Page 211 of Gods of the Sea

I sighed, looking out onto the water as I arranged my thoughts.

“The human world has so much suffering,” I said. “As a human, I had thought the spiritual realm would have less suffering. And though I finally feel at home, I have to admit, Your Majesty, my soul still aches in some places.”

He was silent for a moment.

“Both realms have their responsibilities,” he finally said. “The weight of a siren’s responsibilities are not light. To condemn the physical world to life or death is no easy task.”

I nodded my head, even though that wasn’t what the weight in my heart was from.

“I know that I’m home,” I said, the wind encouraging me to voice my thoughts into them. “But that loneliness I felt as a human, sometimes I still feel it.”

He was silent for a longer moment this time. I doubted that I had offended him, but it made me uneasy that he would be silent for so long.

He then spoke.

“Your heart is pulled in too many directions,” he said. “That pull causes so many tears in you that can’t be filled.”

I thought about it for a moment. The human realm. The spiritual realm. My past lives. My current life. The king. My friends here. My friends on Earth.

“Perhaps loneliness is not your issue, Rhys,” the king said. “Perhaps it’s restlessness. You’re separating yourself into so many pieces.”

“What do you mean, Your Majesty?”

He smiled as he inhaled.

“You want to be in the sky, you want to be on land. You want to be with us, and you want to be with the humans. You want to fulfill your duties, and you want to be in love.” He looked over his shoulder at me with a smirk. “Am I incorrect?”

I met his eyes and then slowly hung my head. “You’re correct, Your Majesty. Please forgive my greed.”

He chuckled. “When I made you, Rhys, I made you with an adventurous spirit and an eye for beauty. Although this design may have led you down dark paths, I made no mistakes when I made you.”

I swallowed my emotions back down my throat, wondering if my desire to cry was also a design.

The king looked up at the sky and took a deep breath.

“It’s a beautiful day to take to the skies,” he said. “Why don’t you go and see what you can find?”

I could only look at his feet. When he turned to walk away, I reached out and grabbed a bit of his robe. He stopped.

I steadied my voice to speak. “Thank you…Father.”

His hand came to the back of my head and brought me in, his lips coming to my forehead. He patted me on the shoulder and left me to look at the skies.

***

The sky fell into darkness, and my heart felt different than before. It was longing for something, some connection with beauty of some sort.

Perhaps that’s why I flew to her.

I just wanted to see that Astraea was well. I wanted to make sure that she hadn’t been sent to another body in the last couple of months.

Did she marry? Did her father recover? Was she happy or in pain?

My concern for her heart outweighed my fears of her rejection.

I circled her house, wondering where I could land to see her better. There were a couple of balconies to choose from, and there was a tiny figure on one of them. I hovered around the corner of the building, realizing it was her.

Her skin was pale with exhaustion and sadness. Was it her father or her marriage that made her frown in such a way? I had to know.

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