chapter fourteen
PHILLIP
My emotions were volatile, to say the least. Was it true? Did Aura mess with my mind and my memories, somehow manipulating me? Was that why I felt like my heart was being shredded? What kind of poison did Malex spew in her ear? I didn’t trust him as far as I could throw him, but she was right when she said the fae Prince was powerful. He could’ve ended me in a split second, and there wouldn’t have been anything I could do to stop him.
I tugged at my hair.
I was losing my mind.
Nothing made sense. Nothing but Luna.
Why couldn’t I stop thinking about her at the stream? Naked…water sluicing over her skin…the moonlight making her glisten. Damn it all.
I gritted my teeth and closed my eyes tightly.
She would never believe me. But should she? I searched my memories for the morning Rolfe and I entered the dark forest and there it was. Rolfe was… pink. Had he even been with me? Had Blackheart? Was my horse really dead? The stag, the fog itself was tinted red; the color of roses and lies.
I sat at the table, bouncing my legs up and down and trying to puzzle it all out. Aura had been using me as a weapon against Luna, and I was the fool who let her. How did Luna have the strength to not snap my neck and get rid of me? I deserved as much.
“When you’re finished wallowing, bring my broom!” she called from outside.
I grabbed the damned broom and headed outside. If she was taking me with her, there must be a reason. She must need me for something.
Ember meowed from the porch as we settled onto the stick. “How is your hair already dry?”
She smiled. “Commanding the wind has its benefits.”
“Why are you taking me with you?” I questioned her. “You should send me home or...” I didn’t want to say it. I didn’t want to die.
“I told you that I would protect you.”
“For William.”
She looked over her shoulder. “For you. And for me. William has nothing to do with it or with us. I will keep you safe because I want to. The easiest way for me to do that is for you to be near me. With me. So, we’re hunting sirens this evening. Their song can lure you to a watery death, so with your permission, when I find one, I’ll take your hearing with a spell.”
I opened my mouth to protest.
She stopped me with a wink. “I promise to give it back.”
“Like you’ll give the eyeballs back, or return the spirit to her grave? What about the dragon’s egg?”
She rolled her eyes. “I need those ingredients for the spell, and your hearing is not on the list. I don’t know if anyone’s ever told you this, but you talk too much.”
With that snarky reply, we took to the air, but she flew slowly, just above the canopy. The wind whipped her hair this way and that. I saw that Malex had marked her again, but tried to hide it behind her ear. “Why the mark?” I asked, hurt.
She tensed beneath my fingers. “It’s for protection.”
“From me?”
“From Aura... and you,” she shouted back at me. A few tense minutes passed and in no time at all, she said, “There,” and steered toward the ground.
As soon as I put my feet down, she waved a hand through the air in front of me and suddenly, the world went silent. I couldn’t even hear the leaves crunch beneath my feet. She motioned for me to come with her.
I could make out one word she mouthed. “Bait.”
You’ve got to be kidding me.
LUNA
I felt guilty using him, but at least I did so with his consent. Sort of. I knew he wasn’t thrilled with luring the siren, but I needed a human and he was the only one I happened to have at my disposal. Plus, despite the fact that it wasn’t his fault that he’d been working for my sister, he owed me. He probably thought my need for him and his help was the only thing keeping him alive right now, but it wasn’t. That wasn’t it at all.
He walked toward the great lake with me. Most sirens were found in the sea, but that was more than a night’s flight away. This lake was the largest inland, and there used to be sirens in these waters. I just hoped there still were.
I positioned him at the water’s edge and mimicked the motion of washing my face. He took the hint, rolling his sleeves up, while I hid behind the thick trunk of a nearby oak, the handle of my knife warming in my palm.
When he dipped his hands into the water, ripples spread out in great arcs, traveling over the water’s surface. The sound of frogs and crickets were the only sounds other than the splashing, watery ones Phillip was making.
He probably thought it was extreme of me to take his hearing; that he’d be able to hear the siren approach and have time to cover his ears, but they were stealthy beneath the surface, and hands over the ears wouldn’t keep her song from reaching his mind. No, this was the safest way.
My muscles were tense, but I was ready for her. I just needed her to sense him. I needed her to be hungry for him. The thought coiled in my stomach.
He looked back to me when a few moments passed and nothing happened. I pretended to unbutton my blouse and he got the hint, swallowing thickly, his Adam’s apple bobbing up and down. But he removed his tunic, pulled it over his head, and then slowly began to unbutton his shirt.
I watched as, inch by inch, his chest was exposed.
And then his stomach.
