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Pearl should have known she was doomed when she first met him, but then again, she's always been much too proud and much too stubborn to let anything stop her. After all, how else had she had–until now, of course–a perfect track record?
She was particularly proud of her collection, stored in a cozy little cave she called her home, tucked away by the seaside. Strung up on the walls were various bits of fancy fabric with pretty patterns. Neatly placed, some arranged on the floor and some hung from above like a set of monstrous teeth, were some very shiny swords. Various pieces of gemstones and gold were strewn about the floor so that when the light peeked in just right they cast a splendid glow about the place.
The winding path into said cave was lined, very precisely, with skeletons.
Yes, Pearl was very proud of her collection of the treasures she had taken from any wayward sailors that had drifted her way. Most other sirens she knew didn't care much past getting some food- maybe taking a fancy trinket here or there- but Pearl loved the finer things in life. It just so happened she found those fine things to be the remains of sailors.
It's no surprise, then, that when Pearl heard the crashing of waves against a ship and looked out to see one of the most ornate vessels she'd ever seen, framed oh so beautifully by the sun on the horizon, she simply had to have its captain! She sized up the sailors she could see until her eyes settled on one man.
He had a shock of bright blue hair that perfectly complimented his long overcoat and large feathered hat–such an ostentatious affair could only be worn by someone of high rank. Her determination was only set further–she simply must see that man up close! She was quite sure she knew exactly where to place that beautiful fabric!
She eagerly set herself upon her favorite rock–a beautifully jagged thing she had to be sure she didn't hurt herself on–and sang. It was an old tune she'd picked up a while back, one that carried on the wind, drifting about, winding its way slowly but surely to the ears of the crew.
At this distance she couldn't make out much detail of them, but she recognized the heads of the sailors perking up, turning about- some looking to their fellows and some off to sea. The captain himself didn't seem to notice, but that was alright, she'd only just begun.
She sang of a winding countryside, with fields of beautiful flowers springing up from it. She sand of land so fertile it could provide enough food for a family from a small garden. She sang of family and friendship, warm nights at the pub, the tenderness of a fire, a kiss from a lover who's been waiting oh-so-patiently.
After many months at sea, even the most seasoned sailors could get homesick. These, however, were not normal sailors.
Upon the deck of the ship, Captain Scott Smajor of the Azure Revenge cocked his head as he looked about his crew–a few of which had stopped working entirely with wide eyes. Even those who had not fully stopped glanced about as if trying to find the source of some-
Sound. No–music? Singing. Scott was no stranger to the sea–he had heard tales of what a strange song foretold. If he didn't want them all to wind up dead he needed to act now. He focused his hearing a bit to make out the words, then scoffed loudly, catching the attention of his men.
“Really? Family? Come on, now. We don't need to return to land for that.” He smiled broadly, playfully clasping the nearest person on their shoulder. A couple cheers piped up, some of the less-affected crew affectionately nudging their nearby friends- but Scott focused on a twinge of melancholy in the eyes of a few. He sighed dramatically.
“Besides, land's got too many lawmen on it for the likes of us.” Immediately much of the crew nodded, others simply muttering in agreement. Even those with doubts suddenly had their eyes go wide as they remembered the true nature of the land that the siren sang of. Scott, feeling much more confident, continued.
“And besides,” he said, “a siren singing about the land? C'mon, that's like a dog singing about living in the clouds! What on Earth do they actually know about being there?” His crew struck up in laughter and his smile turned genuine. Disaster averted, he thought, and it's not even noon.
When Pearl noticed the distinct lack of a ship turning to dash itself upon the jagged rocks, she paused. She narrowed her eyes, grumbling under her breath as she strained to see the people on it. Were they ignoring her? How rude! Well, no matter, it's not the first time a song hasn't worked for a particular crew–and she didn't get the treasures she had by giving up this easily.
She pondered for a moment what song to sing next–if she could make out the ship just a bit clearer she could come up with something–but the halo the setting sun provided to the vessel left those details unseen. Alright then, she would have to guess. She recalled the last couple of ships that had come through had all contained elaborate drawings of the land around her–"maps" she thinks they were called. Whatever they were made fine material to make confetti from.
Her song started up again, the pace picking up a bit but still winding. She sang of something called "books," some ancient tomes of forgotten wisdom from ages long past, ripe for the taking. She sang of impressed peers, secretly envious and bitter that they had not been the ones to find such a thing. She sang of knowledge, discovery, recognition.
Scott froze when he heard the tune pick up again, as did a few of the crew. The deck of the ship fell silent as they all, against their better interest, tried to make out the lyrics of the song. Around the same point, many of them struck up in laughter. Knowledge? Science? Books? Most of the crew couldn't read or write much past their own name–a few lacked even that skill.
One of the crewmen nudged Scott’s shoulder. “We don’t need none ‘a that, right Captain? We’ve got well enough knowledge to keep us afloat.”
“Hm?” Scott turned his eyes away from the water, and back toward the men beside him. “Yes. Of course! We know the sea, and the sea is all we need.” There was another bout of cheers from the crew, and Scott smiled, shaking off any lingering thoughts of what lay below the waves.
Out on the rocks, Pearl narrowed her eyes. That had been working, for a moment. Before the rest of the crew had intervened. If she could get him alone, without their influence… The sun was nearly set already, they would still be well within her hunting range by the time it was fully dark. Yes, that would work much better. She let the end of her song trail off, and dove back under the water, making a show of flipping her tail as she went. They’d think she’d given up on them, now. But there was no way she would give up such a beautiful treasure that easily.
Later, when darkness had fallen, she swam out again to the ship. She stayed in the shadows of the rocks, watching the crew on the night watch until she was satisfied none would notice her. Then she swam out, pulling herself up to sit on the window ledge of the captain’s cabin.
