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The children were drowning.
A small boy, and his younger sister, out in the ocean, thrashing whilst the village watches on in quiet shock. Mostly quiet shock. There's a pair arguing, out on the dock, voices hushed but echoing loudly amongst what is otherwise silence. Their boat, a small, rocky wooden thing lays haphazardly lashed to one of the posts.
Arguing, raising their voices as though there weren't two children flailing in the water, so close to reach and so full of panic. You know, deep down, that they aren't going to lift a hand to save those kids. Not with the way they hang back from the water, hushed and afraid, and certainly not with members of the crowd already dispersing with a resigned look of grief shadowing their eyes.
By no means would you consider yourself a rash person. Certainly not a spontaneous one. But those were two children, two people who hadn't even had the time in their life to understand what being a person meant. By no means were you going to be the person to sit there and twiddle your thumbs as they drowned.
You were off the dock and in the water before you could even have a second doubt.
It was cold. Terribly, terribly cold, and the froth of the waves that battered your face left your eyes sore and stinging. Most of it went up your nose with a disgraceful sputter. Above the rush of water clogging your ears you can barely hear the villagers; and for the most part, you try not to.
"Are you an idiot!? Get back to shore! Now!"
"Is she crazy? Surely she knows-"
And you do. You do know, and so did anyone in the village, fearful and frightened of touching the very boats that founded them. The ocean held a myriad of things; no different to the forests that lay miles from the shore. But the forests didn't hold beasts that could crush entire ships with tentacles or maws large enough to down people. It certainly didn't hold creatures whose mere voice could drive a man to sinking his entire ship and crew in its pursuit.
You know that. Know it just as well as you know that there's been a siren lurking around these particular waters, know strongly that it had already drowned several of the fishers. It had turned over a boat, and drowned all 6 of the men onboard.
Even so...even so, you tell yourself, these are children, helpless and struggling, left out to die because their father had gotten drunk and bored and decided that going out to sea was a good idea. He'd flipped his own boat. You'd heard as much from the villagers by the dock. Gotten so drunk he lost balance, but not drunk enough that he couldn't swim himself back to the dock. Drunk enough that he hadn't bothered saving his own blood and flesh.
So you bury the knowledge, the fear of the siren lurking in the water below you, and focus on kicking. You're not an elegant swimmer; you knew enough to keep yourself afloat, but speed and elegance wasn't your forte, and the fact tears at your throat as you watch the young girl dip under.
Her brother is older, stronger, more confident, and he's keeping himself afloat well enough, but he couldn't be more than twelve. He's latched onto a barrel that must've fallen from the boat with him. It must've rolled, you think, and that must've been when the girl went under.
You take a breath when you reach him, then blow it out in a rush, take a smaller breath in, then dive.
The water below is murky, at best. A deep, blue-green that made seeing even slightly below you a hard task. But you can see bubbles, heavy lots of them, that burst up from below and go rushing up to the surface in a frenzy. You swim, deeper and deeper, and you see the girl- Small, baby face distorted by the waves and panic. She's still further down, and your lungs are already burning with pain, and-
Somewhere in the murk, something violet glimmers.
You try to ignore it; force yourself that tiny bit deeper, grasp the girl's cold hand in yours and pull her closer. She's panicking, though, and her arms shoot out like a viper, latching around your neck and shoulders, and suddenly you can't see. Twisting, stretching, you turn your face sideways against her stomach, enough to see the light trickling from above. Tightening your grip around her, you kick up.
Swimming with a struggling, panicking child is no easy feat. She's like a weight, a force you have to fight and kick against, and the realisation that your won't make it up rushes over you with a chill colder than the water itself.
All this way, diving out into the ocean with such reckless abandon, and it's not going to be the siren that drowns you; just you, weak and unused to the water as you were. The child thrashes, and the last bubbles of air leave her lungs in a panicked, heaped rush, and the anguish of failure swarms over you, all at once, burning and twisting.
