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Serena flushed red that I could see burning in her cheeks even through her dark skin. Her eyes flashed with rage and panic, and she stilled in a way that made me nervous.
“That’s right,” Bastian went on, standing on the hull with his hand on the rigging. “Don’t pretend you’re better than me. We both fail to accomplish the tasks bestowed on us. You were willing to risk all your sirens, giving up the only thing you had to protect them, all for a man that still ended up dead anyway.”
It was then that I realized Bastian not only took Serena’s crown to take away her power, but to take away her army as well. It made sense that he took it in a time when pirates and greed ruled the seas. He was as responsible for the downfall of all mermaids as Cordelia was.
“Giving up my power for love is different than keeping souls captive for your sick collection.” Serena shot back. “And you know it. That’s why you’re running. It’s your only chance.”
“I’ll give you that, I thought it was.” Bastian mocked. “But now I see you can’t even control one testy little siren. So maybe you’re not as powerful as I thought.”
Serena bared her teeth, a flurry of water shooting up around her. The waves rolled and foamed around her, and the sight of it struck something in my brain. Something Cordelia once told me.
Seafoam.
I called to Serena with our siren connection while still keeping my eyes on Bastian.
She glanced at me with a raised eyebrow and tilted her head to one side, a look of half-aggravation and half-confusion. What?
I ran my fingers through the water, emphasizing the bubbles the movement created. Is it true that when sirens die they become seafoam?
Serena wrinkled her nose at me and looked away, continuing to send her golden waves toward Bastian. Yes, but why are you asking me such a question at a time like this?
“Because I don’t think your army is gone.” I shouted out loud.
Serena stopped short and her gaze fell on mine. She got it. With a nod she dove down under the water. I looked for her, waiting for her to resurface. An eerie whistle carried on the wind, sweeping in from all directions. The ocean shifted, and the waves reversed, sinking low and drawing down the entire water level with it. A rumble underneath created an endless stream of ripples across the surface, and I half expected a tsunami.
Bastian glanced around, his face white with fear as he realized the only one who could defeat the dark lord of the seas was about to fulfill that duty. I followed his gaze as he watched something in the distance. It was a wave rolling in—a foaming wave consisting not of water, but of the ghostly forms of sirens within the sea foam. Every single siren who’d ever lived and died at the hands of mermaid hunters, one unearthly chorus of their songs echoing in unison across the night air, as if their voices were infused in the sea spray itself. And in the middle of the siren wave, Serena swam amongst them, her magnificent tail flowing through the water like an iridescent rainbow and her crown glittering brighter than the moon.
The wave approached, and so did the sirens’ wailing song. It was a sorrowful one, full of lament and mourning, but as it grew nearer, it turned to one of anger. I looked up to see Bastian running from one end of his ship to the other, desperate for a way out. As the wave crashed into his ship, he threw up his hands and shielded himself with a wall of black water, but the foaming siren wave wasn’t hindered by it for even a second. It crashed through, engulfing him as the ghostly song grew so strong even I almost covered my ears. The wave took down his ship, specters of thrashing mermaids pulling it down to the depths, creating a whirlpool where Bastian remained. The sirens swept him up in their foaming tide, drawing him into them as they swirled around him like a cyclone, Serena amidst it all as she orchestrated their every move.
The cyclone of sirens spun faster and faster, creating a blur of Bastian behind them. And then, his shadow leaked out from him like ink as they drew it out. He cried out with a desperate scream as the water around him stained black.
“As you dethroned me, I now dethrone you.” Serena’s voice boomed like a clap of thunder, somehow beautiful and terrifying at the same time. Bastian groaned and cursed Serena as he writhed in the prison of the sirens. They encircled him in a blur, moving so fast as to draw out of him the source of his dark lordship, pulling from him the very spirit of Davy Jones that he’d been joined with all these years. Once more Bastian was a mortal man, stripped of his dark power, and the curse of Davy Jones was once again cast away to roam the seas, looking for its next willing host.
My eyes followed the dark shadow that loomed over the waters, erratic and frantic as the sea soaked it up like a stain. I shuddered to think who might welcome him next. But for now, at least it was no longer Bastian.
At last, the ghostly siren wave slowed, the spinning cyclone slowing as it lowered and pulled Bastian down. Davy Jones’ power may have been his curse, but he was still wretched at heart all by himself, with or without the strength of a dark sea lord. And for that, he met his justice at the hands—and fins—of the vengeful mermaids that he’d indirectly slaughtered. They dragged him down with them as they crashed back into the ocean, leaving clouds of billowing sea foam in their wake. I thought at once of Cordelia, and wondered if she had been in there somewhere. She’d wanted to avenge the sirens and redeem herself. And now I guess she had, in a way.
The silence that followed was chilling. The water stilled, and the waves calmed. I drifted there alone, still taking in the fantastical event I’d just witnessed. I could almost still hear the haunting song of those sirens and I replayed their foreboding words in my head.
In future, in past
Our shadow is cast
Torn from the depths
Till nothing was left
One last time we rise
One last lullaby
Sun and moon unite
The wrongs of old made right
Thus ends the the ocean’s night
The song echoed long after in my core, awakening my siren fully, and I couldn’t shut her up fast enough. Kill the queen. Take the Crown. Kill the queen. Take the Crown.