Pearl considered her song carefully, observing the room, still lit by flickering lantern light, for clues. It was decorated nicely enough, rather cozy, if you could call something so dry that. There was a drawing on the wall, clearly of some kind of sea creature, though it wasn’t one she’d ever seen. That was good, probably. She started to sing, putting together a vision of treasures beneath the waves, places and things never seen by any humans. Not any that survived at least, she thought to herself.
Scott startled at the sound of the voice. The song again. He whirled to look around the cabin, and there she was, right outside his window. The siren. The same one they’d seen on the rocks earlier, he was sure. Against his better judgment, he stalked over to the window and threw it open. “What are you doing here?” The siren nearly fell back into the water, flailing for a moment before catching onto the boards of the ship with disturbingly sharp-looking claws.
“Me?” Pearl glared at the man, before schooling her expression to something more pleasant. “I was just saying, imagine all the wonderful things in the ocean. You could find all sorts of things, if you follow me.” To her absolute annoyance, he just looked at her. Incredibly judgmentally. He didn’t even have the grace to curiously lean out the window so she could pull him down.
“I don’t think so. You’d just pull me into the water, and then the only thing I’d find would be a lot more water, before you drown me, and probably eat me or something. So no thanks.” Pearl scoffed, trying her best to pretend he hadn’t described exactly what she planned to do. She didn’t usually get so… close, to her prey. It was a bit disorientating. But she had to have this one.
“I wouldn’t do that, I swear. C’mon, just take a peek?”
“No, thank you.”
She spent hours wheedling and whining and trying anything she could think of to get him to follow her. He never stepped close enough for her to just grab him, even when he moved the little chair in the room closer so he could sit and continue talking. He almost seemed to be… enjoying it, and that made her even more determined that she had to kill him.
It was only when she noticed the dark curve of sand in the distance that she remembered the ship was still moving, though slowly. If she stayed longer, they would be further from her home than she cared to swim back. She glowered at him, poking a finger into his chest. “I will get you, y’know. Some day, you’ll have to come back here. I won’t forget.” And then she turned and dove off the side of the ship, disappearing into the water with another overdramatic flick of her tail.
Scott watched her go. He’d never encountered a siren before, and certainly never imagined such a direct conversation with one. After the stories and terrors he’d heard, she seemed… relatively normal? Sure, there was the fact that she clearly intended to kill and eat him, but she hadn’t, and barring that she’d been rather nice to talk to. Entertaining, at least.
They reached port in the morning, and Scott was standing on the dock when one of the crew members approached him with some concern.
“Captain? There are… claw marks, on the back of the ship. Around your window.” Scott looked where he was pointing, and sure enough, there they were, just where the siren had clawed her way up that night.
“Eugh, that’s… disturbing. It must have been the siren we saw.” For some reason, he didn’t quite want to tell the others about the conversation he’d had with her. “We’ll… paint over them, or something.”
It was a new day, a new week, maybe—hard to tell when you spent so much time deep underwater in the dark away from the sun or moon—but it was the same ship, the one with the blue-haired captain who seemed immune to her songs. Huh. He really did come back.
He was surrounded by his crew, but no one seemed to be looking at him. They were all oriented towards each other. Hands were flung in large gestures.
The siren slipped closer.
“I’ve said it a hundred times, you need to shut your trap!” someone scolded. “It was almost midnight and you just kept—”
“Plug your ears then!”
Someone else hissed in excitement. Like a vulture circling over a dying animal.
“You can’t sing to save your life, brother. What, you thought you were like that damn siren?” They stepped closer to the smaller man they were arguing with. “Pretty little songbird, aren’t you? Gods. You’re more like a screeching crow.”
The singer—apparently—didn’t back down. “We’ve been at sea for years! There’s only so many little joys in the world.”
“You crazy—"
The captain finally stepped in. “What are you two arguing about?”
“Chirpy here was singing in our quarters last night until late and I couldn’t get to sleep until—”
“It wasn’t even that loud, you’re just—”
He put his hands between the two pirates, stopping them both from talking over each other. “Wait, wait. Why were you singing?”
“’Cause I—”
“Why does it matter, Scott?” Scott.
“I—uh. I had a nightmare. It was—I wanted to sing a lullaby my mom used to sing to me. I guess I don’t sing all that great, but…”
All was quiet for a moment.
“I’m sorry,” said the guy who’d been arguing with them, finally.
“It’s okay.”
Pearl hadn’t spoken to the captain that day—surprised by his skill in quelling conflicts, she’d thought he’d been admirable enough to give him a break. He wouldn’t want to talk to her. All she ever did was annoy him and scratch up his ship, and she was okay with that, but—
She still hung around the ship the next time he came, running her claws over the wood just to let him know she was there—like a person carving their initials into a tree, clawing out a remembrance for oneself as selfishly as it was. She watched him walk the deck one morning.
“Siren?” he asked.
She poked her head out of the water without thinking twice about whether this could be some kind of trick. It was stupid to risk her life talking to a man who was immune to her main threat, but for some reason, she didn’t think that he’d kill her. He didn’t seem to have a weapon, anyway. Let alone a ranged one. She’d keep her distance, dart away if things went south.
“There you are.” He hopped up on the edge of the wall around the deck. “Wondered if I’d see you today.”
“You know I’ll always be here,” Pearl said. It sounded a bit more sincere—maybe even a bit more bitter—than she’d meant it to be.
The wind knocked the big captain’s hat off of Scott’s head, revealing more of that enchanting aquamarine hair. It landed in Pearl’s hands as she swam to collect it.
“Oh, it’s fabulous!” Pearl turned the hat this way and that, admiring the shining feathers that adorned it. “I love it!” She turned to Scott, grinning, and he couldn’t miss the way she let the points of her teeth show just a bit too much. “But…”
He raised an eyebrow at her. “But…?”
