Bluedawn (A Watermagic Novel, #2) (19 page)

“I’m with you,” I said, squeezing his
hand.

“Swim as fast as you can for shore.” He held
my face in his hands. I sensed that he already felt defeated. “No
matter what don’t stop swimming and when you get to shore, run as
fast as you can. Hide.”

I was so confused. “But…” I wanted to explain
to him that the people after us were my relatives and that they
would never hurt us. But he was already pulling me down into the
water.

I swam as fast as I could beside him, trying
to make sense in my mind of everything that was occurring. The way
Marine and Brigitte spoke to me in the bathroom, it sounded like my
mother knew what had happened to me. But she couldn’t possibly
know. How could she?

They said something about Josette being right
about what had happened to me and then they continued on saying,
“Look what they have done to you.” They must be making reference to
my physical appearance. And who were they referring to when they
said “they”? Could they possibly know about the sirens? I didn’t
understand.

As we swam, I kept thinking and thinking. It
didn’t make sense that my mother’s cousins had jumped off the ship
and were now swimming after us. Human beings don’t do that. The
fall would kill them. And if it somehow didn’t, it was highly
unlikely that they could survive so far out in the ocean without
life rafts.

The more I thought about it, the more my
suspicions started coming together. All five of my mother’s cousins
had long hair and stunning appearances. That wasn’t normal. Aside
from the sirens, I had never seen such attractive people. And the
way they acted, speaking in unison and eating strange foods.

In the past, I simply imagined that all
French people were odd and ate weird stuff, but none of the dishes
at the French restaurant where I ate my lunch today were weird.
There were no sand crab snacks or raw fish with cream and lard like
Mom ate. The owner who was French acted normal enough.

Mom! My mother was just like her cousins. She
had long hair, was beautiful in appearance, ate strange dishes, and
sang like an angel. Were Mom and her cousins also sirens?

No! It couldn’t be. My own mother?

My adrenaline was racing even faster now as
we swam at full speed. Why would Dylan be rushing away from another
group of sirens? Were they warring groups?

And if they were sirens, why did he look so
scared, almost defeated before he even tried to get away? If there
was some sort of feud between them, wouldn’t he just fight
back?

We must have swum at full speed for about
twenty minutes when we shot to the surface for breath. “We’re
coming close to shore,” Dylan whispered. His face looked pale like
he was riddled with fear. “I don’t understand it.” He shook his
head. “I don’t know why they haven’t attacked.” He looked
around.

There was blackness surrounding us. The stars
were overhead twinkling on the surface and the shore was too far
away to see. It was so peaceful in the gentle dark waters.

“They’re much faster than us.” He continued
to look around. “I get the feeling they are watching us.”

“Dylan,” I whispered. “They’re my mother’s
cousins.”

“What?” he asked seemingly distracted.

“The five people we are trying to escape—they
are my relatives. I don’t think they will hurt us.”

He looked at me confused. “What are you
talking about, Hailey?”

“It’s just what I said.” My voice was
adamant. “They are French Exchange students at Santa Monica High
School. My mother is their chaperone. She looks after them.”

His mind seemed to reel. I got the feeling he
was trying to put pieces of a puzzle together in his brain. “When
we were in Carlsbad near the campsite where I met you, Wren told me
to find out as much about your mother as I could.”

“That’s odd,” I replied, recalling how my dad
told me that Dylan had asked him about Mom when he saw him in the
woods behind our campsite.

“I thought it was odd too,” he continued.
“She was really focused on you and your mother. Gia had said that
we were going to Carlsbad to get a girl for Travis.”

I nearly choked. “Travis?” I kicked my feet
harder to hold my head out of the water.

He lifted a dark eyebrow. “What? You don’t
like Travis?”

“Ooooo!”

“I’ll take that as a dramatic no!” He seemed
amused with me. “Well, Travis messed up that at ‘Let’s suck face.’”
He chuckled. “What an idiot.”

“Is that why you hit him?”

Distracted, he seemed to be listening for
something now. His gaze turned back to me. “Wren was so pissed off
that he screwed that one up. Then she put me on the job.” He smiled
wryly. “Hence, our chance meeting at the mini market.”

“Why do you think she wanted to convert me to
a siren?” I asked.

“Now that you told me that the mers are your
relatives, I think it has to do with that.”

My eyebrows knitted together. “The mers?
What’s that?”

If he wasn’t amused before, he certainly was
now. “Mermaids, mermen. You know,” he said sarcastically under his
breath.

“My Mom and her cousins are merfolk?”

He laughed out loud. “Uh…yeah,” his teasing
voice was matter of fact.

My mind was reeling at that. I leaned back
and stared up at the stars. “No frickin’ way.” But it made sense.
My mother was a mermaid. Her crazy night swims, inexplicable
disappearances, her enchanting voice.

“Lyra told me that sirens and mers hate each
other.”

I bit my lip. “She told you that?”

He nodded. “Yeah. She said sirens and mers
are enemies because a long time ago they both wanted the same
island and during their fight for it Wren killed William who was a
mer. Then the mers killed one of the siren’s slaves as revenge.
There has been a feud ever since. Also the sirens don’t follow
Trident laws. We are a lawless group that puts the mers in danger
with the humans by our indiscriminate killings. Therefore the mers
want to kill us.”

“Is that why you were so afraid when you saw
Marine and Brigitte on the ship?” I watched his eyes closely. They
glimmered under the starlight.

