Lured

Chapter 11 - Ghost

I can't take my eyes off of the Siren in front of me. Despite what she might think of herself, her Siren beauty was breath taking, and even as she dragged me under the water I trusted her implicitly. The music in my mind would have taken my breath away if I hadn't already been submerged. The memories re-emerge along with each note of the song I can hear playing in my mind and they fill in the gaps. I understand now why I thought I had been sleep walking earlier, and I understand why she did what she thought she had to do. Yet I was pissed as hell too. She'd taken away my  decision and forced the memory loss on me without taking into consideration of what I wanted. I could feel her presence in my mind, I could feel her emotions and her voice in my mind, coaxing the memories back into their rightful places.

I remained pissed off right up until the moment I was desperate for air and began struggling. I hadn't realised just how strong she was. Our sparring this morning swam in my memories and I realised just how much she must have been holding back against me. As I began to fear she would drown me just as in the lore of her kind and darkness started chasing my vision, the last memory clicked into place. Her confession of her love of me. The pure sadness on her expression broke my heart and she finally let go of me. Yet I found that I had no strength left to my body, only the desire to hold the siren in my arms and never let her go again. 

She must sense this and she grabs me again and easily drags me to the surface. I take in a gasp of air, my body dragging it down greedily. I notice she's let me go and is out of the pool. I gape as I notice her body is covered in ragged burns and she is coughing and gasping as if she had been the one dragged and held under water. Her tail flails across the rough surface of the concrete, and the scales that once held a lustrous shine are dulled and rough like someone had taken a file to them. As I get closer, I can see the rough concrete has torn at the burn wounds across her skin living her tattered like a roughly ripped shirt. I hear the whimper and the last vestiges of my anger fizzle away. I watch as she shifts back, painfully slow compared to her original shift and I know she's very hurt. Her soft gasps the only allowance she gives herself for the pain she's in. I feel the overwhelming need to touch her, reassure her, reassure myself. I reach out to do so, only for her to growl at me. "Don't touch me." Despite the growled words, her voice is wobbly. I can see the pain cross her expression as she talks, tears gathered at the corners of her eyes. When she starts coughing I start in alarm seeing gobs of blood hit the floor. I see the red welts around her throat and the realisation that she's gotten chlorine into her lungs burns me. 

"Please, is there anything I can do to help you?" I manage to whisper softly, unsure if there was anything I could do for her. 

I wondered if she was ignoring me, or if she hadn't heard me ask when she attempted to get to her feet and immediately collapsing to her hands and knees. She cries out, her hand coming up automatically to stifle the sound, biting down on her knuckles. I can see her chest heave as she tries and fails to keep the fluid down. When she spits up the blood this time, it's a dark cherry red. The colour of water mixed with far too much blood. I suspected she'd shifted too soon, forcing her body to choose between shifting or healing and she was paying for it now.

Her sudden collapse makes me freeze, but it's the sight of so much blood that stops my heart in its tracks. I force my body to move, stumbling towards her collapsing to my own knees when I'm close enough. I look over her body desperate to think of something anything that could help her. 

"Please, let me help..." I whisper tentatively reaching out to brush her hair out of her eyes.

I see her wince when I touch her, and I recoil away knowing her raw blistering skin must hurt a lot. "I need.. I need clean water," Her voice is as rough and raw as the rest of her. "Preferably sea water." Her eyes aren't focusing correctly and I wonder if they're hazy.