Something grabbed the back of your shirt. The panic that bursts forth is muted, dulled, soothed over by a growing dizziness, but it's there nonetheless, beating against your ribs in some last show of helpless survival instinct. The hand yanks, then, and you notice with no small alarm that the child has gone still, not dead but getting closer by the moment.
The collar of your shirt digs in, for a moment, cutting into your throat with the force that rips you upward, then you are up, gasping and wheezing greedily, chasing away the dizzy fuzz with fresh, albeit salty air. The boy is still there, clinging to the barrel for dear life, but you can see the exhaustion that's weighing his limbs like stones, and you know that he won't be able to hold on much longer.
On your shoulder the girl is still, and you don't know how you're going to manage hauling an unconscious child and one that's on the brink of being the same. You sink again, for a moment, water surging back over your face, before the grip on your shirt tugs again, and the reminder that it's there at all alarms you so greatly that your limbs nearly halt.
Then there's a weight against your back, warm and definitely alive, and you don't have the chance to even think about convincing yourself that it's human when scales brush by your feet.
Violet shimmers beneath you and the boy, clutching onto the barrel for dear life, is staring wide eyed and awed.
The siren, and you know now that's what it is, leans against you, craning to stop by your shoulder, where the girls head has lolled near lifelessly. You hear the breath it takes in, feel it's chest expanded against your back, and fear pumps through every part of your body.
It was going to drown you, wasn't it? You doubted it wouldn't, given that is had already drowned multiple people in these very waters. Such was the nature of a siren; to lure unaware fishermen with its voice, and drown them, even if only because of some cruel enjoyment rather than any actual need for survival. All it needed was to say the command and you'd be underwater long enough to feel your lungs give out.
"Breathe."
It- His voice is soothing, quiet, a gentle lullaby whispered right by your ear, and the girls. Your breathing stays much the same, and you wonder why, and what, so very briefly just before the girl begins to shudder. All at once the pressure behind you is gone, though the water still shimmers with the flashes of his scales.
The girl, shuddering, begins to sputter, hacking up lungfuls of water, before heaving altogether and vomiting over your shoulder in the process. She wheezes a few times, the sound wet, before taking in raggard, heaving gulps of air, and you've never been so relieved in your life.
"Hey, hey sweetheart. That's it, just keep breathing."
She leans back, and the movement sends you back under, legs kicking as desperately as they can to keep the two of you afloat, but there's a touch at your legs and waist that pushes, gently, and then you're back above the water, both you and the girl sputtering all over again. She's staring at you, teary and afraid, and you know you need to get them back to shore before either one of you three can no longer swim.
"Hey. I'm going to- I'm going to get you over to the barrel with your brother, okay? I need you to hold on to the other side of it, but you have to be- be really carefully, okay?"
She nods, shakey and unsteady, but you know it's all you're going to get, so you do the only thing you can think to do. You take a deep breath, as deep as you can, and twist around to lay more on your back. The girl shifts, just enough to hold her head up from your shoulder and keep her face from the water, but she otherwise doesn't move from her position sprawled across your stomach and chest. You kick gently, afraid to kick any harder less you sink yourself and her, so the process is slow but it's process none the less.
You don't know how you're going to get the two out of this. The siren, clearly, wasn't going to harm you; unless it was feeling particularly cruel and was waiting to sink you and both kids all at once. Ignoring the siren, though, you still had no idea how you were going to reach shore. You could barely swim, and the girl clearly couldn't at all. You didn't know about the boy, but you didn't think he'd be able to make the distance.
When you reach the barrel, the boy lifts his head groggily, and you can see the lax in his grip on the barrel, see the way he's struggling to stay awake. But the sight of his sister seems to energise him, even if only a little, because his eyes become a little less dazed and unfocused.
"Daisy! Oh thank you miss, thank you!"
His voice is weak, but the joy on his face is enough to keep you going. You'd figure something out. You had to, for the two kids.
