Chapter Eighteen #3
So did his body. Agony intensified as he catapulted, tossed, and forced his body at the barrier. Glass shards sprayed, dissipating into smoke. Several Siren Queens gasped, but he didn’t care.
Slam.
Slam.
The sea built up around him, lashing in surging frenzies.
It slurped along the sand, reaching for the sirens, who deftly avoided each thundering wave.
The sea swamped the bushes. Gorgons bellowed.
Water flooded the grasses, toppling the waving strands.
Up, up it crept while Pedr broke the barrier separating him from Mila.
The sea made the sirens nervous, because they avoided it at all costs.
Hovering far above, they reacted violently defensive to every splash, and released two short notes that set his head on fire.
The half-circle of sirens appeared close, then far.
Here, then gone. He couldn’t make sense of it.
Even Stinna avoided the burgeoning sea, hesitant to get too close.
Only Vassi remained in the same place.
As the glass barrier shattered, he sent the ocean to Mila. A current immediately formed, whisking closer to her. Waves surged for her ankles. A Siren Queen with frizzy black hair screeched and dove, and Mila vanished with a suppressed scream.
Pedr roared.
Her disappearing form became black midnight cloud. Gone. Mila was gone. He didn’t stop, would never stop.
“Amalia!” Vassi commanded. “Curse him!”
A woman elevated far above the rest. She gathered darkness like a midnight funnel. Her arms spun, forming a circle. Midnight whipped into a funnel, and her eyes glazed white as she chanted.
Stinna screamed with blatant joy. “Yes, Amalia! Yes!”
The gathering arcane tightened like a noose around Pedr’s chest, holding fast. He attempted to drown the feeling and access his abilities, but nothing worked. He couldn’t break free. Amalia’s indecipherable words rang in his ears, billowing like the sea.
“Curse him, Amalia,” Stinna screamed, cackling. “Curse him with all available layers! I smell his stubbornness. You must mean it. To protect our Mila, to protect ourselves. You can stop him before he exposes us!”
Pedr’s eyes rolled back in his head. The arcane gripped his body, taking control. Over the black filling his vision came Vassi’s voice.
“It must be, Amalia. For this purpose have we gathered and tested him. He has proven his will. To stop him from coming for Mila, the curse will require all three layers.”
The stranglehold doubled down, wrapping him as close as a lover’s embrace.
The biddies. This had been a trap all along.
They let him thrash and shout to see if he meant it.
He had no hope of breaking the barrier, nor winning.
All this time, they gathered with the intent to curse him if he proved too difficult.
He was a fool.
Lightning split the gathered black and slammed the water.
The force was bent and twiggy, white spires sprouted into a circle.
A hole, eternal and struggling, formed in the middle.
Calling the arcane from within, Amalia brought the stuff to her hands.
It lumped into a dripping pile that she cast at him.
Despair swamped Pedr in a smell he recognized.
It climbed through his nose, forced itself down his throat.
Another slam from without smacked him, strapping shackles against his heart.
A preternatural chokehold pressed him. He’d never felt a weight this massive.
Unbearable, the way it ripped his lungs to pieces.
By the will of Amalia, the Siren Queen, Amalia chanted, the words sliding through his ears like oil over water, you shall never say Mila’s name, our name, nor speak of our power.
Pedr roared. Amalia’s darkness saturated him. He thrashed in the water, but it was no use. His arcane—still unknown and savage and misunderstood—had no power against the Queens. He had no power.
A second thud nearly wheeled him into vastness incomprehensible. The blow should have been as final as death. It pinned him, and his soul constricted.
By the will of the Mother Queen, you shall never leave your ship, so that you may not bring death to the sirens.
Pedr stopped thrashing. His awareness of his body vanished, his will with it. He knew nothing but Amalia’s voice. Other voices, too. Whispers joined, sliding in and out, drenching him in flares of heat.
A third, resounding, violent thud flooded him with dark arcane.
Festering, awful, horrible, powerful. Absolutely overwhelming and complete and agonizing.
If you should break the first and second layer, and if you should, in your determined will, find a path to Mila, the touch of your lips on hers will commence the final layer.
By the will of the united Siren Queens, should you break all the layers of this curse, by speaking our name, speaking Mila’s name, touching Vassi’s daughter with love or lust in your heart, you shall wither.
Your strapped soul will dissolve after seven days, and there will be no life here, or in the After.
Pedr succumbed with the final word.