The Siblen & The Siren

Chapter Two-1

Chapter Two

Winter froze, not breathing, his skin crawling. A siren. The broken bodies in the straight flashed through his mind, their bones picked over. He wanted very badly to push it away from himself, didn’t want to be touching it, but he didn’t dare release his hand from her mouth.

His heart began to pound, remembering all the pictures of their sharp teeth, the palm of his hand itching with anticipation. He tightened his arms anyway, pulling her against himself and upward so her toes left the ground, nothing for it, stretching her neck back.

Isidor’s hand settled on his knife, all traces of his good nature gone, his eyes cold.

“Keep it still, brother,” Isidor breathed, walking back toward him, drawing his knife.

“I’ve got her,” Winter said, very much so hoping he did, keeping his voice calm. “Get something for a gag. We’ll need rope. Check the cabin, see what’s there.”

“We should just—.”

“Not yet,” Winter interrupted him, breathing slowly, steady.

Isidor’s eyes shifted and narrowed at him. Isidor finally replaced the knife.

“Be careful,” Isidor said, leaving at a run toward the cabin.

#

Winter was left holding it. He felt like he had a poisonous snake by the back of the head. Her breathing was shallow and quick, his face near her hair. Her smell was distracting. He looked down.

He could see Maren’s necklace, his mark. A wave of sadness went through him, the grief more dull, tinged with an older acceptance, but now it held all the sting of failed hope.

After twenty years, they’d finally found him, but Maren was dead. Killed by a siren on Nanine. There was no other way she’d have the necklace. They’d never learn where their father’s body was now, wouldn’t be able to launch him to Sága to be with his brother, Dane. The disappointment was bitter.

He looked down at the necklace again. Evidently it had liked it. Winter felt another wave of revulsion, the back of his neck tingling. Its hair was all over him, sweaty, clinging to him, making his skin crawl again, no way for him to brush it off, a strand sticking on his chest, another on his wrist, even his neck. He didn’t want to imagine what else it had done with Maren’s body, gruesome visions going through his head.

Isidor was right. They should kill it. But nobody had ever gotten this close to one. They were deadly. He’d certainly never imagined touching one.

Winter realized he was angry. He wasn’t ready to kill it yet. This thing had given Maren a terrible death, madness and possibly worse. He doubted it could talk, but he wanted to find out. He became aware of the quiet, birds and the rustling of wind through leaves, the sound of her fast breaths. Winter had lifted the screecher’s body, his left arm a bar around its waist and arms above the elbow, his right arm tucked, his hand across its mouth tight, its neck stretched back and its head almost on his shoulder, entirely off its feet.

As more time passed and it didn’t bite him, didn’t struggle, he began to notice the desperation in its breathing, how hard its heart was going. He relaxed his hold, allowing its head to come forward a little. She didn’t seem particularly strong. He eased up a little more, as much as he dared, and she drew a long breath in through her nose. He realized that she—it, really, but that was difficult when she looked like she did, smelled like she did, felt like she did—was having trouble breathing.

They did breathe. He’d been holding it tight. He eased up more, cautiously. She took a longer breath, and another. It still hadn’t made any sound under his hand. Waiting, he imagined.

Isidor came back, to his relief. His brother was panting.

“Gag first,” Winter said.

He hoped that would be enough, that the siren couldn’t sing around it. It couldn’t possibly understand, but this still seemed to awaken it. Winter tightened his hold until its struggles were confined, Isidor watching grimly. Winter met his brother’s eyes and moved very slowly, saying a prayer to Sága about its teeth, rotating his hand so he could pinch its nose closed as well. It renewed its struggles, unable to breathe. He finally met Isidor’s eyes again and uncovered its nose and mouth in one motion.

The siren opened its mouth to draw a great breath of air and Isidor put the gag in. She was pulling for air around the cloth. Isidor walked to stand beside Winter to tie the gag behind her tight, her mouth stretched back around it. Winter looked. Its teeth were like theirs. No sharp points. He flexed his hand, still feeling the imagined threat.

“Tie its hands in front,” Winter said.

Isidor quickly wrapped her hands in rope and tied them tight.

“Why are we doing this?” Isidor said in a low voice, tying the last loop, obviously trying not to touch it too much, leaving a lead that he put in his fist as he stepped back, his face showing disgust again. “It’s a screecher. There may be more on the island. Let’s kill it, see if we can find Maren’s journal, and get out of here.”

“I want to question her.”

Isidor made a face at him.

“How can we question a siren, Winter? It’s mindless, a killer. I doubt it reasons or talks, and the moment it opens its mouth we’re dead.”

“With a knife to its throat.”

Isidor looked at him doubtfully. Winter was doubtful himself. It was a risk. It probably wouldn’t work. The anger swept through him again. They deserved to know after they’d searched for so long. And the thing he held in his arms had killed Maren. He wanted to try.

He held Isidor’s eyes, letting him know that.

“You’re so stubborn, Winter,” Isidor accused, agreeing to it.

“Here we go,” Winter muttered.

Winter simultaneously pushed the siren away and grasped her upper arm tightly, his fingers practically touching around her limb, bringing her up short. He hauled her up onto her feet, his hand gripping her hard.

