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She comes back around to face me while her gills open and close. “Politics?” She doesn’t wait for an answer. “Where is your mate? You should not be traveling alone.” She bows again, slower this time. “Majesty.”
I snort. “I’m not royalty.”
“You are paired with the alpha of Stormscale bloodline, one of the most powerful dragon shifter clans in existence,” she says. “That makes you royalty whether you claim the title or not.”
“Ezra isn’t available right now.” That sounds even worse out loud than it did in my head. “He’s dealing with clan matters, and I can’t get into the details. But I’ll be your guide today, and I’ll introduce you to another Stormscale. Tyrion. My mate’s father.”
“Tyrion.” She says it back like she’s placing it. “Son of Aldric of Stormscale.”
Okay, now I’m nosy. “You know him?”
She doesn’t answer. I push it and make the mistake of meeting her eyes.
They’re solid black with no bottom to them. The edges of my sight go fuzzy around her face. I couldn’t move my legs if I tried. I have no idea I’m sinking into her until my wolf wails. I tear my eyes away and turn to the water while my head clears. “What happened? I know the radicals hunt you, but the ocean is a massive place. Why would you need to flee all the way to Wintermoon?”
Sirena puts the question back on me. “Tell me what you know of Brookstone and Blackburn Enterprises.”
My wolf growls at the name. “Radical human organization. They’ve been targeting supernaturals for years.”
“Humans have been hunting us for as long as my people have memory.” Her gills pull flat against her neck. “Brookstone and Blackburn are newer. They rose after the curse broke, organized, with ships carrying sonar arrays built to locate pods, chemical dispersants pumped into the deep water, biological lures engineered to draw us up. They have technology that reaches farther than their bodies ever could, and they point all of it at us. They poison our food sources, cut our communication, contaminate the waters that sustain us, and every time we retreat farther down they find a way to follow.”
My stomach turns over at the thought of chemicals poured into the lake behind her.
Sirena stares out past the bridge. “Our queen wants war against them. But we are no match for their technology anywhere they have learned to reach, and they keep learning. We have heard stories about Wintermoon. Kade has spoken to us, came to us on land once, and tried to bring us here to this sanctuary. But why should we surrender our home for humans who have hated us for thousands of years simply because of what we are?”
She turns back to me with her sharp teeth showing. “We are not a people meant for land. We own the waters. The whales have carried our songs across hemispheres since the beginning. Orcas fight beside our pods in contested waters, and sharks enforce our territories. And then there was Aldric of Stormscale. For generations he was our navigator.” Her face falls. “But the Great War changed everything.”
That’s Ezra’s grandfather she’s talking about. I’m nosy enough to want the rest of the story. For now I sit on my questions and put my hand on her shoulder, where her skin is cool and dry. “I’m a different generation,” I tell her. “But I get it. More than you’d think.”
She glances at my fingers and up at me. “You are a fierce wolf, Aya of Stormscale.”
“It’s actually Ash Clan,” I correct her. I’ll take the compliment, though. My wolf eats up every word of it.
Sirena faces the tower rising over the tree line. “Will you give me a tour of your Academy? I find it fascinating, a diverse community of supernaturals living together. It is unheard of. My brothers are not sold on the idea.”
“Sure. I’d love to.” I’m already heading for the trail.
“Wintermoon is a remarkable place.” She stays put on the rocks. “But I am not certain my queen will accept this offer without Stormscale’s approval.”
I walk back over to her. “You are welcome here,” I insist.
She studies me. “But your alpha is not with you.”
I keep smiling. Without Ezra here I’m only part of what the Mer came to see, and Sirena’s too polite to say so. My wolf aches for home and my mate, but I stay put.
I motion for her to follow. “Come. Let me introduce you to a Stormscale who lived through the Great War.”
“Ah. Tyrion.” Her gills give a pleased flutter.
She falls into step beside me. “I have a full day before my body will crave the water again.”
“I’ll have you back well before that,” I promise. “Even if I have to shift to do it.”
“It is a deal,” she agrees. “But if you break it, my brothers will come for me.”
She points back toward the lake, where Cael and Nereus float with only their faces above the water. They eye us without any expression at all. I wave, but they don’t return it.
Getting from the border to the Academy takes a while when I’m not running. With Sirena talking, I lose track of the time. She tells me about trenches no one up here has ever mapped and the things that live down there in the dark. I can’t even hear my feet on the trail over her voice.
