Sirens - The Salted World

Every now and then I get a little bored and I tell myself stories. They’re not always complete, and they’re not always good, but they’re always fun and full of ideas and dreams.

I thought I would share some with you all.

Here is the beginning of my newest adventure into storytelling, Sirens - The Salted World.

‘The salted world is cold.

In its expansive caves and depths.

You can find endless roads - worlds within worlds within your own mind. Your insides fill with salt and dark and fullness.

And yet - the salted world is life. I always told myself as much when trying to distract myself from what I did not have. Being too negative was extremely painful, and being too positive filled my heart with longing.

I had been separated from my family since I was a child - my scales were tiny and pliable and mint green, able to be easily separated from my legs. While scales were able to fall off with time and oxygen, we often did not have such a luxury. I remember at first how my skirts would rip and tear and I’d fall over myself over and over. Until my captors tired of setting me free hour after hour and made the wise decision to tie me down and pull off my waning scales one by one.

They would have fallen off on their own if I had been allowed to expose my legs. Unfortunately for me, I was old enough to have to have my legs covered at all times.

I can still remember the pricks over and over and the warm blood dripping down my ankles. It stained everything a slight green.

I never blamed my captors, really. They were trying to improve my life and make their days easier. And a young child giving away her status by showing the world her scales just makes her a target. No one needs a target on their back like that, especially a siren of such standing.

I call them my captors, but in reality they were land liaisons. We had had such good relations with humans for so long that royal blood was often protected.

I had to be separated from my sister for our safety. Everyone knew that sirens held power, even if we never really knew it ourselves. Royalty carried an even higher status - not only did a type of magic run through our veins, but we also held positions in the government. Lir was first in line for the throne unless she listened to our advisors and went through with an arranged marriage.

Which…made sense if you knew the truth. 

The world was changing - faster than we would like. Word was spreading about life in our waters - and traps were constantly being set. While kings and queens of sand would only protect due to understanding our secrets and having an understanding, young fishermen with a stomach full of whiskey and a dream would try to collect us for their own collection or to fill their purse. Our places of hiding were becoming fewer and further between.

I knew that Lir was being trained as a diplomat - far away from me and the cold salty air. She was living weightlessly - full of bubbles and privilege, never really knowing where I was or what was happening. We knew it was for our own safety, but I never felt like I could truly forgive her for what I was enduring.

I knew my own future was being decided for me. From the time I was old enough to learn that my braids were to cover my pointed ears, I understood that everything had purpose. I watched the world work - wide-eyed and innocent, while putting everything together at night when they thought I was sleeping.

That was my secret - I never really had to sleep. I definitely needed rest and reset - but not for the 8 grueling hours that the people I was surrounded with needed.

I’d creep through the halls of whatever esteemed estate I was staying at, and try to find out information while also hoping to find an open kitchen. For people of the sea are truly always hungry.

I was currently staying in a giant mossed stone castle by the sea. I found out it was a popular place of exile for various royal children. These children were often bastards - born from passion and ill-equipped to actually acquire the throne, but were still needed in case a true heir could not be procured. I often saw myself this way, even though  my mother was indeed a queen of our courts. Though she was cold, she was still royal and still my mother.

I preferred our stone palace to the other places I had been forced to grow up in. Being landlocked made me uneasy. While if I jumped into the ocean from a passing window I would definitely sprout my scales again, I knew that I would be stuck in the water with no real way or direction of where I needed to go. And if I found my way back home, what was to stop them from sending me back? I was told it was about safety, but I knew everyone was also too busy. Lir was all they needed.

‘Lady Miurieth?’

I stopped raising my head to smell the thick salt and opened my eyes.

‘Yes?’

It was a courier of no real status, and a nervous one at that.

She shook a bit. She obviously could tell I was not human.

‘M-m-madame Julienne is ready for you.’

‘Ah.’

I made no move to dismiss her, so she sat for a moment while I looked back out the window. I waved her on with a flick of my wrist.

‘You may go.’

She started, not used to hearing my voice, and scuttled out of the room so fast she almost lost her cap.

I never understood why people were so nervous of me. I looked just like everyone else. Other than the ears and a green tint to my blood, the only thing that would make me different was being in the sea for a long enough time to sprout my fins again.

I sat for a bit, remembering being small and stupid, asking Madame Julienne if I could play with the children in the village. We were staying in a warm villa, exposed to sunlight and singing of church bells each day. I could hear all of the children playing in the streets in the mornings, and dreamed of going out and finding a tree to climb or a puppy to chase.

She had looked at me - gauging my understanding of my small world with her thin eyes. She was a very plain woman - prim, proper, and underfed. She tried to be caring enough, but her lack of knowledge of sea people made her a target of my tricks. Thus she lacked patience with me.

‘Miurieth, it just is not possible’

‘Why not?’ I remember the whine and desperation of my voice.

‘Because they are the offspring of store clerks and blacksmiths. They are not royal children. They are not suitable playmates.’ She spouted off these last words like they were truly an answer to my question.

That was that, at the time.

A year later, I eventually found a playmate. This time I was surrounded by young lords and ladies, and one of them was especially fond of tricking the adults.

You wouldn’t think such a thing, to look at him. He seemed like a shy child- always smaller than the rest of his companions. He always ran behind the group- quietly watching. At least, until you took a closer look and realized that the children were running to the locations he originally suggested or subtly mentioned, and that he wasn’t really quiet at all. In fact, his body language was louder than any person could be. His freckles would stand out against his striking skin, and 

his eyes would sparkle with mischief.

