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The two female Sirens were named Aine and Erin, twins with golden hair plaited in a swirl circling their heads like a crown. I didn’t know which was which, as they were so similar down to the movements they made in unison, but Moira and I were assigned to a Siren, and we were flown to the edge of the Dark Sea with the flock of recruits at our side.
Arden circled the water overhead, dipping and weaving through the dark clouds hiding the moon over the sea. I squinted and looked out across the water, unable to see any hint of land on the other side. The moonlight made the water look like a potion of green, blue, and purple. The waves rolled across the surface, and without a boat in sight, the two cliffs hugged the end of the cove like cupped hands. The wind pulled my hair away from my face and into my mouth as we watched from the shore.
“The Undine migrate once a year and reach their majority as a collective,” I said, feigning disinterest as I offered the information. “Do Sirens…?” I allowed my question to trail off.
Aine, or Erin, I wasn’t sure, looked down at me with irritation. “We are called when we are called,” she said gravely. “A Siren must travel to the trench in the Dark Sea and dive to the bottom of the water in a single breath. They touch the Kraken’s eye, and Belisama grants them their due if they are worthy.”
I frowned, trying to consolidate my knowledge of the migration with what she had described. “The Kraken’s eye?” I said.
The female Siren nodded gravely. “The only beast of its kind. To look upon it is to look into the eyes of death and to become the waves.”
I watched as Arden opened his arms above the water, and Colm’s limp form fell through the air; his body's splash looked like a raindrop in a puddle.
A moment later, a tentacle larger than anything I had ever seen in my life, more significant than Cruinn Castle by a mile, shot from the water. It reached up, glowing in the moonlight, its red sucker glistening as the appendage made a grab for Arden.
Arden soared away from the tentacle, weaving away and dipping behind a cloud. Staying close to the patch of ocean where Colm had disappeared. A choreographed dance between Fae and beast. Arden played with the Kraken, but it never reared its head above the surface. I got the impression that the beast was a glacier. That whatever was under the surface was larger than I could even comprehend.
When I had fallen into the dark sea, when the pirates had taken me aboard their rowboat, I had felt something in the deep depths of the expansive water. Something older than the beginning of time, somethinghungry.
Had I felt the Kraken?
The only connection between facing the Kraken and the Migration was the risk. Undine risked their lives by crossing the lake, journeying to the sacred beach, past the Skala Isles, and the front line. But the Migration had also occurred during times of peace, so perhaps the danger wasn’t the key to reaching magical majority.
There must have been something appealing to the gods between the Kraken’s eye and the Frosted Sands. Something that granted their favor.
If only I could figure out what it was.
I had resigned myself to never reaching my majority, but as I watched the ocean surface bubble and heard the roar of the Kraken echo into the cove, I felt a desperation that left blood at the back of my throat.
What would I give to have magic? To be able to defend myself instead of running. I might have beengoodat running, but there was no pride in it.
Arden always nodded approvingly when I was a mite quicker than him, even when I muttered begrudgingly about wishing I were stronger and not faster. Arden always shook his head and said there was no pride in death. To become foam and fodder held no glory. It justwas.
Aine-Erin stepped forward, and her hand flew to her mouth.“Belisama’s Ballsack.” She cursed, pointing out to the water. “There’s a ship on the horizon.”
Erin-Aine joined her sister, her wings snapping as she prepared for flight. “It’s the bloodyGlittering Diamond.”
“What’s the glittering diamond?” one of the recruits asked, his lip shaking.
Aine and Erin exchanged a glance before they turned back to the water.
“They’ll shoot him out of the sky,” one of the female Sirens said. “We need to help him.”
The other female gestured back to our ragtag group of younglings and two hapless undine. “It’ll take us too long to return them to the cradle.”
“We can help,” Beth, one of the recruits, stepped forward. Her chin jutted in defiance. “We can fly. We can lead them away from Arden and Colm.”
The other five recruits nodded eagerly. Their wings ruffling in excitement. Even the nervous male at the end.
Moira and I exchanged worried glances.
“We’ll have to stay behind,” Moira said, knitting her hands together uneasily.
My eyes trailed down the craggy cliffs to the tumultuous waves below. “We won’t be any help to them,” I whispered.
Aine and Erin extended their wings and shot into the air, and a moment later, the other recruits joined them. Moira reached for my hand, gripping my fingers so tightly that I worried she would break them.
The Glittering Diamond approached the opening of the cove. Its sails were a translucent white, glittering in the moonlight, no doubt the ship's namesake. It sliced through the water as the Kraken’s limb pulled back under the surface, disappearing. No doubt focusing all of its energy on Colm and his quest.