They both stared at her. He could see it clearly now, didn’t know how he could have missed it. No sharp teeth, but otherwise she looked like the legends described. A siren. She was strange, strange and so beautiful. Everything desirable. It looked like a woman, smelled like one. Felt like one under the dress.

In all the lore, sirens were mimics. They were predators, always hungry, hollow and mindless shapes of women that drew men and drove them mad and then ate their flesh, sometimes not in that order. They boarded ships and left vessels drifting empty, dragging their victims into the sea, down to the depths. Winter set his eyes away, trying not to look at it too much.

They brought it to the small bamboo cabin, set high, a tall, sharply sloped grass roof almost touching the ground on either side, a porch with stairs leading up, crude hacked poles and lashing. There was a river not far, a sagging line with a blanket hanging on it, a garden. In front of the stairs leading to the door of the cabin there was a pit for fire, a great tree with low hanging branches, an arbor built into it for shelter from the weather, now failing, shell chimes and feathers hanging from it that twirled in the wind, making a pleasant sound.

This remote cabin had most likely been Maren’s home. Somebody had lived here recently. Not the siren, obviously. There was a garden, not much, but someone was tending it. Signs of a recent fire in the pit.

“Nobody was here?” Winter said, puzzled.

“I yelled, but I was in a hurry,” Isidor answered, his eyes also scanning the camp, uneasy.

They would look around in awhile. Winter brought it under the tree as Isidor tossed the excess rope over a low limb. Isidor stepped back, pulling. Her arms rose above her head. Soon the siren was hanging, on her tiptoes, swinging. Isidor tied the rope off as Winter came around, both of them staring at it.

She was trying to find her balance, losing it again. Winter looked at her face. It was difficult to see past her beauty, difficult not to feel badly for her. He didn’t doubt its fear was real. Winter drew his knife. The siren made a sharp noise, straining away from him, its strange pale eyes going to his face.

Winter approached it cautiously, still nervous even with it bound and gagged. He reached with his other hand for her hair, digging in and getting a good handful. It was silky and thick. What he and Isidor used to call grabbing hair when they were young and being crude. He brought himself closer, getting control of her. She even smelled good, somehow clean and under that the sweetest musk.

Winter made his fingers snug, wary, pulling its head back, holding the siren steady. He put the knife to its throat. They wouldn’t take the gag off yet. He wanted to see if it spoke any language before they risked that.

“Do you understand me?” he said in the Dorsan language.

Isidor made a small scoffing noise. Winter did feel a little stupid for trying to talk to it, but he was determined to know anyway.

It looked at him blankly. He tried again, cycling through all the languages he knew, watching its eyes carefully. Beautiful eyes, uptilted, the color like amber, like light through thick honey, long tangled lashes, her brows sweeping and high. Winter blinked, feeling himself becoming fascinated, clenching his teeth, his skin crawling again, trying another language. It took awhile.

No sign of recognition, no sign she knew any language. Just blank. A mindless hunter, eyes as flat as a shark, just existing to eat. Winter felt a stab of disappointment, although he wasn’t surprised. He hadn’t really expected it to talk. He felt another wave of disgust. There was no reason to keep it alive then. It had killed Maren. His hand tightened on the knife.

“Maybe it only speaks siren,” Isidor said, making a joke, because Isidor was never serious at important times.

Its eyes shifted to Isidor when he spoke, the spark Winter had been looking for.

It had done that when he and Isidor were talking before, reacting like it knew what they said. He could swear it understood Isidor. That wasn’t possible, never mind that she was a siren. All Siblin learned multiple languages, but they didn’t teach their language to those who weren’t Siblin.

“I’m going to kill it now,” Winter said in Siblin, on impulse, flat and casual, the same inflection in his voice Isidor had just given.

Its eyes went straight to his, widening, the siren struggling again.

“You understand Siblin?” Winter said incredulously.

He tightened his grip on her hair. He must be wrong.

“My brother is going to take the gag off so you can answer my questions,” Winter said slowly in Siblin, watching its eyes. “If you sing, if you even hum, I’ll cut your throat.”

He looked at its face. No change. He was wrong.

“Nod if you understand me,” Winter said, waiting, feeling stupid again.

It made a brief motion, nodding. Winter stared.

“It understands?” Isidor exclaimed beside him, Winter feeling the same sense of shock.

It knew language? Winter stared at it more, looking into its eyes carefully. He finally turned his head, glancing at his brother. Isidor came and slowly loosened the knot on the gag behind its head. Winter felt his back tense. Isidor slowly drew the cloth away from its mouth, both of them ready. Winter held the blade. One swipe and he’d open the siren’s throat, silencing her forever.

“Where did you get that necklace?” Winter said to it when the gag was off, still feeling a little foolish talking to it, asking it questions. “Where is Maren?”

Her lips parted. Winter tightened his hand on the knife at her throat. She closed her mouth.

“Answer!” he demanded.

Nothing. It probably couldn’t. They’d know before they were done. Winter’s eyes went to her fragile jaw, her collarbone, lower.

“Do it,” Winter said.

Winter held her hair tightly, held the knife steady at her throat as Isidor stepped forward and cut the top of the dress straight down, cutting the sleeves. The whole garment fell to her feet, revealing her body, naked under it, no undergarments. Winter kept the knife to her throat, surprised, looking down at her, a surge of hot lust going through his lower belly.