Page 16 of Siren's Treasure

A loud huff was her answer. “Oh! I can’t work under these conditions. You are more suspicious than your father!” The Sea Witch stormed a ways off… but not too far. Her tentacles pulsed with irritation, but Thessa noticed how they kept between her and the exit. The harpy wanted the princess to jump blindly at the chance of giving all her gifts away, but should she?

Thessa’s siren voice could freeze the sons of men—could Scylla turn that same power against the merfolk? Of course, she could. That was far too much power to give their enemy, especially if her father wasn’t there to defend them… but if he was there? “You can’t use my siren’s voice until I’ve rescued the blade,” she said.

Scylla wrapped her arms around her middle—annoyance seeping through her perfect facade. “You have two days before I wield your powers. That’s all I can allow.”

And if Thessa wasn’t successful? Well, she had to be… everything rested on getting Undine’s Blade. With her father gone, the Sea Witch would come after them anyway. Steadying herself, Thessa made a choice that made her tremble with fear, because even if she saved her father, she could never show her face to him again. “I will give you my powers, but in return you will give me everything I’ve asked for, plus one last thing.”

Scylla’s brow rose. She was no longer amused, no longer playing. The walls of the cavern contracted, and several bottles began to beat with an ominous light. “And what would that be, little maid?”

Thessa knew more about human customs than Undine did. “You’re providing a dress with those legs.”

The Sea Witch’s laugh made the very water shiver, and in the depths of her bottles, captured horrors stirred at the sound. Thessa would be a fool not to know that the witch might try to capture her in much the same way.

Chapter nine

Raggon’s wrists were already slick with sweat and blood from the manacles’ rough edges. His leather coat clung to him in the dank cell. With enough pressure in the right spot, maybe he could—

The dark iron suddenly gave way with a crack like breaking ice. The sea steel, without its partner to maintain the spell, crumbled to glittering dust. His magic rushed back like a breaking wave, leaving him gasping with relief.

A shout echoed through the stone corridors, followed by the scuffling thud of boots. More visitors were coming. Raggon hurriedly threw his hands under the broken iron left of the manacles, pretending to still be bound.

A familiar, putrid caller came into view. Captain Maddox. He brought with him the stench of stale rum and sweat. Seeing Raggon behind bars was enough to set the man to sniggering. “I hear I’m to wish you felicitations. You sly dog. You’re to marrythe Land Witch, and here I was thinking you were enemies. Have the Sylphorians made up with the Circians then?”

Raggon glared. His black hair fell into his eyes as he steadied himself for this confrontation. “Where’s my brother?”

“He’s on my ship,” Maddox snarled. “We’ve got to keep you in line somehow.”

His stomach clenched when he thought of the crinkling at the corner of his brother’s eyes, even in the worst situations. Ah Smiley! How long could he hold up?

Maddox moved into the light. Red pulsating injuries were the man’s latest tokens from their battle. Some inept surgeon had clumsily stitched them in a way that would leave more repulsive scars on the man’s face. Maddox had repaid Raggon by slashing him in the side… except the wound was inexplicably gone.

“I’ve made slaves of all your surviving men,” Maddox boasted, the gaps of his teeth rotting pits as he reveled in his enemy’s downfall. “A whole ship of hostages readying to set sail to the Undine Isles.”

The revelation hit Raggon like a punch to the gut, but he kept his face neutral. “Circe has it wrong. I can’t touch that dagger. My power is of a different sort. She’s delusional!”

Maddox’s snorting laughter was full of mockery. “You must’ve convinced the Land Witch of your… skills.”

Raggon had heard enough. He’d release himself of this deadweight and liberate his men. “I didn’t thank you,” he said.

“For what?” Maddox asked.

“Your ship.”

Raggon dissolved into seafoam, his form becoming mist and shadow before materializing on the other side of the cell bars—one leap in the chain of shifts that would eventually carry him to freedom. The manacles clattered dully to the dirt as Maddox’s eyes widened in shock. The beasts guarding the dungeons roared, their twisted forms of scales and fangs lunging forward.

But it was as he said, they weren’t much for brains and Raggon shifted again, this time snatching a sword from a guard’s scabbard mid-transformation. Maddox screeched out and almost took off his head, before Raggon disappeared into another cloud of vapor.

Maddox’s blade whistled through the air where his neck had been a heartbeat before, but Raggon was already gone, racing through the dank corridor in bursts of mist, appearing and disappearing like frenzied lightning. Each materialization brought him closer to freedom, closer to the ship where his brother waited as Raggon moved at ten times the speed of a natural man.

The drawbridge loomed ahead, still lowered. He didn’t wait for the cry to halt his escape, his boots thundering across weathered planks each time he touched ground, when movement stirred in the moat below. A roar shook the bridge to its foundations. A massive dragon’s head shot from the water, fangs dripping venom and foul brine, its serpentine, scaled body adorned with trailing algae and reeds like some hideous crown.

Raggon stumbled, scrambling backward, overcome by the overpowering stench as the monstrous head descended. Fire erupted from the recesses of its belly and shot at him in a spray of brimstone and death. Raggon barely shifted in time. When he materialized a distance away, the air reeked with smoke, and looking behind him, he saw the scorched bridge was a wreck of blackened timber and melted metal behind him.

Excellent! Another obstacle facing Circe’s armies in their pursuit of him. They’d have to go around to chase after him.

Then Raggon danced with the wind itself, his body dissolving and reforming in heartbeat rhythms. Each materialization lasted no longer than a lightning strike—here on mud-slicked cobblestones, there between shadow and sunlight, now atop a merchant’s cart, then beside a startled guard. He waseverywhere, never daring too far a distance lest his essence scatter beyond recall, and yet, he was also nowhere, a story told in fragments of sea spray and shadow.

The port emerged before him like a painting coming into focus, familiar sounds washing over him—seamen calling to one another, gulls wheeling overhead with piercing cries, waves lapping against wooden hulls. The forest of masts rose against the morning sky, their white sails unfurling like great wings as crews prepared for departure.

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