Page 7 of Cursed By a Siren's Kiss

My heart pounded in my chest as I watched him smile sadly.

He gave his head a slow shake. “No, I think not. Instead, I think I’m just going to make myself comfortable and enjoy the evening beneath the stars and away from so many eyes of judgement.” He patted the sand next to him. “Care to join me?”

With my stomach in knots of worry that slowly began to detangle themselves, I tried to lower myself, my legs almost pitching me face first into the sand next to him as they still remained weak from lack of use.

“Don’t worry,” Proteus murmured through a barely concealed smile. “You will get used to them.”

“How often are you on land?” I asked as I settled into the sand next to him, stretching my legs out as he had but crossing them at the ankles as I leaned back onto my elbows. I tilted my chin skyward and breathed in deeply, gazing up softly at the stars glittering within the skies above.

“Almost every day,” he admitted, leaning back as I had. His eyes stared out at the horizon, where the colors blended and changed as the sun dipped out of sight. So rarely had I bothered looking at the sky, always consumed with the depths of the sea, that I was almost in a state of awe as I watched the night fall upon us.

“Zeus’ kingdom is beautiful, is it not?” I asked in amazement.

Proteus let out a derisive snort. “The sky may seem beautiful, but it’s always under the control of Zeus, its oppressor.”

His words were heavy with bitterness, and I fell silent as I continued gazing upward. As the sun fell completely behind the horizon, the moon broke free of its cloudy embrace once more, casting silver light across the surface of the sea. The light glittered across the water and this moment, even spent without the male I would have chosen, felt magical.

We lay like that in silence for what felt like hours until I released a content sigh and turned toward him. “I know I didn’t choose you, nor you me, but if you’d like we could…” I trailedoff, feeling an unfamiliar heat spread across my chest and face. I knew what was expected of me, and I knew my father would twist this into another failure if I didn’t do my duty.

“You’re cute, and I’m flattered, but no.” He paused, studying my face before turning toward the sky again. “I’m afraid my heart belongs to another, and I would be unable to give you the experience you deserve.”

I sighed and chewed my lower lip as I sat up. “Thank you.”

“For?”

I smiled, my body relaxing as my fingers played within the white sand beneath us. “For not forcing me. My father took away my choice as a punishment for failing our people.” I sighed, looking out across the dark, calm water. “I know I deserved it. They died because I couldn’t protect them in his stead.” I let my head lower, my hair curtaining my face as I finished, “I don’t know how to turn them off.”

“Turn what off?” he asked, sitting up with me.

Concern flashed behind his blue eyes, breaking me down even further. I felt I could trust him. Something I hadn’t given anyone. It should have made me more cautious, but that kindness I’d seen in him earlier still shone through his every feature as he watched me closely. I tossed that caution to the wind, realizing I needed to trust someone, I needed to tell my fears to someone.

I looked up at him then, tears brimming within my gaze and blurring my vision. All of it a weakness and so unbecoming of a siren, especially that of the siren heir. “My emotions.”

Sirens weren’t supposed to have emotions. The confession hung like a solid weight in the air between us. My breath halted in my chest as I waited for him to say something. Anything.

“Let me guess,” he replied, his gaze not leaving mine as he spoke. “You think you shouldn’t feel them? That you should be vicious, cold, reserved, and logical like most sirens appear?”

I nodded, my lower lip sucking in between my teeth as I stopped it from trembling. For the first time in my life, I felt seen. I felt heard.

“It’s a lie, you know,” he mumbled, once again falling backward into the sand. He lowered himself until he lay his head into his cupped hands, his attention on the stars twinkling above. “Even more so for you, a child of one of the prime three gods.”

“What’s a lie?” I lay back into the sand, twisting onto my side and propping my head up onto my bent arm as I stared at him. My hair fell around my chest in dark waves that covered my bare breasts as my legs curled slightly within the white sand.

“Sirens have emotions, but they’re more primal and predatory. The gods, which accounts for half of you, are some of the biggest emotional babies that I’ve ever met.”

I gasped, my gaze shooting to the stars at his blasphemous words. If any of them overheard us, I couldn’t tell. I suddenly remembered Proteus was also a god. Maybe the rules differed for him, maybe he was safe to speak as he wished?

“How old are you?” I knew gods could appear younger, like my father, Poseidon, who usually chose to bear the features of someone in their thirties. Proteus, in this state he had chosen now, looked to be in his mid-twenties, though his usual state had been that of an old, weathered man. “Is this your true face?”

He chuckled, his gaze sparkling as his shoulders shook. “Yes, this is my real face. I use the old man visage to keep eyes off of me, as well as my age. It isn’t really important.”

I shook my head. I didn’t know much about Proteus, but I suspected he was as old as Poseidon, if not older and from another primal line.

“The real question, the more important topic right now, is not why you can’t suppress your emotions, but what you choose to do with them.”

I frowned. “What do you mean?”

Despite the dimness of night, his eyes sparkled almost mischievously. He turned to me then, pulling his attention from the stars above to my wide and curious gaze. “What would Talia do for love? What would you do to be loved? Isn’t that what you truly want?” he asked, watching me in such a way that it felt like he saw far too much. It was as if he saw more than I wanted him to see.

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