The Siren. Kiera Cass
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were never exactly the same thing twice. It was almost painful to watch them fall apart, one grain at a time, rarely lasting more than a few days after we left Her.
You seem sad. Her words came only to my ears.
I’ve been having more nightmares, I admitted.
You don’t have to sleep. You’ll be fine without it, you know that.
I smiled. I do. But I like sleep. It’s soothing. I’d just like to have it without the dreams is all.
She couldn’t take away my dreams, but She always comforted me as best She could. Sometimes She took me to islands or showed me the prettiest parts of Herself, so easily hidden from humans. Sometimes She knew that caring for me meant letting me be apart from Her. I never wanted to be away from Her for too long, though. She was the only mother I had, now.
Part mother, part warden, part employer … it was a hard relationship to explain.
Aisling swam out to greet us, her own dress partially formed and floating in strands around her.
What a surprise! she greeted, squeezing Miaka’s hand. Follow me.
We trailed behind her, skirting around the plates of land as they pushed themselves above the water into continents. Our sense of geography was a bit specialized, knowing that some places were surrounded by rocks, others by sand, others by sheer cliffs. There were other things we knew by heart as well, like the places we’d found each other or the locations of ships we’d taken down, a peculiar knowledge of unmapped ghost towns on the Ocean’s floor.
We tailed Aisling as she went to a slightly uneven coast, pulling herself upright as soon as the water was shallow enough.
“Don’t worry,” she said, taking in our nerves when she brazenly exited onto land. “We’re all alone out here.”
“I thought you lived near a town,” Elizabeth said, hopping across the rounded rocks as we crossed the shore.
Aisling shrugged. “Distance is relative.” She led us to an aging cottage just beyond the tree line. It was picturesque, settled underneath some heavy branches, and I imagined those limbs cooling the space in the summer and protecting her from snow in the winter. In front was a small garden bursting with flowers and berries, and the way everything flourished made me feel that, while the rest of us were connected solely to water, Aisling had drawn strength from all the elements.
“This place is so small!” Miaka commented on entering. It was one room, barely the size of the living room in our beach house. There wasn’t much in the way of furniture, just a small bed and a bench along one side of a table.
“I think it’s cozy,” Aisling remarked, placing a kettle on an ancient stove. “It’s nice of you to come. I picked some fresh berries today and was making a pie. Give me forty-five minutes, and we should have a magnificent dessert!”
“Expecting company?” Elizabeth asked. “Or just incredibly bored?”
We didn’t have many reasons to cook. We didn’t need food, and Elizabeth especially could go for months before the craving for a particular taste hit her.
Aisling smiled as she finished lining the bottom of her pan. “Yes, the king should be dropping by any moment.”
“Ah, the king likes pie?” Miaka joked back.
“Everyone likes pie!” she teased, and sighed. “I was a little bored today, to tell you the truth. So I’m very happy for your visit.”
I stood beside Aisling as she poured the filling. “You know, you can always come stay with us.”
“Oh, I like the quiet.”
“You just told us you were bored,” Miaka said, her artist’s eyes exploring the room.
“One day out of a hundred,” Aisling said, dismissing us. “But I know I should spend more time with you all these days. I’ll try.”
“You okay?” I asked. “You seem keyed up.”
Aisling plastered a smile on her face. “I’m great. Just happy to see you all. What’s the occasion?”
“Can you please tell Kahlen to calm down?” Elizabeth asked, sitting on the lone bed looking as if she owned the place. “She’s moping again. Dabbling with the scrapbooks, afraid her world will end if so much as the shadow of a human crosses her path.”
Aisling and I shared a look, and she grinned. “What’s really going on?”
“Nothing,” I swore. “We’re just comparing coping mechanisms. I feel safer when we’re more anonymous. The fewer people we interact with, the better.”
“And yet you insist on living in big cities,” Elizabeth grumbled.
I rolled my eyes. “So we blend in easier.”
Miaka walked over, placing a tiny hand on Aisling’s shoulder. “I think what Elizabeth means is, since you’re the oldest, you might have some wisdom to pass on.”
Aisling took off her apron, and we all sat together, crowding on the bench and the bed. “Well, let’s be honest. The Ocean doesn’t need more than one of us at a time. She could do Her work with a single siren. But She makes sure there are at least two at all times so we won’t be alone.”
“And we have the Ocean,” I added.
“Which is weird. She’s hard to understand.” Elizabeth toyed with the salty sparkles of her dress.
“She’s not a person,” I pointed out. “Of course She’s hard to understand.”
“Back to the matter at hand: Aisling, don’t you think it’s possible to interact with humans without consequence?” Elizabeth pressed.
Aisling smiled to herself, her eyes fixed on a blank space in the air. “Definitely. In fact, I think seeing lives that actually change and have seasons has added to my life even though I can’t change myself. It’s about knowing your limits, I think.” She drew her gaze back to Elizabeth. “It seems to me Kahlen knows hers, so maybe we should respect them.”
“Well, it seems to me like she’s miserable and would be much happier if she stepped out into the real world every once in a while.” Elizabeth grinned, a snippy smile that wasn’t asking for a fight but let us all know she still thought she knew best.
“Along the same lines,” Miaka said, straightening up. “Skydiving. Would you do it, Aisling?”
Aisling laughed nervously. “I don’t like heights, so probably not.”
Miaka nodded. “I admit, the falling would be weird. But I want to see the world from above.”
“You’ve seen wars, watched countries disappear and re-form. You have experienced more seasons of fashion than most people can remember. We walked the Great Wall, you rode an elephant … For goodness’ sakes, Elizabeth took us to see the Beatles!” I reminded her. “Do you really need anything more?”
Miaka beamed. “I want to see everything.”
We passed the rest of our visit talking about paintings Miaka had made, books I had read, movies Elizabeth had seen. Aisling really meant it when she said she enjoyed watching the lives around her, and she told us how the best baker in town was finally closing her shop and how there was a boom recently in people hired as dog walkers. It was all a bunch of nothing to me, but everything to these strangers who were living it.
“I wish I had a talent like you, Miaka,” Aisling lamented after hearing her theories on adrenaline and art. “I feel like I don’t have anything to say. Right now, my life is very still.”
“You really are welcome to stay with us,” I offered again.
She leaned into me, our heads touching. “I know. It just seems like life is very fast these days. I won’t have this quiet much longer. I think I’ll miss it.”