Siren's Song

Chapter One: Asda

"As you all know, tonight marks a very special occasion," Leucosia begins, a smirk playing on her deep red lips. She looks away from me, addressing the crowd that is so silent, I almost believe they have turned into statues. "Only yesterday it was that a talented member of our kind secured a place in our elite...."

The stillness of the water. The crescent moon that looked like a tiny silver rip in the inky darkness. The huge ship....the boy with the black hair standing at the railing.....his eyes closing as I pulled him down, down, down......

I close my eyes and open them again, something so quick it might never have happened. Bile rises in my throat and makes my mouth prickle, and I glance away from Leucosia, knowing that if I look at her any longer I will surely throw up.

Amongst the other sirens, Lena gives me a tiny, shy wave while Hali grins. Her smile is wide enough to show her fangs.

I look at the ground this time, avoiding everything for as long as I can. I try to focus once again on what Leucosia is saying.

".....she has been in consideration for a long time, and her rite of passage only proved that Asdarise is as capable with the hunt as she is with her song." A pale finger slides under my chin, tilting my head up and forcing me to look at my princess and future colony leader. There's a hunger in her eyes that even I, clueless as I am with emotion, can detect. "And, in two months' time, if all goes as planned, Asdarise will join me and a select few others to colonize a new region of the ocean. But I have talked far too much. I'm sure you would like to say a few words? Tell the others what you gained from your experience?"

I force a smile onto my face and look at the other, still pure sirens from my place on the rocks. They are towards the side I am closest to, the right, segregated from the hunters. "It changes you," I say. My voice comes out as smooth as Leucosia's, something that surprises me. "It was a magical experience. It's just like the stories, you see, only every rite of passage is different. You'll appreciate losing your purity, when your own time comes." I swallow hard after the word purity. Would it be that I still had mine.

But no. Treason is unthinkable. Refusing to undergo a rite of passage would invoke the wrath of the Queen herself. Just having one of her daughters here, and imagining her doling out punishment greater than imagination, is more than enough to scare away these thoughts of mine.

"Excellent," Leucosia says, and for a few horrifying seconds I think that she has seen into my thoughts before I realize she is just praising me. "And now, it is time to bring this ceremony to a close." She lazily beckons another siren forward. With a jolt I realize she has been waiting by her side of the rocks this entire time, and even greater is the shock that I recognize her. Eliria. How long ago was it that she was one of us pure sirens, basking in the sun and imagining ships with their human passengers, feeling a tickling sensation every time a fellow siren sang and wondering if it was from a comrade's rite of passage, counting down the months until her very own came? Until we never saw her again?

Now Eliria has the jagged scar of an X carved into her shoulder, signifying she is now a royal guard. If she remembers me as well, she does not show it. Her face is cold as stone, and only when Leucosia motions for her to come closer does she make any movement.

In her hands is the wreath of pearls that every siren has heard legends of. The Queen's crown. Even seeing it is enough to make my spine tingle and my heart pound.

"Asdarise." Leucosia's voice takes a new, more solemn tone. "Do you swear to defend your fellow sirens, to bring pride to our kind, and above all, to uphold the honor of the Queen at any cost?"