“But it’s not as pretty without a skull to match!” Pearl whined. Scott just laughed.
“If I happen to die in a storm or some other horrible accident, my skull is yours, but until then you’re not having it.”
“Aww, you’re no fun.”
“Well pardon me for preferring my skull stay attached to the rest of my body.” Pearl flicked the end of her tail, splashing water onto his face and coat. “Hey! I’m giving you a gift, you could at least be polite about it!”
“When have I ever been polite, Scott?”
“No, you’re right, I shouldn’t expect manners from someone who has the audacity to leave claw marks all over my ship every time we visit.”
“Well you’re not exactly willing to come down and visit me, what else am I meant to do?”
“You’ll have to try a bit harder than that to get me,” Scott said, still amused.
And, looking back, maybe that was the moment it all went wrong.
Pearl was stubborn. Pearl was very, very stubborn. That had never been a problem before—never even something she’d had to think about before, really—because sirens didn’t lose. Especially not her (not that she knew many other sirens; she was a solitary creature at heart).
Being a sore loser had never been a problem, because she’d never found anyone she couldn’t lure. Anyone that was on the sea for long enough, even if they loved it, grew to yearn for home eventually—most sailors, despite their off-key shanty-ing, seemed not to so much love the waves and wind so much as they didn’t like something on land. If they could be made to believe that that detestable something—whether it was a person, a family, a job, a lack of any of the former—would go away, they’d dive right to their deaths. Pearl couldn’t understand it then, couldn’t understand such yearning.
She couldn’t drown his smile in her mind, not with all of those pretty teeth for her collection, not his bold eyes and bolder spirit—and Pearl wanted all of that to be hers! She’d treat his bones so nicely, didn’t he understand that? She’d put the shiniest stones she could find—maybe she’d even go searching for two of her namesake—in the gaps of his empty eye sockets. She’d thread kelp through her ribs and drape him in a cape of fish skin; how the scales would glitter on his shoulders! She’d seat him on a throne of coral, to honor how strong of a leader he’d been of his crew. Why couldn’t he appreciate that?
The sea was dragging her back with every gentle tug of the tide on her body, but the waves pushed her towards Scott just as persistently. She needed the comfort of the open sea, salt air and ships to lie in wait for. She was only a siren, after all.
Her tail flicked again, low in the water like a snake. The sand grit at her stomach. She still held his hat. “Maybe I will, Captain. Maybe I will.”
Scott ignored that, glancing at her gills under the water. “Do you want me to bring you something? From the land?”
“Like what?”
“I don’t know. Food? You’ve never had human food, right?”
“No.” Maybe he really was just that stupid.
“Okay. I’ll get you something. Something fishy.” Scott brushed imaginary sand off of his pants, and smiled again. “It’ll be better than I’d taste, at least.”
“Oh, I don’t know about that.”
When Scott reached for his hat back, Pearl gave it to him, though she did steal one feather with a grin, explaining, “Just so I know you’ll come back.”
She didn’t think she’d be able to bear watching her prey walk away before her very eyes, so she twisted in the shallow water, whipping her tail, and was away before he could even say goodbye.
Scott watched, though. Watched as the shimmering curve of the siren’s back rose as she dove into the deeper parts of the water. Watched as her tail slid through the shallows like a winding road disappearing into the distance. Suddenly, he was five years old again, learning to swim for the first time: his limbs heavy and clumsy, slapping at the water more than flowing through it. He’d slipped under when his mother wasn’t watching, and though the feeling of water in his ears and salt on his tongue and burning his eyes was long since familiar now, he’d always remember the stabbing pain in his chest as something new and unmistakably raw.
He wasn’t afraid of the water. He wasn’t even afraid of drowning, or of dying. So maybe all he was really afraid of was that it would hurt.
That he’d hear his mother shriek again as the siren pulled him under. Or that he wouldn’t.
He made a promise to get the siren—by the seven seas, he really needed to ask her name; did sirens even have names?—human food, so he would. She hadn’t said she’d like it, but it would be fine even if she didn’t—he was pretty hungry too, and she had to eat something other than wayward sailors. They hadn’t seen another ship in weeks.
As he proceeded up the dirt track he’d gone down to get to this little beach in the first place, Scott kept trying to remember everything he knew about sirens.
They were beautiful, with even more beautiful voices, but everyone knew that. They could be evaded by putting wax or fluff in your ears so you couldn’t hear their songs—Scott hadn’t, and neither had his crew, and they’d been alright, if curious. She’d sung of land and love, and they didn’t need either. Maybe regular sailors did, enslaved as they were to masters and profit motives, but pirates had enough of love to fill their hearts full and most of them never liked the land much when they were stuck on it.
He’d never heard of a siren continuing to chase a ship after she was denied them once—that was the whole point of plugging one’s ears, after all. He’d never heard of a siren taking interest in a particular person either, only pretending to. Maybe she was doing just that, but why him? His crew would follow him anywhere, but not to their own deaths. And why did she seem to like swimming so close to him?
Maybe she was desperate. She didn’t look like she was starving, but Scott supposed he didn’t know enough about what healthy sirens looked like to say one way or the other with certainty. Surely she would’ve killed him already if that was the case. She had sharp teeth. There was no reason why she couldn’t have leapt out of the water and dragged him in while they were talking on the beach, and starving animals didn’t tend to be patient about it. The way she acted, it was almost like she—like she wanted him to be lured, not just captured. Like she wanted him to go with her on purpose. Was that what sirens were usually like?
“Hey!”
