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“Was it the kiss?” Ramsay asks, looking so hopeful that I almost laugh. “True loves kiss, right?”
“Don’t be daft,” I tell him, trying to bite back my smile at the crestfallen look on his face. “We’ve had plenty of those so far.”
Then I think to what Nerissa said.
You can make any world your own.
“Wait a darn minute,” I tell him, sliding out of his grasp. “I have to check something.”
“Maren?” he asks as I start running across the deck, hope rising in my chest. My strides are short, my gait uneven as always, and I can’t move very fast but still I run across theNightwinduntil I’m to where the railing has been smashed away by the Kraken.
I take in a deep breath and I jump off the side of the ship, diving straight down into the water below, the Kraken having already disappeared into the depths.
I dive deep and the moment I do so I feel a current of electricity around my body. My gills start to work again, rising from my neck and when I look down at my legs, I watch as they fuse together, turning into a tail. Intomytail.
I let out a squeal of joy in the water and start swimming for the surface just as Ramsay launches himself overboard and into the waves. He lands with a splash and swims over to me and I flip around, raising my tail in the air for him to see.
“Behold!” I cry out, laughing, making the sun shimmer on my scales, shifting them from teal to lavender and back again.
He laughs too. “What does this mean?” he asks, pulling me into a kiss.
I press my forehead against his, my tail swishing beneath me. “Nerissa gave me another chance, another spell.”
“You saw Nerissa?” he asks, his dark brows raised.
“How on earth do you think I was able to control the Kraken?”
He lifts his shoulder in a shrug. “Maybe a Syren thing I wasn’t privy to.”
“Well, now that Edonia is dead, they’ve been released from her spell. They’re free agents, they just happen to listen to me now.”
“And they did a lot of your dirty work,” he says as he treads water, kissing me on the head. “For which we are all fucking grateful, in case you couldn’t tell.”
“Oh, I could tell. And best of all, Ed Smith could tell too. Your cheers were the last thing he heard. Well, aside from me telling the Kraken to tear him apart.”
He gives me a devilish grin that makes his eyes gleam. “I have never wanted you more.” He kisses me again, deep and hard, then pulls back. “But this still doesn’t explain your legs and your tail.”
“Nerissa had chanted some kind of spell when she found me,” I tell him. “Then she kissed me, as if that sealed the deal. She wouldn’t tell me what it was, other than that I could control the Kraken now, but she did say that I could make any world my own. I guess this is what she meant.” I wave my tail around for emphasis. “She gave me the ability to live with you above and in the sea below, able to choose which ever world I should want.”
“And do you still want mine?” he asks, his brows shadowing his eyes.
“I want yours and I want you,” I assure him. “That is always a given, Ramsay. But isn’t it delightful that I can return to being a Syren any time I wish? I don’t have to give up that part of me anymore.”
“Of course, cearban,” he says to me, a look of heat coming across his face. “And I don’t have to pretend I didn’t want a chance to bed you on the ocean floor again.” His expression hardens slightly. “What about the book?”
I think about that. “Perhaps she has it. Last I saw it was with her and the Kraken. But fret not, Edonia is gone. Her soul is in the bottle around her sister’s neck.”
“The bottle should be destroyed,” Ramsay grumbles.
“You know how family can be,” I say, somewhat understanding why Nerissa would want to keep part of her sister close, no matter how horrible she is. My sisters came looking for me even though I’m the one who left them behind.
At that thought my heart clenches and I say, “I hope I see Larimar again.”
He gives me a faint smile. “I’m sure you will, luv. You’ve only just got your fins back and it’s a mighty big ocean.”
“And this is just the Pacific,” I agree, gesturing to the wide horizon beyond the graveyard of Kraken-smashed ships. “There are more oceans and seas on the other side of the world where she could be. The North Sea, the Atlantic, the Mediterranean, the poles. She could be anywhere.”
“Luckily for you, you also possess a ship that can take you wherever you want to go,” he says, and I gaze up at theNightwind, suddenly aware that the crew has been staring down at us and watching with rapt attention. Even Skip has jumped up on the railing, staring down at me.
