Soren peered around Asta to Kaid, “Were you a particularly fussy baby, Your Highness?”
Kaid’s award winning grin appeared for the first time since before his abduction and Asta’s stomach flipped. Thank the gods her face was already red, or else her reaction would have been much more noticeable. Kaid was still one of the most frustrating beings Asta had ever met, but something changed after the night they spent in the cave.
“Father said I was the fussiest,” Kaid replied with his chest puffed, clearly proud that he had been trouble right from birth.
Soren twisted the cap of the salve back on and stowed it in his pack. “Likely because you were craving blood and all he could give you was milk at first. He likely fed you rare meats whenyou were old enough to subdue the thirst. Which means, you probably—”
“Have the most obnoxiously fantastic anti-feeding tolerance known to sirenkind,” Revna stated plainly as she rolled her eyes.
As if Kaid needed one more thing to inflate his ego.
Asta had barely fallen asleep under the protection of Thurs when Annika let out a low grunt, her head lifting from the sand and observing the dark water surrounding them. Their night vision added with the start of dawn above gave them visibility, but it was extremely limited.
“What do you—” Asta’s question was cut off as a massive grouper burst through the kelp beside her, sending herself and Thurs rolling. The fish circled back, massive snapping jaws filled with rows of small pointed teeth coming straight for Asta. She sprung out of the way, the entire camp awake now. Two more of the colossal groupers joined the first and barreled through the camp.
Revna already had her swords, cutting into the fishes' scales with each pass. “Morphling Groupers!” she bellowed.
Kaid floated frozen in fear directly in the path of one of the beasts. Without second thought, Asta grabbed the heavy chain floating at his side and yanked him out of harm's way by the cuff on his wrist. His body slammed into hers but her hands landed on his biceps to soften the collision.
Asta’s gums throbbed again. Her hunger was making her weak and she neededsomething.
Kaid snapped out of his frozen state and began using his chain as a weapon, a weapon in which Asta was quite impressed he had learned to control so easily. She scrambled on theseafloor in search of her sword that had been knocked away from her during the first fish’s attack. When her hand landed on the grip, she pulled the sword up and turned to swing the blade just in time to slice a deep gash into a grouper’s gills.
Black blood eerily similar to that of the finfolk poured into the currents around them. Revna speared a sword between her opponent’s eyes and the fish went still. The siren jerked her blade free and the fish floated away in the current. One down, two to go.