The word stunned him out of his reverie as he realized he’d nearly walked right into someone. He stepped back, apologetic, and only then saw that the man was standing at the counter of a shop, waiting for his food; the sign above them, wooden and thin and bouncing against the brick wall of the shop with the wind, bore the words ‘FISH SANDWICHES AND SOUP’ in big bold letters.
Ignoring how silly he must seem, Scott got in line.
While he’d been pondering the strange siren’s motives, he’d somehow made it into the town proper. It bustled with life: the bright sunlight swept over parents herding their children, couples walking hand in hand, teenagers in packs giggling and shouting at each other. Brick stores edged the cobblestone road on both sides, carrying brightly painted signs. Flowers sat in pots on windows. It was a nice town, Scott thought. Very normal, but nice.
The siren would probably think it needed more skulls.
He got white clam chowder in a thick paper bowl and asked for an extra spoon. He wasn’t all that hungry, but if the siren was afraid the soup would be poisoned—as he would be if she was the one giving him food—or she didn’t like it, he wouldn’t pass up the chance to share. Nobody seemed to know him and his crew here, but it was only ever so long until someone recognized them. Port cities were always a danger like that, so many people coming through from so many places.
He was safer on the beach. Safer with the siren and the sea and the salt air nipping at his nose.
He hesitated before going back, though. Something soft and human within him kept him on the land, with the strange people he had too many reasons to fear. The sea was his beloved, his cruel, beautiful love, but it would be there when he got back. When he was done. He should go back, but—
He went back. The soup was still warm in his hands as he walked down the trail to the beach, stepping carefully so as to not spill any of it as he moved over the rocks. Soon there was sand under his boots.
He squinted at the watch as he approached. The sun glittered on the gentle waves, but he couldn’t tell if there were scales glittering too. He was sure if she was there that she could see him, but he called out anyway, “Hello, siren.”
Her head poked up out of the water, dark hair clinging to her neck and shoulders. “Hey, captain.”
She was ten or fifteen meters away, but she approached fast. Like a shark after spilled blood.
“I have soup for you,” Scott said as she sat over her curled tail in the shallow water. He held the bowl in one hand and one of the spoons in the other, close enough for her to reach out and take.
“Not worried I’ll eat you instead?” she teased.
“Eat the soup first, and then if you’re still hungry, you can try.”
Still, she didn’t take the spoon, watching it with narrow, wary eyes.
“It’s not poisoned,” Scott tried to reassure her. “Here, I’ll take a bite first.”
After that, her hand finally emerges from the water. Her pale fingers—or probably better described as claws—curled, one by one, around the spoon. As if she’d never eaten human food before and didn’t have the first idea of how to grip a utensil. She probably hadn’t. He’d never heard of sirens eating human food, just humans themselves; though, they’d likely have to kill their prey less often if they looted the ships after and stole food stores. They might even be able to bargain, like pirates sometimes could with sailors—your lives for food, or supplies, or treasure.
But it was hard to hate her while she awkwardly dipped the spoon into the soup and pulled it up too unsteadily, dropping almost all of the broth back into the bowl. One little chunk of clam remained on the spoon though, and she seemed to have decided that was fine, for now.
It was hard to hate her when she smiled at the taste, chewing slowly, hesitantly. He’d gotten something with meat for a reason—he knew her teeth were more than capable, and her digestion hopefully was too—but she still seemed so careful about it.
“Do you like it?” Scott asked.
Instead of answering, she took another spoonful, losing a bit less liquid this time.
When she was done, Scott couldn’t bring himself to be annoyed that he hadn’t gotten any of the soup he’d bought. He just let her leave.
Well, that was enough of a strange experience for one day, Scott remarked to himself as he hiked back up the trail. Feeding a siren soup? What kind of pirate—hell, what kind of person was he?
But she didn’t seem quite as threatening anymore.
He should go back to the ship and just hide out until the crew came back—he’d promised them a full day on land to get supplies and—maybe, just maybe—to shake off their sea legs for a breath of fresh, slightly-less-salty air. But that didn’t mean he had to be there. He was safer on his ship. There were surely some sort of repairs or upgrades he could do while they were close to the land; the siren would swim around the ship, and he would be on it, and everything would be right as rain.
But, for some reason, he hesitated, and that was enough for Jimmy to find him.
“All by yourself, handsome?” his first mate chirped, throwing an arm around Scott’s shoulders.
“Jimmy.” Scott grinned. “What’re you up to now?”
“The town’s having a dance tonight. For the solstice.” Oh, right. “The guys and I were thinking we could head out after that?”
There was a sinking feeling in Scott’s gut.
“None of us have anything to wear,” he said.
“It’ll be fine. We can stay on the outskirts, blend in as much as we can.” Jimmy nudged him. “Come on, you wouldn’t deny me a dance with you, would you?”
“We can dance on the ship, can’t we?”
“To a shanty? Nobody in our crew can sing their way out of a paper bag and you know that.”
Scott sighed. It was supposed to sound theatrical. “Fine.”
“Other than that siren, of course,” Jimmy continued, and they both laughed.
Jimmy’s hair looked softer, in the gentle shadow of the trees above them, the sun making dappled patterns on his skin. His smile seemed less harsh, more true. Scott couldn’t remember if he’d been one of the ones that was tempted by the siren’s song of land or not. Did he want to be here, instead? Did he hate the sea more than he let on?
No. He couldn’t. Jimmy had waxed poetic a hundred times about how much he loved being on that ship with their crew, how he hated the people on land who only ever saw him as a joke who’d never amount to anything, how the wind whipping through his hair made him feel like a bird taking flight, even as he clung to the mast. Jimmy, more than anyone, loved being a pirate.
But maybe he’d lied, to spare Scott’s feelings. Maybe Scott liked the sea more than anyone else on the ship did, and they just stuck around for the treasure and the glory. That wasn’t fair! He didn’t like thinking about that, worrying about things he hadn’t worried about for years. That damn siren, getting in his head.
