Page 40 of Drenched

The water shifted, and out came the Sirenshade.

It had stolen Jaime's voice, but everything else was wrong. Its skeleton body was covered in rotting seaweed, algae stuck all over its bones. Empty eye sockets stared at me, scarier than any real eyes. It reached for me with these crazy long, skinny arms.

“Come here,” it said, sounding exactly like him. “You're safe now. I got you.”

My eyes filled up with tears. “You're not real,” I choked out, the words escaping despite my own disbelief.

The Sirenshade smiled, its skeleton grin splitting its face in two. “Don't be scared,” it whispered, the words wrapping around me like chains. “I'll take care of you.”

Its fingers touched my arm, cold, invasive, and I flinched violently. I grabbed the dagger from my side and struck out. The dagger cut through its arm, and the Sirenshade let out this skull-splitting shriek.

Its empty sockets blazed with rage. “You dare?” it hissed, its voice getting ugly, losing all that warmth. “You fight?”

It lunged, clawing at my throat. My vision went wonky as it squeezed. Then came the voices, whispers and screams flooding my mind like a torrent.

“You let us die,” it hissed, Jaime's voice turning sharp and mean. “You abandoned us.”

Kim's voice joined in. “You left me, Pearl. You let him kill me.”

Jonathan's laugh echoed, cruel as hell. “You think you're innocent? You think you're a victim?”

“No!” I screamed, fighting against its grip. “I didn't, “

The voices got louder, piling on top of each other until it was just noise, drowning me in guilt and shame. Images flashed in my head, Kim's body all bloody and broken. Jonathan's dead eyes. My reflection, looking like some kind of monster.

“Stop!” I begged, my voice wrecked. “Please, stop!”

The Sirenshade got right in my face. “You can't get away,” it whispered, all mocking and dark. “You belong to him. You belong to us.”

I tried swimming away, reaching for that faint glow of the Blue Hole up there. But its skeleton claws grabbed my leg dragging me back into the dark.

The pain of its claws stabbing into my skin made me cry out, but the water swallowed the sound. Blood swirled around us in little ribbons, and with it went my strength. My arms and legs got heavier by the second, exhaustion creeping in. My vision went blurry, and the glow from the cave walls turned into this hazy mess.

For a split second, I thought this was it. My chest got tight like I knew what was coming, and I wondered if giving up would be easier than fighting.

Then the water shifted. This violent current came out of nowhere, ripping the Sirenshade's claws out of my leg and throwing it back. I tumbled through the water, totally lost, until a familiar shape came out of the chaos.

Rynar.

His silver body cut through the water like a knife, moving fast and sure. The currents seemed to do whatever he wanted, swirling around him as he went after the Sirenshade. The skeleton thing hissed, its creepy voice turning into something that didn't sound human at all as it lunged at him.

Rynar caught it mid-attack, his clawed hands grabbing its skinny arms like it was nothing. The water pulsed with this crazy energy as he pulled the thing close, his black eyes burning with pure rage.

“You dared touch her,” he snarled and I could hear his voice in my thoughts. “You dared go against me.”

The Sirenshade let out this high-pitched scream, its seaweed-covered body twisting as it tried to break free. But Rynar wasn't letting go. His grip tightened and with one brutal move, heripped the thing in half. Its body turned into this sick, glowing mist that the water just... ate up.

Then suddenly, the water went dead still, this unnatural calm that made my skin crawl. Rynar turned to me, his black eyes burning with something too raw to name. His tail wrapped around my body, not to trap me, but to protect me. His stare pinned me in place, making my chest hurt.

“You went against me,” the words thundered in my head like shards of ice slicing through the air. It wasn't just anger, it was something deeper, older, something that pressed down on me like the whole damn ocean. His claws flexed, and you could feel the tension rippling through the water between us.

Before I could say anything, he dragged me back to the cave. Every move he made was deliberate, each flip of his tail sending shockwaves through the water.

Once inside the cave, he let me go. His tail turned into legs without missing a beat. He started pacing, each step echoing in the cave. Every turn he made felt charged, like the air before a storm ready to break loose.

I stayed put, shaking and soaked, unable to take my eyes off him. Everything hurt, and that deep scratch from the Sirenshade on my leg was still bleeding a bit. But it wasn't the pain freaking me out, it was him.

Suddenly, Rynar stopped dead in his tracks, tilting his head like he heard something I couldn't. His black eyes cut to me, sharp and searching. I shivered as he stared, feeling like he was peeling my mind apart.

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