Page 90 of Gods of the Sea

I couldn’t sleep. It seemed logical considering my doom would be sealed the next day.

I watched Luc as he slept soundly, breathing heavily as he gave way to dreams. I wondered how long it had been since he slept somewhere that felt like home. This place seemed to soothe him. I could see it.

And I also knew that it soothed him because this place soothed me, too. The amount of peace I felt in this place was alarming.

I stepped out of the room, wandering into the caverns. I wasn’t worried about getting lost; for some reason, I didn’t feel afraid of many things here. I felt afraid for my trial and the crew’s fates, but in everything else, I felt nothing.

The air here was cool and refreshing, and every ache in my body seemed to release. With such a healing feeling, I wanted to stay here forever.

But guilt nagged the back of my mind at the idea of it.

I didn’t know how long I had wandered through the caves, but no one stopped me or accused me of trespassing. In fact, no one had been speaking to me at all except for the king. Whenever a siren and I crossed paths, they went the other direction, head down, refusing to make eye contact. The more it happened, the more concerned I became, not knowing how I could offend so many sirens I had never met before.

The caves now were still and quiet, the only sounds breaking the silence being the rushing brooks that ran down the caverns.

I followed the path of one of the brook branches, ending up in a strange room that had a bluish-white glow. The brook streamed into a large pool, the steam from the hot water rising to caress my face.

“Is this…a hot spring?” I asked myself.

I touched the pool with the back of my hand, the water warm and inviting. I agreed to its invitation, slipping off my shoes and dipping my toes in. Somehow, I knew this wasn’t against the rules. Somehow I knew this was completely common and accepted here, but I didn’t question why I knew such a thing. I wiggled my toes under the water, sighing with a smile as the heat coated my legs in warmth.

“Is that all it takes for you to be happy?” a voice asked.

I gasped and turned to the voice, irritated to find Jacques sitting on the other side of the pool, fully immersed in the water. He was topless, the water surrounding the bottoms of his ribs as he sipped a glass of wine.

“I didn’t realize you were here,” I said.

He chuckled. “So I noticed.”

There was a glow that rose out of the water, hitting Jacques’s skin and bringing a strange power to the dark, patterned circles across his chest and shoulder. He cocked his head to the side as he looked at me.

“Do you like what you see, Mother?”

I made a sour face at him. “I told you to quit calling me that.”

He chuckled, bringing his wine glass to his lips. “That’s one way to dodge my question.”

I couldn’t help but stare at the patterns across his skin.

“Did they burn those into you?” I asked, unable to hold in my curiosity.

He nodded as he swallowed. “Burning the skin is the only way to release the demons.”

I blinked. “Demons?”

“Judges are humans who were once possessed by demons.”

I snorted. “Are you sure you’re not still possessednow?”

He swished his wine in his cheek with a distasteful look at me as he set the wine glass down next to him.

“So you’re human?” I asked.

He laughed. “More than you are. Both my body and soul are human still, but I now have some special abilities thanks to my demonic residue.”

He said it casually, as if he had explained it to many people before, but the glow in his eyes made it clear that he didn’t take the situation lightly.

“Are you in any sort of pain?” I asked.

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