We’re headed to Wonder Lagoon, Anya’s home. I stare out at the sea, endless, full of secrets. Anya, my aunt. Today, I forced myself to keep reading. My mother’s journals and truths. She once wrote that if she died in her human form, she’d return to her original form in the ocean.
Her death is imprinted in my mind. My father cradling her lifeless body, holding her like it was the last piece of him thatstill made sense. And then, placing her into the sea with this reverence. He stood there for years.Years. Staring out like he was waiting for a ghost to rise from the waves.
I can’t be a siren. I refuse to be. There’s no way. If I were, why would the ocean choose me? Why would she bless something so vile, so feared, to become her soul? Sirens are cruel. Cold. Heartless. Their souls are twisted, dark things wrapped in terrifying beauty and wicked lies. Mine can’t be. Can it? Even though they’ve protected me my entire life, this is not what I want.
The thought makes my skin crawl. My chest tightens like it’s caving in around my heart. Would Kai still want me if he found out? If he really knew what I am, what I might be? Or does he already know?
The questions slice like knives through my sanity one by one. My mind is spinning, thoughts crashing like a storm against a rocky shore. But through the chaos, one fear rises louder than the rest, sharp and unrelenting: What if I lose him?
He’s my anchor. My constant. The one I’m tied to, in more ways than I can explain. But I don’t want to be bound to someone who might come to hate me. Who might look at me and see only the blood he despises most. Desperate for answers, I reach for one of my father’s journals, the oldest one I can find, dated years before I was born. The black leather is soft and fraying at the corners, pages brittle from salt and time. I didn’t expect much. Honestly, I didn’t think he’d written anything at all.
He was a pirate, after all. Most of them can’t read. And almost none of them write. But my father was never like most men.
A thin leather cord holds it shut, wound tight like a secret. I untie it carefully, but the strap disintegrates in my fingers.
Inside, the pages are yellowed and soft, edges curling like they'd once been damp. Some were stained, the ink blurred andbleeding, and for a moment I wondered if the sea had gotten to them… or if something else had. But it wasn’t tears.
My father didn’t cry. He was a storm. A myth. A man made of salt and steel. Most of the pages were blank, like he’d meant to say something but couldn’t find the words or never dared to write them down.
Until I found it. One single page. Half-filled in his unmistakable, rough handwriting, like each letter had been carved instead of written. As if even his thoughts had weight.
Sirena.
Queen of the bloody sirens.
She came to my ship like a ghost, quiet, glowing.
Stars in her hair. Death in her voice.
I didn’t fight it.
Didn’t want to.
She looked me in the eye. Said,
“Captain Bleu, I’ve waited a long time. Let me show you a world you’ll love.”
I stepped off my ship. Willing to go.
Into the black.
Her hand in mine, pulling me under.
Could breathe. Somehow.
Felt like she gave me her soul just so I wouldn’t drown.
Couldn’t see at first. Water like tar, black and thick.
Then it cleared.
She was floating. Watching me.
Eyes glowing like moonfire.
Skin pale. Shining.
She touched my face.