"Don't thank me, buddy. Thank the si- Thank our friend in the water. Now, Daisy? I need you to grab onto the barrel, okay? Gently. Just let your legs do their own thing, but be very careful with barrel, okay?"
Daisy nods, and you let yourself sink for a moment to help push at her legs and get her up and on. When you come back up, both kids are clutching onto the barrel, which now rocks unsteadily, but holds them up all the same. You kick your feet and hold yourself up. Touch the barrel and you'll drown both children. Your legs are growing numb, and sore, though, and you hope you get them back soon.
It's just that... You can't fathom how you're going to do it. Strength is bleeding from your legs, along with your energy. Pushing the barrel along isn't an option; it'd tip if you so much as leant on it. Swimming back with the two kids wasn't an option either; you weren't strong enough a swimmer, and the only reason you'd been able to surface with the girl was because-
The kids gasp. Panic flares in their eyes, in their limbs, and the girl jolts so fiercely the side of the barrel the boy clutches to twists under water briefly. Their eyes are fixed past you, away from the shore and further out to sea.
"Hey hey hey, no, Daisy, what did I say? Gentle, gentle with the barrel. You don't want to hurt your brother, now-"
She cuts you off, voice squeaky and desperate.
"But that's- There's a-"
"A friend, Daisy, a friend-"
Her brother speaks up, this time, voice rushed as he tries to get her attention and hold it.
"He's helping, Daisy! He- He helped you and the miss you out of the water! He's not bad he's helping, he's okay, please stop moving the barrel."
Daisy's face was still full of fear; but she's holding her brother's eyes, trying to still her own shaking, and the barrel's not trying to roll anymore so you'll take it as a win. With them okay, though...you turn, albeit hesitantly.
Tales of sirens painted them monstrously. You suppose you had been expecting that from the siren in the water. Terrible fangs, scales, claws ready to slash. But the face that peers up at you, half submerged, is so strikingly human it's jarring. White hair, plastered against his pale face by the water, and soft, purple eyes framed by long lashes. He's pretty, you think, then wonder if that coincides with how they lure the fishermen out to drown. Maybe the tales of monstrous beasts were to make men and women feel safer in their own skin, away from the thoughts of faces much like their own staring out from the sea.
His stare is placid, you think, not hostile, and the relief that surges over you is overwhelming.
The siren blinks, almost slowly, before casting his gaze over your shoulder and toward the docks. You follow it, and nearly cry.
There's a boat. Just a small one, a wooden rowboat, with two men rowing out to you as fast as they can, calling out to tell you it'll be okay. You do not, however, fail to notice the harpoon one is holding.
You turn back, and the siren is still there, looking between you, the kids, and the approaching men, and while you know any other in your village might scream for help, you simply can't. You hadn't survived this on your volition. Back then, under the water with the girl against you like a weight, you would have drowned. You know that without any doubt in your heart. The only reason you hadn't, was swimming right in front of you.
"You should- You should go," you murmur, "before they get here."
Words lay on your tongue, heavy, because there's so much more you want to say, but you know you don't have the time if the siren were to stay safe.
He meets your gaze steadily, and there's- There's surprise in it, you think, with the way they've widened ever so slightly. He spares another glance around, before fixing his focus back on you. The siren nods once, firmly, and in the brief moment where he bobs up before submerging, you glimpse the outline of markings around his mouth; two black circles either side, each outlined by a thinner circle, with lines leading back to his lips. Then his tail flicks up after him, briefly slicing though the water's surface, and you realise it's not just a solid violet but an artistry of different purples, whites and grays that swirl together beautifully.
And then, he's gone, diving far, far below the water and far, far from sight and range of the fishermen and their harpoon. You can't help the relief that floods you, like a balm that soothes over the ache in your limbs, even if only in sensation and not in practicality.
Daisy speaks up, voice hesitant and quiet, and you can't help but agree with her.
"He was pretty."