The muscles across his abdomen flexed as he finished the job and shrugged the shirt off. He splashed water on his skin, his muscles rippling with every movement. He scooped a handful into his auburn hair and I watched it sluice down him.
My heart beat loudly in my ears. Everything in me hummed to go to him, but then I heard it: the most beautiful voice I’d ever heard. He looked up to find a siren staring him right in the eye, only inches from his face.
Her hair was stringy with algae clumped in the strands, and her teeth were gray and rotten. However, Phillip looked at her like she was the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen. That look is mine, I thought angrily. I would strip her glamour and shove it down her whore throat, right after I tore out her larynx.
She was so focused on him, she never saw me coming.
Before she was aware of my presence, my knife found its mark, slicing right through her flesh and lodging itself into her wretched, shriveled heart. When she cried out, I already had the bottle open and ready to catch her voice. It filled the glass and I corked it, sealing it inside. She began to fall back into the water, but I caught the handle of my knife and pulled it from her chest before she fell backward, splashing us both.
Phillip was stunned for a moment. He clutched his chest and saw me beside him. Then he stood and began to pace and curse, raking his hands through his hair. “I can’t hear! You promised to return my hearing!”
I waved my hand, restoring him.
He calmed.
“Did you have to be so brutal? She wasn’t hurting me!” he roared.
“Look at her.”
“What?” he asked, exasperated.
“Look into the water at the creature who was luring you in.”
He looked into the lake and saw her gray body floating there, a stream of blue-green blood flowing out of her chest. “What? That’s not the same creature,” he stuttered, confused.
“She glamoured herself. It’s part of her lure. She makes you see a lovely, attractive woman, and her enchanting voice snares your soul. Then she drags you to the bottom, drowns you, wraps you in seaweed, and eats little pieces of you at a time until you’re gone. I did everyone in this forest a favor, really.”
“I was so scared. So damned scared, Luna.” His hands were trembling.
“Why? What did you see?” Legend said they showed you the person you wanted more than anything. Did he see Aura’s face staring back at him?
He growled. “She looked like you, and for a second there, I thought someone had hurt you. I thought... I thought you were dying. God, above, I thought Aura had gotten to you somehow.”
Oh. I swallowed. “It wasn’t Aura’s blade that killed the siren, Phillip. It was mine.”
His brows furrowed. “Stop comparing yourself to your sister,” he remarked shrewdly. “You aren’t like her.”
“I’m exactly like her. The fact that I’m capable of collecting these ingredients proves that much.”
Without another word, he pulled me into his chest and stroked my hair. I sank into him, not giving a damn if it was real or not. Because I needed to believe it was.
It had to be real.
My heart cracked a little further, but he held me until I pulled away, and then he placed a soft kiss on my temple.
We stood in silence for a moment, staring at each other, too many unspoken words stretching between us. But there was nothing we could do about it until this spell was made, and it wouldn’t be made if we didn’t gather what it needed.
I tucked the siren’s voice into my bag. “We should go. I have one more ingredient to collect tonight.”
“Only one?” he rasped.
“I’ll save Terigon for tomorrow, and I have no idea how I’m going to get the last one yet. I’m still working on that.”
He grabbed his shirt and buttoned it quickly, tugging on his tunic. He kept an eye on the siren as she floated in the water, staring up sightlessly at the star-smattered sky.
When would he realize that real monsters were alive and well, living among us?
LUNA
In my bag, my fingers searched for the golden chain and found it, dragging my moonstone out with it. “What’s that?” Phillip asked, eyeing the sparkling stone.
“I need to find something. This will help me.”
“What, does Ember have the night off?”
I smiled. “Ember is good at tracking animals, but she’s shit with tracking humans.”
“The umbilis?” he guessed.
Pinching my lips together, I inhaled. “The umbilis—which I have to cut.”
“How do you know a child will be born tonight?”
“I don’t,” I answered. “I’m just hoping for a little luck.” I held my palm out and angled it horizontally, fingers together. Our land was shaped similarly with a small peninsula at the top, cliffs near the eastern shore, and rocky fingers along the western shores that jutted into the sea. The southern shore was sandy and warm. Most of the humans lived there, but it was too far. I needed something closer...
Holding the chain above my palm and letting the moonstone dangle down, I said the magic words: By the power of the wind and moon, help me a newborn find, somewhere I can fly tonight, before the sun shall rise.
As the stone began to spin in a circle, tugging on the cord, Phillip made an awestruck sound.
The stone darted northeast. Brookhaven. We could make it to the tiny village tonight, as it wasn’t far from Virosa. If the midwife or new mother didn’t wish to accommodate my needs, I’d simply have to persuade them to cooperate.