That had to be all it was.
And so he followed Jimmy around like a lost puppy instead of his captain, let himself be led into tourist shops and around trails, never looking back at the beach that was slowly rotting its way through the edges of his mind. Resolutely not watching the people milling around them for any sign of recognition. They were going back. Just one dance. After that, he’d leave, and Jimmy and the others would follow. He just had to hold on for one dance, and then he’d be back on his ship with the only people that really mattered. The siren would be in the water stalking her prey, and he’d be on his ship searching for his, and everything would be as it was supposed to be.
The sun hadn’t dipped below the horizon by the time they and the rest of the crew ended up in the town’s main square.
Around them mingled people in various degrees of formal wear: some in sparkling, colorful dresses, others in suits and capes, and still others clad in more ordinary, clean if unpolished, clothing. Children raced about in the crowd, chasing each other and shrieking with laughter that rose above the light music of the lone fiddler playing—there were other musicians with instruments hanging around him, so maybe he was just starting?
Scott did as he had planned to, slinking about the outskirts of the crowd as much as possible. Though some of his crew were too busy getting lost in the ardor and excitement of it all—he couldn’t seem to blame them for it—Jimmy stayed close to his side. Waiting for his dance, probably.
It wasn’t that either of them didn’t like people. It had just—been a long time. The two of them had been haunting the high seas for longer than anyone else in their crew, and, given that, it had probably been years since they had been around this many strangers—at least, without swords in their hands and a hope of gold at the end of it. For the same reason, they were also the most likely to get recognized and that was a mess neither of them particularly wanted to start. People didn’t usually see pirates up close and live, but enough of them did—bargains were a common enough thing—that he was still cautious.
Maybe it would be better to mingle more, to seem less like a mysterious stranger. Scott wasn’t confident enough in his acting skills to pull that off, though—any skits they played out on the ship were more comedy than serious fare—so he stayed outside and tried to be invisible instead.
The musicians started playing a faster song, and a drummer finally broke in, the beat coming in time with every pulse of Scott’s heart.
“Come on!” Jimmy grabbed both of Scott’s hands and started hopping on one leg, and then the other.
Scott tried his best to follow the footwork—it wasn’t all that complicated: one of those quick dances that was more about getting your heart rate up than any kind of skill. He only stepped on Jimmy’s toes a few times.
Kick forward, kick back. Tap feet.
He spun Jimmy in one fluid motion, earning a burst of laughter and a smile when he turned back around.
“Oh, I missed this,” Jimmy said, half-breathless.
The storm in Scott’s stomach grew darker.
“Yeah?” he asked. “Be careful talking like that, or you might end up losing your sea legs altogether.”
Jimmy giggled again and blew the hair out of his face. “You know I could never. A pirate’s life for me.” He frowned suddenly. “Did you think I was serious?”
“Of course not,” Scott half-lied.
The crowd clapped twice, and the melody began again, faster this time. The quicker pace required greater focus from Scott, though he remembered—most—of the choreography, and with his fear of losing his first mate abated, he was eager enough to stop worrying so much.
Jimmy never would’ve gone back to the land anyway; Scott had formed the very start of his crew beside him, enticing him to come commandeer a ship—and bring a few friends from his work at the shipyard—with flowers and a grin and a promise to take care of him. And he had, so Jimmy had taken care of him in return. For all these years, the two of them had kept their crew in good working order, chasing treasure and weaseling out of bad situations—Jimmy wasn’t necessarily a great fighter, and he had the glass eyes and a couple scars to show for it, but he was plenty charismatic enough to earn sailors’ mercy or respect even when Scott’s more somber authority would’ve gotten neither. People just trusted him. Scott couldn’t blame them.
Jimmy was a strange pirate, but a good one. Calm and quick-witted when he needed to be, ruthless when strictly necessary and surprisingly kind—for one of them—whenever it wasn’t. He kept his word, too, which would’ve honestly been enough for Scott on its own: he didn’t need nice people, just people who wouldn’t turn tail at the slightest inconvenience.
The music jumped up in speed twice more, before stopping sharply. Scott’s hands burned from clapping and his ribs burned from laughing. He—he was having fun. Huh. He hadn’t expected that.
The next piece was slow, and Jimmy held his hand out. “One more dance?”
Scott nodded.
Lightning flashed in his stomach. Count the seconds.
One—he placed his hands on Jimmy’s waist, almost surprised by the shape of the handle of the knife he always kept tucked into his pants; Jimmy’s hands rested on his shoulders.
Two—they swayed gently back and forth, like cattails in the wind, like algae moving slow. Scott had watched the sharp hull of the ship cut through fields of lilypads and kelp many a time.
Three—Scott was pulled close to Jimmy’s chest. He could feel his body’s warmth through the thin dress shirt he wore—it was the dressiest shirt any of them had, anyway: light blue to match his eyes and contrast with his sun-golden hair. Light as the sky on a clear day. Collared.
Four—over Jimmy’s shoulder, Scott saw—
Someone—he didn’t know who—he’d never seen this person with nondescript brown hair and muscles nearly popping out of their suit and an eyepatch over one eye, or at least not that he remembered—but he saw their one eye widened and realized—
Thunder rumbled.
Jimmy pulled back—must’ve felt Scott stiffen in his arms—“Wha—”
“We’ve gotta go,” Scott hissed.
Jimmy seemed to understand, but he hesitated to do anything! “Sure. Okay. Let’s go, then.”
