She searched my face, her brow dipping. “I suppose Zeke needed to fucking die anyway… but damn it, Zander. That really fucked with my head. I don’t even know you!”
“All I can say is that I’m sorry,” I spoke honestly and put my palms out peacefully. “Plus, I don’t think you really feel that way. I think that you know me pretty well, like I know you. It’s just how we are made.”
Her eyes welled with tears that shone like tiny diamonds as she looked away. I wanted to touch her. I fucking hated touching people, and for the first time in my life I wanted to give someone a hug. The weird sensation worked over me as she looked up and let her body fall back so she was again floating on her back.
“It doesn’t matter,” she mumbled and then pointed the conversation in a different direction, only making me want to fucking fix this all the more. “So let’s say I was to go along with this shit for the dark ones. When do we need to do whatever the hell this is? I mean, this is weird. Like do we just find you when they get closer or something?”
“Because you and your brother are the youngest sirens I know of, I have been directed to stay with you until then.” I frowned slightly, not knowing how I expected this to work out.
She looked at me in disbelief. “You’re going to stay with us?”
“I have to stay in the area of where you are.”
A small musical laugh came from her. “Good luck with that one, Zander. Dean will kill you if you even suggest that.”
“Dean asked me to come find you,” I explained. “But yes, I admit that they looked rather murderous when I arrived. Which is why you need to tell them I need to stay.”
“Why would I do that?” she asked seriously.
I really felt like only a visual would do this shit justice. I grabbed her hand, and despite her tensing, she didn’t pull away. I focused on pushing us through space, stars whipping past as I followed the closest scream I could hear. A small sound left her throat as I pulled us to a stop, my eyes focusing on the expanse of the universe in front of us.
That void of space and time, that darkness, was terrifying… but not nearly as fucking scary as the dark one. The massive void, the black hole that consumed the energy around it, drawing its light and life until it was nothing more than dry cosmic dust. Removing it from existence in its entirety.
The screams of pain from the planets and stars being swallowed whole vibrated around us, and Lorcan trembled from what I assumed was pain and fear.
“Is that a dark one?” she whispered, her voice tight.
“That’s what is coming for everyone,” I swallowed. “They won’t stop with us, either. They just keep going. No one has successfully stopped them, and we are the only thing that stands in the way of them continuing on their path. We can stop them, Lorcan.”
Her eyes focused on me fully. “You promise this isn’t some bullshit?”
“I’m on your side, Lorcan. I fucked up, and I will keep saying fucking sorry about that. I had no idea that would have happened. I won’t deny that I was trying to mess with you a bit… immortality gets rather boring, but that… that was fucking horrible.”
“I believe you, you don’t have to keep saying sorry,” she determined after a few moments of silence. Then she met my gaze. “So how do we beat these bastards?”
“Well, your brother and you need to learn how to actually use your magic,” I explained, feeling moderately better now that she didn’t want to fucking kill me. No doubt she still hated my guts, but at least she would let me do my job.
“I know how to use it,” she retorted.
“Not completely,” I corrected softly, not wanting to hurt her feelings. “You need to be able to roll someone’s magic, even mine. You can’t purely rely on the most natural components of being a siren. You have way more fucking potential than that.”
She scowled. “I can turn into a mermaid, that’s not natural!”
I smirked. “Yeah? You figure that out recently?”
I knew she had. I’d been keeping tabs on her for some time. Is that what we were calling stalking now? Fuck. I was such a creep.
“Fuck you,” she grumbled.
“This is why it’s hard to be a siren,” I explained. “Unless you have someone to help you figure it out, it takes fucking forever. And while it’s good you have your guardians, they don’t seem to know much either.”
“It’s a learning experience,” she bit out defensively, her protectiveness making me smile. Her brow dipped then as she asked the next logical question. “Where are your guardians?”
I exhaled, “I don’t have anyone.”
Loneliness surged over me, and any attempt at being cocky or confident disappeared. It wasn’t like she wouldn’t see it anyway. She was a siren, so I’m sure she understood what it was like to feel alone. I would never fix that, though. Unlike her, I had no predestined guardians I could rely on. It was just me. Alone. Forever.
“What? Why?”
“I wasn’t born like a normal siren is,” I admitted. “Consider me the Cosmos god’s test run. I came before he decided guardians were a good idea.”
A fucking experiment. I wasn’t even supposed to exist.
“Oh,” she breathed and then nodded after a minute, seemingly having decided something. “Alright, fuck it. You’ve convinced me that we need help. But Maker help me, if I find out that this is some fucking bullshit...”
“Yes, yes, you can command me to rip off my own cock, I hear you loud and clear,” I goaded with a chuckle.
She let out a small laugh with a sadistic edge. “Yeah, he deserved that.”
Placing a hand on her shoulder, I pulled us away from the horrible screams and to a spot where we could easily return to Earth. “We need to get back. Sooner rather than later.”
“Why?” she asked. “I mean, I know we do, but why now?”
I winced. “If I tell you it’s been almost four days...”
“Holy fuck!” she squeaked as I nodded. “Yeah, we need to get back ASAP, because if we don’t, Dean may destroy everything.”
With a pull on our power, I let us fall back into our bodies. Almost immediately, both of us jolted awake in the silent room as her seafoam green eyes met mine with a hazy remembrance before they sharpened and looked around.
I could feel how fucking exhausted I was. My body felt shaky, and I knew I was going to need to sleep for goddamn hours to fix this. It was stupid how long we’d stayed up there, but she looked so much healthier that it felt worth it to me. I would rather be weak than see that pain echo through her face again.
“Oh fuck,” Lorcan muttered, noticing that the room was in a state, to say the least.
Yeah, ‘oh fuck’ is right.
12
Lorcan
“Harlem River talk to me
Where are we headed now?
Harlem River I'm in love, love, love, love
All because of you.”
-Harlem River by Kevin Morby
Do you ever see something and have a triggered memory fly to the front of your brain? Yeah, well, this destroyed fucking room was one hundred percent one of them.