Escaping the Siren Prince

Beyond Reason

Cora woke to the sound of waves.

For a while, she didn't open her eyes. She simply lay there listening to water move gently over stone, trying to understand why the sound felt so familiar.

Too familiar.

Her body felt impossibly heavy, every muscle carrying the deep ache of exhaustion. Her throat was dry, and wet hair clung coldly to the back of her neck.

Cora opened her eyes and found stars stretching overhead.

"No."

She sat up too quickly, and the world immediately tilted. Catching herself with both hands, Cora waited for the dizziness to settle before forcing herself to take in her surroundings.

Pale stones covered the ground beneath her. Dark cliffs rose on either side, framing the rocky outcrop that extended toward the water.

The northern cove.

Again.

Cora stared at the sea as her mind struggled to assemble the pieces into anything resembling a coherent memory.

She had been on a boat.

Hadn't she?

She remembered Petar and Dario, the homemade wine and whatever terrible cherry alcohol the Irish women had convinced everyone to drink. She remembered snorkeling, the sea cave, lunch, and eventually the boat turning toward home.

Then the wave.

Falling.

Cora pressed both hands against her temples as the rest began returning in broken pieces. She remembered floating in the open water and watching the boat disappear. She remembered swimming as the sun dropped toward the horizon, then seeing the lights of the island appear in the distance.

And then something had grabbed her.

Her breath caught.

Luka.

Underwater.

His mouth against hers.

Breathing.

"No."

Cora looked down at herself. She was still wearing her swimsuit and shorts, and her skin was damp beneath the cool night air.

That proved something.

Didn't it?

Except she'd dreamed about Luka underwater the night before. She'd dreamed about the cove, only to awaken here with no memory of ever leaving her bed.

A sickening thought crept into her mind.

What if she'd never actually gone back to the guesthouse?

Maybe she was still dreaming. Maybe the excursion had been part of it too. Maybe she'd fallen asleep again after waking at the cove and somehow dreamed an entire day, complete with Petar and Dario, snorkeling, wine, falling from a moving boat and nearly drowning in the middle of the Adriatic.

That made absolutely no sense.

Neither did breathing underwater.

Cora turned toward the sea, searching the dark surface for anything that might prove what she remembered had actually happened.

There was nothing.

No Luka. No blue-green bioluminescence beneath the surface. No dark-haired man watching her from the dropoff. The water moved gently against the shore as though the last several hours had never happened at all.

Cora struggled but pushed herself upright. Her legs nearly gave out beneath her, and she had to steady herself before she could take another step.

Every muscle in her body hurt. Her shoulders burned, her back ached, and there was a deep heaviness in her thighs that felt exactly like what it was: the aftermath of spending hours fighting against open water.

That was real.

It had to be.

Except some stubborn part of her mind immediately supplied the alternative.

Or you dreamed that too.

Cora stood motionless for another moment, staring out at the Adriatic. Nothing moved beyond the gentle rise and fall of the water, and there was no trace of the creature she'd seen beneath it.

No trace of Luka.

She didn't know what frightened her more: the possibility that none of it had been real, or the growing certainty that all of it had.

Cora turned away from the water.

And ran.

Again.

Luka watched her leave.

Only his eyes remained above the surface as Cora hurried across the cove, her movements unsteady from exhaustion. She stumbled near the edge of the beach and caught herself against the rocks, but she never looked back as she disappeared onto the narrow path leading toward the village.

Luka didn't follow.

He remained motionless in the shallows long after the sound of her footsteps had faded into the cliffs, staring at the empty stretch of beach as the water moved quietly around him. Only when he was certain she was gone did he rise enough for the night air to touch his face.

He had been wrong.

There was no avoiding that anymore.

The first night, Luka had convinced himself that Cora had simply responded more strongly than most. It was rare, but not impossible. Some humans heard more than others. Some wandered farther than they should. Occasionally, they even remembered fragments that should have disappeared with the song.

Cora had been different from the beginning, but different didn't necessarily mean dangerous.

Then she'd come back.

His gaze settled on the dark opening between the cliffs where she'd disappeared. He had spent most of the day trying to convince himself there was an explanation for that too, turning over possibilities until he'd nearly managed to believe one of them.

Tonight had destroyed every one.

Luka lowered his gaze to the dark water surrounding him. He could still see her beneath it, red hair drifting around her face as he reached her. He'd expected panic when she saw him. Fear, certainly. Then unconsciousness if he couldn't get her to the surface quickly enough.

If he'd reached her too late, death.

Instead, Cora had looked directly at him.

She had seen him.

Not Luka Varek, the man who walked the streets of Vela Luka. She had seen what existed beneath all of that, the part of him no human was ever supposed to look upon and understand.

And she hadn't looked away.

Luka's jaw tightened.

Giving Cora his breath had been instinctive. She was drowning, and in that moment every question he'd had about Cora Langley became irrelevant beside the possibility of watching her die. He hadn't thought about what might happen afterward. He'd only needed to keep her alive long enough to get her back to shore.

That was all his breath should have done.

Instead, Cora had pulled away from him. For one impossible moment, she'd simply stared into his eyes while the water surrounded them. Then, despite every instinct that should have told her otherwise, she'd opened her mouth beneath the Adriatic and drawn in a breath.

Luka had watched her chest rise.

Once.

Then again.

On her own.

Even now, the memory sent something cold through him.

Cora hadn't choked. She hadn't panicked. She had simply breathed beneath the surface as though her body had forgotten that it belonged on land.

And then she'd reached for him.

Luka could still feel the faint pressure of her fingertips against his cheek, tentative and almost disbelieving, as though she'd needed to touch him to prove that he was real.

The irony of it would have almost amused him if it hadn't unsettled him so deeply.

Because Luka Varek wasn't the impossible thing he'd seen beneath the water tonight.

Cora Langley was.

His gaze shifted toward the distant lights of Vela Luka, scattered warmly against the darkness as though nothing had changed.

Everything had changed.

For the first time since Cora Langley arrived on the island, Luka wasn't wondering why she could hear the song.

He was wondering what she was.

And for the first time in longer than he cared to remember, he wasn't certain he wanted the answer.

Luka lowered himself until the water reached his mouth, his eyes remaining fixed on the path where Cora had disappeared.

"It's impossible."

Then he slipped beneath the surface, and the sea closed over him.