They couldn’t run without attracting far more attention—and Scott understood that, but his fraying nerves sparked uncomfortably at the idea of being in this town for one second longer than they needed to be—so they walked, weaving through the crowd of strangers that Scott couldn’t help but feel now all knew who he was (he could fight that one person, if he had to, but even he and Jimmy couldn’t fight whatever army of townsfolk they might bring along—the people who hated them most tended to have friends, for whatever reason)
They walked hand in hand, and that was quite possibly the only thing keeping Scott from just throwing caution to the wind and sprinting off as fast as his legs could carry him. If he was alone, maybe he would’ve, but Jimmy was slower than him—Scott was miraculously lucky with avoiding injuries, but Jimmy wasn’t. Jimmy loved the sea, loved the pirate’s life, but he wasn’t born to it like his captain always seemed to be.
They seemed to have lost the brown-haired person in the crowd, though Scott wasn’t exactly going to look back and check—he could feel breath on his neck, eyes on the back of his skull. Maybe a knife pointed there too, right at the soft spot where it connected to his spine. Ready to be plunged into him, spill gray and pink flesh onto the cobblestones on which they walked. Gods knew he had plenty to be revenged upon for. But they weren’t dead yet.
Every step felt like a snail’s pace.
Scott led Jimmy down the trail to the little beach where the siren was—what he’d started calling “the siren’s beach” despite himself. Their ship was there—
Except.
Fuck.
“Where is it?” Scott asked, frantic.
Jimmy’s blue eyes were wide as Scott turned back to see—
It was like in one of those fancy theaters with the big, heavy curtains hanging in front of the stage. Except the curtain was the dark of the forest—gods, when had it gotten so dark?—and the star was the same person who’d first recognized them, striding forward with hate in their eyes. They were followed, too. By at least ten or twelve people, some with knives, others holding rope. Some had scars or amputations.
“Hey, this isn’t—” Jimmy said, holding his hands up in surrender. “We’re not doing anything.”
“We know who you are,” Eyepatch Guy growled. “Canary.”
“And the captain, the one with the long name,” someone else piped up.
A lady in overalls with her hair tufted up almost like young antlers shrugged. “I think that’s another guy actually.”
Eyepatch Guy sniffed, which seemed so un-stereotypically haughty that Scott almost laughed. “Does it matter? What are you doing here?”
“We’re just getting some supplies,” Jimmy said—Scott was too busy keeping his fool mouth shut, for once. “We’re paying for them, too. You can ask anybody. We’ve been nothing but polite.”
Hopefully none of their crew had been reckless enough to make Jimmy a liar.
“You expect us to believe that little song, Canary?” the lady with the overalls asked. “We all know your story: the little bird that sings when you’re about to die. We’re not going to trust you!”
“We’ve got gold,” Scott offered. “We can give it to you, if you’ll just let us go in peace. We were just about to head off anyway.”
“Where’d your ship go, then? Your crew sail off without you?”
No. That couldn’t be—they wouldn’t.
But some of the crowd seemed like they were coming around to the idea of a little gold in their pockets—
Until Eyepatch Guy spoke again. “We don’t need your blood gold, but here’s a deal for you—a mighty fine deal if I do say so myself. You leave. Right now. And when we find your ship, we’ll just kill your crew and take the gold.”
“Where—how are we going to leave?” Jimmy asked.
Eyepatch Guy smiled.
Shit.
But why would they let the two leaders go and kill the rest? Landlubbers were stupid about pirates, but not that stupid. They weren’t taking prisoners, and they certainly weren’t letting them go freely. Maybe fate had finally come to collect her due, but Scott wasn’t going down without a fight.
The waves crashed against the rocks.
“How about you come with me instead?” the siren said, voice heavenly; even through the fog of fear clouding his senses, there was some odd something to it that Scott hadn’t heard before. Safety, gods, thank you.
Somehow her scales looked even more beautiful in the moonlight, glittering like the edges of knives. Her mouth was curved into a cold frown. Then it opened slightly, revealing pointed fangs, a sudden smile. Her eyes glowed with the purest light. She was stunning. Like an anglerfish’s lure of light in the undercurrents. Like a lighthouse to steer towards desperately.
Scott and Jimmy both resisted her pull—he had the notion that she was probably not necessarily aiming for them, anyway—but the crowd were sucked closer. There was a naked vulnerability in the way Eyepatch Guy’s face softened as he hesitated to step forward but did so anyway.
A shiver ran down Scott’s spine. This—he recognized their expressions. They were similar to the faces his crew had made when the siren almost succeeded in drawing them away; he hadn’t realized how awfully close she had been. Not until now. Not until he saw these strangers—who by all rights shouldn’t even love the sea, shouldn’t even want to go towards it—caught helplessly in her net.
“Who are you?” Eyepatch Guy asked.
“Oh, I’m nothing but your perfect dream,” she sang, sounding almost playful, beckoning with one hand curved up. “so how would you like to come in the water with me? I can give you anything you could ever want.”
They weren’t looking at Jimmy or Scott anymore.
“Really?” Overalls Girl asked. At least one of them was a little skeptical—no! That wasn’t a good thing (but somehow it was hard for Scott to hate them, when they looked so soft and unthreatening—it was like seeing someone asleep for the first time). “And you’ll let us leave after?”
“Of course I will!” the siren lied, looking slightly offended at the accusation. “You can come and leave however you please. I just want to play with my new friends!”
Her voice softened and she began to sing, almost unbearably sweetly, gentle and high. She sang of adventure, of safety, of community and of power—and no one in the gang seemed to see the contradiction in either of those. They just let her lead them with whatever they longed for, and apparently ignored any lyrics that didn’t appeal directly to them. Scott could hardly blame them; she wasn’t even trying to attract him and yet he could easily feel the call tugging on his frozen limbs—if he moved a muscle, he might just—
A rope whipped through the air.
Someone from the townsfolk gang must’ve thrown it. The loop caught around the siren’s neck, her eyes going wide and her voice cut off for a gasp of air as the slip tightened. She thrashed desperately, grabbing onto the rock she’d been holding herself up on with both hands, clutching, clinging. Her claws screeched on the stone.
