Mira
Chapter thirty-three
Shell of Secrets
When I wake, my thoughts are razor sharp. We’re inching closer to facing the most powerful witch the sea has ever known.
The memory of my mother still clings to me, her body drifting lifeless in the tide, the ocean wrapping around her like a grave.
I remember the exact moment my father’s soul shattered.
The blade touched her skin, and something in him fractured, never to return.
He carried that grief like an anchor with every wave he sailed.
But even in all that sorrow, he was unbreakable, his love for her so fierce, so consuming, it cracked the world open.
I think I knew then that’s what I wanted. That rare kind of love. The kind that ruins you and rebuilds you. The kind that scars and saves in the same breath. Now that I know what they both sacrificed for one another, I know what they had was pure, unrelenting love.
And now, I have it. In the quiet moments, when the storm stills, he calls me treasure, like I’m the rarest thing that’s ever drifted through his world. He’s the rhythm in my tide. The fire in my blood. The calm in my chaos. He’s the map I never knew I was following.
My mother evidently knows I’m alive and thriving.
The commands she’s sent through others are evidence enough.
Telling me to bring her the witch means she’s either confident in my ability to make it happen or reliant on Kai to do the heavy lifting.
She must know who he is to me and who he is to the witch.
My father’s journal said she’s the Queen of the Sirens.
That means she and Veyra must know each other, two forces born from the same source: Mother Nature herself.
But Mother Nature isn’t all rainbows and blossoms. She’s also storms and fire.
Veyra is the gentle beauty in all things.
My mother is the tsunami you pray never finds your shore.
But who is the corrupted Soul? What physical form does she hide in?
And what has she done to take the skins she’s been living in?
Kai is already gone when I stir, but he leaves behind a hot coffee, a glass of water, and extra blankets in case I miss the warmth of his body beside me. A small smile creeps across my lips at that.
I get dressed slowly, adding more weapons than usual to my belt. I need to be ready to see Taika today. I take a sip of the coffee, letting it wake me from the inside out. It’s just past sunrise, and neither of us has gotten much sleep. Still, I feel as prepared as I can be for what is coming.
I wonder now if Taika knew Smith was a traitor.
She barely looked at me that day. Her eyes kept snapping to him, tracking him like a threat.
She felt it. But she did warn me. Her voice echoes in my head even now.
“You wish to protect those with bad blood in their veins?” She knew the person I was standing next to would sell me out.
While searching the room for smaller weapons to strap to my thigh and calf, my fingers brush against something cold and familiar. A seashell, nearly identical to the one Taika gave me. My blood runs cold. How does Kai have this? Why?
It was just sitting there out in the open, that somehow makes it worse.
I trust him. I do. I know he’d never lie to me about seeing her, but my thoughts begin to spiral anyway.
Seashells like this are rare and personal.
My father had one too, given to him long ago.
Maybe this one came from Kai’s father? Maybe it’s nothing, or maybe it’s everything. I grab the shell and leave to find him.
I spot Kai on the deck, leaning against the railing with his coffee in hand. The sun kisses his skin, illuminating the ink on his body. His hair is damp, dripping onto his shirt. He must’ve just bathed. He has to be the cleanest pirate I’ve ever known.
He turns around like he can feel me coming, that sixth sense of his always one step ahead.
“Good morning, my treasure,” he says with an alluring smile and a raspy voice. Then his gaze drops to my hand. He stills. He steps toward me slowly, carefully, like the space between us is charged. “What’s this?” he asks, gently curling his fingers around my hand.
“I could ask you the same thing,” I reply, not backing down.
His eyes narrow, studying me like I’m a riddle. “I took it off Archer,” he finally says. “After I killed him. I searched his body and found this. I wasn’t hiding it from you, if that’s what you’re thinking.” He nods toward the shell. “You carry one just like it every day.”
I open my mouth to respond, but he cuts me off. “Mira, this is dark magic.” His voice is tight. “You shouldn’t be carrying something like this.”
“What do you mean? It’s not dark magic.” I say, but even as the words leave my mouth, doubt crept in. Who am I to argue with someone who has magic in their veins about what's dark magic or not?
I open my mouth to speak again, but he cuts in, testing me.
“Where did you get yours?” I break his gaze, turning to stare out at the sea.
“Mira,” he presses, “if someone as vile as Archer had this, it can’t be good.
” I look back to him, then slowly pull the shell from my pocket.
“It’s from Taika. She said it was a direct line to her, if I ever needed help. ”
I hold the shell in my palm. Then the pain hits. A searing heat licks across my hand like fire. I drop it with a cry, the shell clattering to the deck. Kai catches my wrist instantly.
“She can hear everything,” he mutters grimly.
He snatches the shell from where it’s fallen.
Without another word, he hurls both shells into the sea.
I see the wince flash across his face. She burned him too, but he says nothing.
He turns his full attention to my hand, cradling it with so much care that my throat tightens.
His eyes lock with mine. “She knows we’re coming. ”
My body goes rigid. “How could she have heard everything… through a shell?” I ask, my voice shaking. Kai doesn’t answer at first. He is already heading toward the quarterdeck. “Kai! Tell me what’s going on! Don’t walk away from me,” I demand, stomping after him.
He stops, turning to face me. “We can’t go to her. The only advantage we had was the element of surprise, and it’s gone. We have to turn back.” He’s right. We are sailing straight into a trap.
Then he adds, “When you were little, did anyone ever tell you that if you held a seashell to your ear, you could hear the ocean?” The realization hits me like a knife to the gut. My stomach twists, bile rising in my throat. She’s one clever witch. It’s too late for us.
That thick, dark fog begins to roll in, just as it did the first time I saw her. It swallows the ship inch by inch, curling through the rigging and over the deck. I grab Kai’s arm and hold him close. “We’re here,” I say.
He looks down at me and presses a kiss to my forehead.
“I know. May the tides be with us.” He covers my mouth and nose with a cloth, then does the same for himself.
The crew around us coughs and gasps for air, same as before.
But this time, we aren’t here seeking help. This time, we’ve come to collect.