Page 9 of Ocean of Sin and Starlight

There is a man right in front of me, the strange, otherworldly scent of him filling my nose. He winces at the scream coming from my mouth, and somewhere, I hear glass shattering from the power of my voice.

But the man doesn’t stop what he’s doing. I see a long, sharp spike in his hand, and he quickly places it against my other wrist before slamming it in through my arm with a round wooden object. He moves so fast my eyes can barely track his movements; he’s just a blur, a smudge in the air.

The pain hits me even faster.

I scream again, thrashing against the spikes that have me nailed against a plank of wood. It causes my flesh to tear, blood flying everywhere. The man tightens the ropes around my arms, ensuring I can’t do any more damage to myself, and the pressure on my lungs lifts a little. My tail below smacks wildly against the ground until I’m able to keep myself supported.

Then, the man takes the end of the rope and slams it into my mouth, as if he wants to keep me from screaming.

As if that will help.

Fool.

I stare right into his eyes and bite down on the rope, my teeth slicing through it with just a few snaps of my jaw until it falls, frayed and free.

His brows rise, and he looks impressed more than anything.

This is the first moment I really take a look at him.

Because he’s not like most men, is he?

When I saw him in the ocean, I thought perhaps he was another fisherman, one who had come to investigate what I did to the others. One who wanted revenge.

And I welcomed it. Because of my injury, I knew that eating another’s heart and liver would go a long way to fuel me until I healed.

It seemed too good to be true, and it was.

I had grabbed his ankles hard enough to snap the bones, and yet, they didn’t break. I hauled him down from the surface and went in for my attack.

But when I got a look at his face, I realized this was no ordinary fisherman.

He was handsome in a beautiful way that most humans aren’t, with a strong jaw and nose, bright blue eyes framed by long black lashes, coupled with a brushy dark beard and long, black hair. His aura was unlike any human I’d ever had the pleasure of devouring.

But it was his eyes that struck me as the most unusual, that made me think he perhaps wasn’t human at all.

They held no fear in them whatsoever.

Instead, they danced with excitement.

With violence.

Before I could act, he opened his mouth, showing off a pair of sharp fangs, and simultaneously found the knife wound in my back, digging his fingers in until I screamed in agony.

The last thing I felt was his teeth on my neck, a hit of pleasure until I blacked out from the pain.

Now, the man stands in front of me, those same cruel blue eyes staring at me with a mix of respect and malevolence.

What are you? I want to ask. What do you want with me?

I decide to scream again since it bothers him so much.

The corner of his mouth quirks up in a cold, calculating smirk. With regular humans, a Syren’s scream can immobilize them, but with this man, it does nothing.

Suddenly, he moves away from me in a blur, and in that moment, I manage to take in where I am. I’m in a windowless room with white walls, the only light coming from candles placed here and there. Despite the pain and confusion, I feel proud of myself for recognizing what these things are. My friendship with Jorge, the boatbuilder’s son, wasn’t for naught.

The man comes back to my side, a heavy rattling sounding as he adjusts a chain in his hand, like the one a ship would anchor with but thinner.

Before I can figure out what he’s about to do, he snaps the chain taut between his hands and then shoves it at my face, pressing it between my lips.

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