Page 49 of A Siren of Beasts

“She’s fine, right?” I asked as I watched her walk down the stairs towards me. “I found a spell to make our jobs easier so we’re not wasting time looking through dusty old books that mean nothing to us. Why had that earned me such irritation and anger?”

Shiny stopped in front of me and I saw the faintest mark on her cheek almost as if it were a paper cut. Teeth bared, I snarled, reaching out a hand to her. “He let you get hurt.”

“No, he didn’t,” she countered, her tone firm but not angry. “The book I was holding in my hands was ripped away and I got caught by the corner of it.”

Pain ripped through my chest as the thought that something I’d done had hurt her. “Shiny,” I whispered, my words choked.

“It’s fine, it doesn’t even hurt. Besides, I’m pretty sure it’s already healed. As a monster, I think I can handle a paper cut. Can you?” Shiny asked with a grin tugging at her lips. “Next time, let us know you’re building a spell and what it might do so we can prepare better.”

Pulling her to me I nuzzled her wounded cheek, which was in fact already healed. I could scent the faint tang of her blood which only made me even more upset with myself. “I’m so sorry, my dearest Shiny. I promise, next time I will make sure to give you ample warning.”

“Thank you, now let’s get reading. We have a lot to cover even if you narrowed it down to this amount. Tell me, is there a spell for speed reading?” she asked, cocking her head as she watched me.

“As a matter of fact, there is one,” I shared and tugged her over to the book open on the book stand to walk her through it.

twenty-two

Three days, it’s been three days that we’ve spent practically living in the library. There were so many books and even with the help of our magic to speed things along it was a daunting task. Many of the books talked about wizards more like boogie men that you warned your children about at night. They were tainted by the devil and the power they possessed was pure evil. Blood sacrifices, rituals, murder, and so many other things, it made me question if I wanted to learn anything more about them. This type of magic was in my blood from a man who’d kidnapped my mother after he’d killed her lovers.

So what did that make me?

“Zia,” Rhun called out to me, where I was perched on the second floor with my feet dangling off the edge.

Looking up from my book, I found him with a tray of food and my stomach growled with delight. I was still learning what it meant for me to be a human monster hybrid and eating had been the hardest thing to figure out. I could go a full day without eating, but then the next day I was ravenous and wanted to eat everything all the time. Milin suggested trying to eat one meal a day and ensuring I got a good dose of moonlight to feed that part of me as well.

Setting my book aside, I got up and headed down to the main floor and took a seat at the table we’d added to the space. The stew smelled amazing and I was pleased when Rhun joined me to eat. He needed meat every few days and most of the time he was the one who joined me for meals. The others didn’t need food and didn’t want to waste what there was when I could eat it the next day.

“Find anything interesting going on with the humans?” I asked.

Rhun and Imp both took turns keeping an eye on the villages that they believed this Holiness was going to visit to see if they would give us more information. So far, all we’d learned was that they were panicked about lodging, food, and if they had nice enough stuff for these important men.

“I followed a pair of hunters and they were talking about some sort of ritual they do once a month. There is a building that all the villages have that is a place of worship to their gods. They have services in them once a week but once a month on the new moon each member of the village bleeds on this special stone,” Rhun shared.

That had me frowning. “I’ve never heard of such a ritual before. Granted, they could believe in different gods than we did in Estya, but still. What would be the purpose of bleeding on a stone?”

“Your guess is as good as mine,” Rhun grunted as he shoved a large spoonful of stew into his mouth.

“We’ve read that they need materials to cast their spells whether it be blood, plants, or other items of value. Could this somehow be tied to that?” I asked, just not understanding how this all connected.

Trying to think like a wizard was like trying to describe a sunset to a blind man. Some things were just impossible to understand if you had nothing to refer to. How could you describe a color to someone who’s only lived in darkness? None of us knew or understood what it was like to have power or magic that wasn’t already inside you. Wizards had to create it out of something or steal the magic from something else.

“Oh before I forget,” Milin spoke up. “Imp wanted me to tell you he’s hiding out in the special building tonight. They are doing their weekly meeting and it will be another week and a half till the new moon. He hoped that listening to whatever they say might give us a clue as to what the hell is going on, or if it even has anything to do with the wizard. I mean, we really can’t discount humans just being odd and doing things that make no sense,” Milin added as he joined us at the table.

Since the talk I’d had with Moreth three days ago, he hadn’t shown up again. Milin didn’t comment on it and I was too worried to ask. I hadn’t meant to upset Moreth or hurt his feelings in any way, but I also wasn’t going to let anyone feel like they could just do what they wanted with me either. If Moreth and Milin wanted a relationship with me then there needed to be some effort to build a bond. Imp had made it his mission to win me over as swiftly as possible and it had worked. Hisceas and the respect he gave me, even as he challenged my views on what that respect should look like, created a bridge between us that made it easier to trust.

Rhun was a special case, he’d set our bond in motion without even meaning to. He was mine whether I wanted him or not, but he made it so damn hard not to want him. In everything he did he put my needs and comforts first and foremost. It was overwhelming and sometimes smothering not having experienced it at all to things being flipped on their head. The slightest hint I gave him that I was cold, hungry, tired, or in need of a hug, he was right there ready to fix it. Even with all that, I wasn’t ready to take on another mate while I was still trying to figure out what the hell I even was.

Milin was a fantastic teacher though. He had so much knowledge of the monsters that lived in this world, as well as what life had been like when my mother ruled. The task of him being my guide and support made perfect sense. My curious mind loved to chat with him, but at the same point, I felt like I didn’t know anything about him. Without me specifically asking he never shared anything about his life or even so much about simple things such as likes or dislikes. It was frustrating to spend time with him when it seemed he didn’t want to be around me, that I was more of a duty for him. One that my mother had assigned to him hundreds of years ago.

Looking up at the glass ceiling I noticed it was nighttime. “When did he leave?” I asked.

“You were sleeping and he didn’t want to wake you, Little Siren. He was worried you wouldn’t go back to sleep if he woke you,” Hisceas explained.

“That was hours ago,” I blurted.

“He said he wanted to check his other treasure finding spots before he had to be locked in with the humans,” my gentle giant said, smoothing a hand over my hair trying to soothe my irritation. “Don’t be upset, you’ve barely slept in the past few days.”

“There isn’t time to sleep,” I argued. “What if we don’t find the information we’re looking for and the wizard shows up?”