“Wait, stop!” Scott shouted.
Despite himself, he lunged—
The rope pulled the siren out of the water and sent her crashing onto the beach as if she was thrown by a great wave. The crowd closed in around her.
Scott stared at them. He stood between them and her. He hadn’t even—he wasn’t quite sure how he had gotten there, but there he was. Bold and bright and fucking tired.
“Let her go,” he said.
Eyepatch Guy’s head tilted, like a dog hearing a sound it didn’t recognize, or a fox on the hunt.
“Let her go,” Scott repeated, “and I’ll go willingly.”
“What?” Jimmy sounded shocked—almost betrayed. Scott wished he could tell him why he was throwing his life away for a random sea monster that still seemed more likely than not to kill him, but he didn’t know himself.
Overalls Girl smiled. “And what of the Canary?”
Scott was silent, so the only sound was the faint, quick gasps of the siren on the beach behind him. She could breathe air, right? Yeah. She could still breathe, for now.
“I’ll go too, if you let the siren free.” Jimmy stepped up beside Scott, who nearly fainted with surprise, fear, and overwhelming gratitude warming his chest.
“And what’s to stop us killing all three of you?” someone asked.
Scott pulled out his whistle from under his shirt and glared. “I’ll call my crew and they’ll come. And then you’ll all be dead, and you’ll have lost us. If you want any chance—”
Rope slapped on the sand.
The siren, with a loose loop of rope—frayed on the end where she’d bitten it apart—hanging on her neck, lashed forward. Her teeth landed in the leg of one of the men closest to her, who shrieked and stumbled back, blood gushing from his thigh. She must’ve hit an artery. Smart, for an ambush predator.
Her hiss bit through the air like a whip, like metal on the tongue. He’d never heard a siren sound so—obvious, before. She wasn’t luring anymore. She was going in for the kill. If they were in the water, she’d have them all dead already, and she clearly knew that, so she let the waves float her back.
Eyepatch Guy grabbed for Jimmy, and Scott’s arms were around his throat in an instant, dragging him backwards. The water lapped at his ankles, and he spun around and let go—
The siren struck like a thunderbolt. Her teeth latched into the man’s neck and ripped, throwing bits of viscera and gushing hot, dark blood down his pale green dress shirt. When the body dropped, only the spine and bits of tattered skin connected the lolling head to its torso. The siren’s mouth was dripping with blood, and her eyes glared.
Fucking terrifying. You weren’t supposed to see this and live to tell the tale.
The crowd, surprisingly, seemed to keep their nerve, even as blood and bits of flesh swirled around Scott’s ankles—gods. She was like a paper shredder. They stayed on land, though. They understood the same thing Scott did: without legs, the siren was nearly helpless on land, but none of them could fend her off in the water. Scott, half-in the water, was invulnerable because of his closeness to the hissing, blood-soaked creature they all were smart enough to fear.
But Jimmy was still on land, and someone had grabbed his hands behind his back and another had their arms wrapped around his waist.
“You’re gross,” Overalls Girl taunted, stepping in front of Jimmy—between them, hiding the terror in his expression (suddenly, Scott understood why you were never supposed to get between a mother bear and her cubs). “Getting a siren to protect you? Can’t fight like a human?”
“You were trying to, like, ten v. two us!” Scott protested.
She lifted a hand in a whatever gesture. “Anyway. Give up and come with us, and we’ll let the little birdie go.”
“No! They won’t—” Jimmy’s voice muffled suddenly as someone slapped a hand over his mouth.
“Let him go first, and I will.”
The siren hissed again. Seemed her desire to protect Scott was exclusive to only Scott.
Pearl couldn’t help but remember every moment, from seeing the blue-haired pirate captain on his ship for the first time, his coat blending into the pale sky, to watching him help his crew stop fighting, to talking with him after she’d clawed deep grooves into his ship—she’d still wanted to kill him then, but then—
She remembered the salty warm taste of the clam chowder he’d given her, remembered the clumsy feeling of the utensil in her claws. Remembered his smile at her inexperience, his soft laughter. The feeling of sun and warmth in his stomach chasing away the storm and darkness. Had she given some part of that storm back? Was that why he’d gotten into this trouble, because her bad luck had worn off on him?
She didn’t know what humans thought happened when a person died—she’d never really thought about it before, other than that their bodies would decompose in the salt of the ocean and their bones would stay with her. When a siren died, their soul joined with the water and created storms in correlation with their strength: the most kills a siren had, the greater tsunami they would cause. Their deaths upset the whole fabric of the ocean until it settled back again when their death-rage wore off. Pearl thought suddenly that if Scott died, her rage would be equal to herself dying. It would destroy this beach with hate. It would flatten the whole town, drowning every inhabitant. Even the innocents had to fall, because everyone needed to feel the grief she’d feel. The grief that would consume her would consume them utterly as well.
He couldn’t die here. Not today. She couldn’t let him leave her.
With nothing but powerful instinct to guide her, she sang out again—singing not to the ideals and dreams the people would desire wholesomely, but to the darkest parts of them, the darkest parts of her own wrath. Kill me. Let gallons of my blood pour over the sea before a drop of his. You know you want to.
And they did. They did want to, if evidenced from the way their bodies were pulled irresistibly towards her. Their bodies were like magnets given human form. Walking over sand, over rocks, over kelp. Every hateful eye was on her. Every foot moved slowly, haltingly, stumblingly towards her. The first splash of boot hitting water crashed deafeningly into her mind. Like a shark on the scent of blood (the air reeked with iron already, but there could always be more—she would destroy them all).