He was definitely the leader of the group, but only the children were ever really aware.

‘Where is Bastian today?’

‘What does Bastian think?’

Echoes of his name would linger in the halls, and every time a lady would slip in a puddle or a lord would fall asleep into his drink during a fancy dinner, you could almost always guarantee green eyes would be poking around a corner.

I was always an outspoken child around adults, but truly speechless around other children. I never understood their games - they puzzled me, with how I could never tell if their intentions were truth or a lie. Adults were easy. If you assume that every word that came out of their mouths was some form of untruth, you’d never be disappointed. You’d easily catch on to their true meaning.

Children were another thing entirely.

I’d always linger on the outskirts of their groups, never quite knowing what to do. They seemed slightly wary of me, which made sense as I gave off a smell and an energy unlike any they had known. Children always seem to understand and read people better than adults ever do. I was also skinny - too skinny almost, and always had two braids plastered to my head to keep my ears down. I’m sure the strange hair style certainly didn’t help.

One afternoon I was on the outskirts of such a grouping when they decided to gallop off down the hall. I was paused for a moment deciding if I wanted to try and join them at the risk of being rejected when I heard a tiny voice from above-

‘They’ll never let you in, you know.’

I started and looked up. Hanging from a beam like some primate - Bastian swung by one arm. The other arm he was munching on an apple, looking at me underneath heavy curls.

I finally found my voice.

‘What do you mean?’

He let himself fall - catching himself rather well for having one hand full.

His mouth was crunching-

‘I mean,’ he swallowed,’they won’t let you join if you just stare and hope that they’ll bring it up.’

I looked down at my feet and realized how desperate I must seem.

‘Oh.’ I knew I sounded extremely disappointed, but I couldn’t help it.

He must’ve realized his words lacked a certain comfort that it was obvious I needed.

‘What I meant was,’ he leaned against a statue casually,’you need to just join in. Don’t wait on an invitation. They don’t like being nice, they just wanna be.’

I didn’t need an invitation? This was new. Everything I was learning about courts and etiquette and curtsies were all about waiting for an introduction.

I really was spending too much time with adults. I wasn’t learning how to bond with children my own age.

Could it really be that simple? I just needed to join in?

I swung around and looked down the hall and thought about simply going up to the group and saying something like I belonged.

The very thought made my heart beat through my chest. I was sure the freckled boy could hear it - and he could probably see how flushed my face had become as well.

‘Also, you might have to work even harder because of your ears.’

I started again, but this time from his words and not his presence.

I immediately grabbed at the tips of my ears, worried they had poked out from my braids.

He grinned at me. 

‘Noooooooo..’

I must’ve looked even more puzzled than I felt.

‘No - not like that. I’m not saying you can see them. I’m saying nobody is being tricked by you hiding them. No one wears their hair like that unless they’re hiding a secret. Plus - you smell different. I’ve got a theory though.’ The air sizzled with silence as he let me get hit by the full impact of his words.

Had he really a theory? I stood up straight, daring him to try me with his worst.

He giggled a bit, happy at our game.

‘Are you…. An elf?’ The last words came out slow, as though he knew how silly they were simply from the mention of it.

That was the last thing I expected. I burst out laughing, not meaning to. The sound came from deep in my throat, and it surprised me so much I couldn’t stop the coughing fit when it arrived.

‘An elf?’ I finally spit out. ‘Are you serious?’

He seemed to have lost a bit of his previous confidence.

I didn’t mean to make him upset, I was just happy he had let me join in his imaginative game.

I grinned. ‘Guess again.’

‘Then I’m lost.’

I waited patiently. He sighed, knowing that if he didn’t keep guessing he would never know.

‘Well, whatever you are, you’re special, or else they wouldn’t make you stay here. We all have to stay here at some time if we are part of the club.’

He kicked at the statue he had been leaning on, and breathed out a large hopeless breath.

The boy peeked back up at me.

‘Alright then, I’ll guess.’

I gave him a minute to gather his thoughts.

‘Well, you smell different. I cannot for the life of me figure out like what though. It just smells..different. Not like wash day. You also carry yourself differently - you seem taller than what you are. You have that funny gap between your front teeth-’

I immediately clapped my hand over my mouth, realizing the truth of what he had said.

‘-no, it isn’t a bad thing. It just doesn’t seem like it is because of bad breeding. It seems on purpose.’

He wasn’t wrong. Our people often had unusual teeth- purposeful to let us survive on a multitude of diets.

‘And of course, the ears.. And sometimes when you’re nervous you turn kind of a ..pale green.’

Now THAT one I had not expected at all.

Green? I had no idea. I knew my blood was tinged with green when it was spilled, but I never would have thought that when blood appeared on my cheeks I looked like a common house plant.

I was a bit breathless at how well he had read me, but I was also desperate to keep his attentions and to possibly keep any sort of ally.

‘Well,’ I breathed out, ’any guesses? Other than elf, I mean.’

‘Are you…’ he caught himself and choked out a whisper ‘a..harpy?’

My eyes matched his in width. This game was certainly turning out to be fun.

‘No,’ I breathed out, ‘but you’re pretty close.’

I don’t think he really expected his answer to be close.

‘I don’t know very much about merpeople.’

‘That’s alright, I’m not a merperson.’

He was taken aback.

‘Something else, then?’

I briskly nodded. ‘Yes.’

‘Then what?’

‘I’m a siren.’

Until next time -

XOXO,

Windham