Page 24 of Siren Problems
“Calder—” I start, but I don’t even know what I want to say. Thank you? I’m sorry? You scare the hell out of me and somehow I still keep diving closer?
His eyes finally meet mine.
And what I see there...
It isn’t rage.
It’s grief.
Old. Bone-deep. Carved into him like the sigils I saw underwater.
“You weren’t supposed to find it,” he says.
“I already had,” I whisper.
Neither of us moves.
I reach for his hand without thinking.
He lets me.
His skin is calloused and damp. His grip doesn’t tighten—but he doesn’t pull away, either.
“You don’t have to keep guarding it alone,” I murmur.
His lips twitch. “I do.”
“No. You’ve just been doing it so long you forgot there’s a difference.”
He stares at the sea.
And for once... doesn’t argue.
The ocean still rolls around us, gentle now—lulling, almost. The kind of calm that only shows up after everything’s already gone to hell.
Calder’s sitting on the bench again, elbows on his thighs, face turned toward the horizon like it’ll tell him something he doesn’t already know. He hasn’t spoken since we surfaced. Hasn’t moved, except to occasionally flex his hand like something aches.
I notice the blood a few seconds before he does.
“Hold still,” I say, pulling the med kit from the bench storage and kneeling beside him.
“It’s fine.”
“You’re bleeding, you emotionally constipated barnacle. Let me help.”
He doesn’t argue.
I take his hand carefully, and it’s warmer than I expect. Big. Calloused. There’s a gash along his knuckle, shallow but angry, probably from where he slammed into coral dragging me out.
I clean it in silence, wrapping it in gauze I enchanted to be salt-resistant. He watches me like he doesn’t understand why I’m doing it. Like touch is foreign. Or forbidden.
I glance up once, catch the edge of something in his expression.
Gratitude?
Fear?
I don’t push.