She circled the frontrunner—she didn’t know their name, and she didn’t give two fucks. She aimed for their neck—hit—and dragged them down, crashing into the silt. She killed quicker this time, breaking their neck in one clean snap of teeth.
Then the next.
They’d fallen out of her spell when she’d first attacked, and were screaming, running, splashing water wildly in their wake. Some fell. She cleaned those up pretty quick, but there were still some that escaped. She’d let them. She had others to cull.
One man tripped on kelp and hit the sand, half in the water and half out, desperately struggling to crawl up as she closed in. She was so close—
He flipped, a knife in his hand, and slashed wildly. The end of her tail erupted in pain as she landed her teeth in his neck, whipping her head around in agonized rage like a dog with a tug toy. His head split from his body and went flying onto the sand.
A piece of her own tail fins floated up next to her.
There was no one else left standing in the water but Scott. Oh. He… he hadn’t run. Pearl wasn’t sure what she thought about that, but the storm in her body slowly receded, the sun coming out from behind the dark clouds.
For a moment, everything was still, despite the ripples of water still lapping at their bodies. They watched each other with careful gratitude and yet also wariness.
Her tail stung as salt got into the wound, adrenaline finally leaving her enough to let her feel the pain fully. She snapped into a curl around it like a caterpillar when touched, still watching the pirate captain over her folded tail.
“Are you hurt?” Scott asked.
Pearl was dimly aware of a high whine filling the air. Maybe it was one of the bodies. Maybe it was her.
“Here, I’ll—” he reached out, and she hissed. He backed off.
She found her voice then—gods, she was acting like an animal. “I’m not gonna—not gonna hurt you. Just—”
“It hurts. Right?”
She groaned agreeably.
“It’ll hurt less if we get you out of the salt water,” Scott said, still so unbearably patiently.
He was right, but logic didn’t cure the storm lashing in her stomach any. They’d just seen her kill—very, very few humans ever got that chance and survived. People were scared of her, usually. And people usually wanted to kill the things that scared them. What if they turned on her? She’d made very clear her desire to protect Scott and Scott alone, so even if he liked her, he might still kill her to protect his friend.
But he was still standing in the water. He’d’ve run, if he was really scared. Right?
A coat, blue against blue sky. A calm command. The taste of clam chowder. A smile. A laugh. Ripples of blood in unsettled water.
He hadn’t run. He still didn’t—he just stood there, both hands held out, empty and visible.
The pain in her tail made the decision for her eventually; she wouldn’t be able to orient herself in the water well enough to go back to her deep home with only half of her tailfins. There were other dangerous things in the ocean. Sharks and other large predators would avoid a healthy siren in favor of smaller, easier-to-catch fish, but she was hardly difficult to kill now. Certain death in the sea or possible death at the hands of men was not really a choice. Maybe that made her a bad siren.
Though her pride rankled, she let Scott and Jimmy pick her up. Scott held her close to his chest—sunlight bloomed in her own body, soft and warm, as her head rested on his shoulder. Maybe she wasn’t so much of a solitary creature as she thought.
Jimmy took off his jacket and wrapped it around the end of her tail, gently folding the remaining tailfin, holding it up.
“Where are we going?” she asked.
Scott and Jimmy looked at each other.
“We have to find the crew,” Jimmy said.
“And the Revenge.”
“Town isn’t safe,” Jimmy added. “So—”
Scott chuckled. “We didn’t really think this through, did we?”
“We didn’t expect them to try to kill us, you know?” Jimmy said wryly, “and we certainly didn’t expect you to pop out of the water to save us. No offense.”
“None taken.”
“They were supposed to come back to the beach after the solstice dance, so we only have to wait for a little bit. If—if we’re right.” For the first time, Scott seemed genuinely unsure of himself.
And that, of course, was when a small group of people milled out from the trail. Pearl stiffened, but Scott and Jimmy’s faces brightened—
“There you are, finally!”
“What.”
Once the two men holding Pearl explained what—and why—that was the way things were—how she had saved them from the gang and gotten injured in the struggle. He described her actions so heroically. She didn’t expect that. She’d just been so angry, not trying to be a hero; she’d never been anything like a hero, never been anything but a monster in fact.
Maybe there wasn’t much difference between the anger of a monster and the anger of a hero. Maybe the anger wasn’t the problem.
“So. We’re bringing her back with us.” Scott’s tone invited no argument.
And so she was brought.
They camped in the woods until the rest of the crew came back on the ship. After a gentle warning by Scott never to run off on their own again, everyone breathed a sigh of relief and got on. Someone wrapped the end of her tail properly in bandages. It wasn’t bleeding so much—there weren’t a ton of blood vessels in a siren’s tail, apparently. Not that she’d known that. But somehow she hadn’t been all that scared. She had people around her, people she barely knew and yet somehow thought she could trust. People who were friends, not prey.
She curled up on a blanket someone lay down for her and put her on, surrounded by the pirate crew, and she slipped into sleep.
But it wasn’t long before she was awakened by someone near her screaming. Wha—what’s wrong? Nothing seemed to be. The person sleeping on the other side of the person—who must be having a nightmare—gently rubbed their forehead, but they still shook and panted.
A lullaby my mom used to sing to me.
Almost on their own accord, Pearl’s vocal cords started vibrating. She sang, sweet and low and soft, of a mother’s warm arms and comforting words signed to her—she’d had a mother once herself, though she hadn’t thought about her in years. She sang of fields of lilypads they’d swum through, picking the flowers to put in each other’s hair.
She sang, for the first time, without any goal but to make someone feel better. And slowly, their breathing steadied and they settled down. The other person smiled at Pearl and nodded, before laying back down themselves.
Night passed over the ship, and Pearl thought she might just like it here. She’d been doomed, but against all odds, she had survived anyway.
She really was a terrible excuse for a siren.