Chapter 15

Brizo held me like I used to hold dead rats I found in the inn before ushering them into the garden for the crows. This sister siren was formidably strong and terrifying to behold. I almost felt pity for the countless sailors she had lured into her sharp grip. Surely their end was the most painful.

Brizo spoke over the rough waters. "We have magic, us sirens. Did you know that? It is materialized by our song, though the spirit of the ocean lives within us."

"That's amazing," I answered. "You're each very special."

She nodded. "You desire to stay with my sister as her mate, correct?"

"I do… is that even possible?"

Brizo glanced around, scanning for something, I wasn't sure. "There are stories of men becoming mer when they drowned in pursuit of a mermaid that loved them. If you're sure my sister loves you… there's only one thing left to do to test that theory."

"Die?"

A current slammed between us and Brizo let me go, swimming leisurely backward and blowing me a kiss goodbye. I made to scream, but it was a pale whimper as my mouth filled with water and an undertow sucked me into a cyclone of bubbles, pulling me deeper and deeper beneath the surface.

I'd come to terms with the fact that I would soon die a watery death— I'd just hoped my siren would have been with me when I did. I wished I could kiss her, feel her soft purple skin one last time. Had Brizo truly believed their legend, or had she only wanted me dead? It didn't matter, as the oxygen burned from my lungs and the sea from below grew darker and darker. My mind was blurry. I was fading— when a slash of red broke through the current and grabbed my arm.

She pulled me out of its grip and up toward the surface. The waves were wild then, and we were closer to the kraken. Every thrash it made as it still slowly savored its ship, rocked the ocean and seemed to make the waves angry.

The pirate captain held me, shouting over the violent waves. "We fell in love with sirens, lass. Together, we go down with our ships."

I didn't know what she meant until I looked up and saw a mountain. No, not a mountain of dirt, a mountain of sea— a wave larger than I'd ever knew possible, was looming and growing in height and force above us. It would take out the rest of the ship, it would stop the kraken— but it would bury us alive. There would be no surviving it.

In the distance, I thought I saw her— my amethyst sea goddess. She was swimming to me so fast, but she would be too late. I forced a small smile and squeezed Captain Calico's hand. "For the sirens of the sugar seas."

Her freckled face chuckled in return. "To Davy Jones' locker we go, lass. Perhaps a mer will take us to a door."

She spoke nonsense, but I was thankful to have the pirate to hold on to. My siren shrieked a mournful melody, and I thought I heard her sister Cupida do the same. As the mountain of a wave crashed into us. Swallowing us whole.

Calico held tight to my hand for as long as she could before it was pried away by the sheer and insurmountable force of the tide. I was pushed so far, so deep, my back hit something solid. Was it sand? Water overtook my lungs and in my delirious last moments of life, I opened my eyes and was in the arms of my raven-haired siren. With a kiss on my forehead, she tried to save me, but she was too late.

With my last breath, I pushed my final words through my throat. I love you became just another bubble in the great world of the ocean. A sentiment that would become the tide and be erased by it at the same time. Love was a massive, all-encompassing thing— it was also walking a plank to your end.

Somewhere in the distance, as I faded away, my siren sang an eerie and forlorn song. Cupida joined her. And something about it tugged on my soul. Sirens could lure sailor men with the songs to death… could they lure the woman they loved from death toward life?

The song continued, and my body felt strange as she held me. Somehow larger than before, somehow floating easier, my limbs not fighting between sinking and floating. Though my eyes were closed, I feared to open them and find that I was no longer here, no longer inside my body. Maybe my soul was floating above the tragic scene and watching as we left this earth.

My face felt sunshine, and the ocean settled. My siren ran her hands through my hair. I raised a hand to meet hers and my fingers felt strange. Opening my eyes, I first noticed my hands were now webbed. My siren smiled and wrapped her long tail around mine and pulled it above the water. "You're remarkable," she awed. "And you're mine forever."

My tail? My tail was light green and shimmering. The upper half of my body remained the same, aside from my webbed hands. I touched my neck. There were no gills. I felt my teeth for fangs, nothing. My tail was not as long or thick as my siren and I looked at her with confusion. "What has happened?"

"The goddess, the ocean, has given you a gift." Her smile was the most beautiful thing I'd ever seen. She let go of me then, and I didn't sink. I had so much control over my body it was as if I were my own boat in the water. Finally, strong within it instead of at its unrelenting mercy. No, I was a part of the ocean now.

"I'm not a siren?" I awed, spinning my tail around and admiring the sparkling emerald scales.

My siren came close and unbuttoned my tattered shirt and dropped it into a wave, letting my breasts hang freely. A naked woman from the top up, a long green tail from the waist down. "You are not a siren, my love. You are a mermaid."

A laugh of glee fluttered from my throat. "We can be together now?" I asked, full of hope.

"Forever," my siren answered, pulling me in for a kiss. "There is a whole world I cannot wait to show you, my love, my brave sailor girl."

We kissed for a few moments before I pulled away, noticing the pirate captain and another woman on our sunning rock nearby. "Who is that with Captain Calico?" I asked, relieved the pirate captain was okay.

My siren grinned. "Come, I'll show you." Instead of cradling me, she let go, and fear gripped my chest— until I remembered what I was now. My fin moved, I moved, cutting through the water as if propelled by magic. I sucked in a breath under the waves, the water not invading my senses but a part of them now. I laughed. "This is amazing."

My siren smiled on at the rock, where she waited for me to take my time in exploring my new body, my new skills. A mermaid. I was a mermaid now.

I reached the bolder and rested my head in the lap of my siren's long purple fin. "Captain Calico, thank you for coming after me. You saved me."

"I collected a story once," the sea captain answered, not looking away from the nude woman beside her. "That the ocean goddess likes trades… I figured she owed me a favor."

"What do you mean?"

Cupida sat up, and finally I recognized her, but she looked different. She kicked her long, pale legs, and wiggled her toes. "I'm going to have to learn how to use these things now."

I gasped. "You're human now?"

With a giggle, she smiled. "Between the sirens and the captain's pleas, it looks like the ocean offered us a bargain. I am human, you are mer."

"Pirate," Captain Calico corrected. "You're my pirate queen, now." They kissed softly, knowing their love had changed everything.

My siren ran her fingers through my hair, knowing the same. Our love had transformed what was impossible for something magical. What should have been was— and we would indeed be together forever. I looked out at the ocean that now looked just as big, but not as scary as before. My new home, my new world.

My siren slipped into the water and held my hand. "Where would you like to go?"

"Anywhere with you."

"Then that's where we'll go, my little mermaid."

I'd come to the sea to escape a love that couldn't be. Only to find a more impossible love awaiting me. This would be a love I'd never run from again, couldn't run from now that I had fins. My beautiful siren held me close, wrapping her tail around mine as we kissed. She was my forever.

I'd found a love that didn't hide me in back rooms and leave me in confusion. I'd found a love that offered me the whole ocean proudly, that took my hand, that taught me to swim it.

And they made their home in the deep ocean and tied in the warm sea of knowing their love was a love of depths the waters could never reach. Love was love, and love would always hold the power to transform what was into what could be.

A human loved a siren, and the ocean gave her fins.