“I wasn’t afraid,” he joked. “You’re even
newer at being a siren than me, but as you develop, you will come
closer in touch with your instincts and intuitions. I knew they
were mers by their scent and by their mannerisms.”

“Are mers dangerous?” I stared at his facial
features intently.

His eyes widened. “Very dangerous.” Then he
smiled. “But so are we.”

“Why were you afraid then?”

At that, his voice lifted as he spoke, “I
wasn’t afraid.” He glared at me teasingly. “Mers are almost always
with their school, so I knew if there were two mers at the
bathroom, more would be nearby. A group of mers would easily tear
us both to shreds. Their hatred runs deep.”

“Do you think my mother kills people like the
sirens do?” The idea disturbed me immensely.

“I assume so, but I just don’t know. I only
know the bits and pieces that I’ve overheard the triplets talking
about or what Lyra told me.”

I just couldn’t imagine my mother killing
people. She wouldn’t do that. Not her. No way.

He ran his fingers through his dark wet hair.
“What I didn’t foresee was that they would jump in the ocean after
us. They are much faster and more capable in the water. They don’t
have to come up for air like we do.”

“Where do you think they went?” I asked.

At that, five heads popped out of the
water.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

Dream as if you’ll live
forever. Live as if you’ll die today.
–James Dean

“Hi, Hailey,” Brigitte, Marine, Laurent,
Pascal, and Marcel said in unison.

“Uh…hi?” I replied, not knowing what to make
of this surreal situation.

Dylan pulled me closer to him.

“We’re not going to hurt you or Hailey,
Dylan,” Laurent said, his bronze skin and golden brown hair
shimmering slightly under the starlight.

Marine’s long blond hair fanned out on the
water. “We know you’re a victim, Dylan. You didn’t choose this
life. Soon the sirens will kill you like they always do with their
slaves once they tire of them.”

I looked at Dylan, my face must have gone
pale. He put his hand on my back.

“You aren’t our enemy,” Pascal added. He had
long black hair and his eyes were electric blue like the rest of
his school.

“The triplets are our enemies,” they all said
at once.

“Oh, Hailey,” Brigitte sang. “We’ve been so
broken up over you.” She had sea shells woven into her long black
hair.

“We feared you were dead,” Marcel explained.
His hair was also long and luxurious, but it was a darker shade of
brown than Laurent’s.

Marine nodded. “The police surmised you were
dead, but your mother believed you were alive. She found a
medallion of a mermaid with a sapphire crystal dagger in her
motorhome. It was the same piece that the triplets stole from us so
long ago…”

“That’s the medallion you gave me in your
cabana in Carlsbad,” I reminded Dylan. “I was upset and dropped it
on the floor of our motorhome.” I furrowed my brows as I remembered
back in time. “I thought you said you found that in the ocean?” I
asked him.

He winked and then shrugged. “I just told you
that so you’d take it. Wren said she stole it from your mother.” He
stroked my hair.

“So you knew it was really my mom’s medallion
and you wanted to give it back?” I wanted to make sure I really
heard him correctly.

“Yes.” He nodded.

“From finding that…” Marine continued before
I could even make an opinion about what Dylan had just conveyed to
me, “…Josette guessed that they had stolen you from her as a form
of revenge…”

Dylan interjected, “The sirens knew that if
they converted Hailey to their kind, it would humiliate the mers.
To have a half mer as Hailey is convert to a siren has got to be
the greatest revenge.”

“That’s exactly it,” Brigitte agreed. “But
what the sisters didn’t realize is that you are now more powerful
than them. You have the powers of both a siren and a mer.”

“That means you are stronger than Wren, Lyra,
and Gia,” Dylan said to me. You don’t have to come up for air to
breath! You have the powers of a fish and a bird.” He sounded very
excited.

I rolled my eyes, finding the entire
situation overwhelming. My heart kept aching at the mention of my
mother’s name. I missed her and my father so much. I had no idea
how to use those powers and what I wanted most was to just be a
normal, average girl again.

“We love you,” my mother’s cousins said in
unison. “And no matter what, we will stick by you.”

“I don’t want to be with the triplets,” I
said, trying to keep from crying. “I want to go back home and I
want to take Dylan with me.”

They all looked at each other and nodded.
“You can leave the sirens, Hailey, but Dylan cannot,” Laurent
said.

“What do you mean?” I asked astounded.

He continued, “Because you are siren and mer,
you can leave your flock and join in a sacred covenant with the
mers if you desire. The covenant will dismantle the energy force
that keeps you from leaving your flock by yourself. You have a
choice. But because Dylan is purely siren, he is unable to separate
from them and the energy field that binds.”

Nausea rushed over me; Dylan’s face went
pale. “I can’t leave Dylan,” I said. “There must be another
way.”

“There is,” Pascal added staring at us with
his intense blue eyes. “If you kill the sisters, Dylan and their
other slaves will be freed.”

I looked at Dylan, my eyes filled with wonder
of the possibilities. His expression was unreadable. “What should
we do, Dylan?”

“You should go with your mother’s cousins. Go
back to your family,” he said sternly.

I felt so sick inside. “No, I’ll never leave
you,” I breathed as I threw myself against him.

He took my face in his hands and looked me in
the eyes. “Your parents need you.”

“No, no…” My heart ached. I shook my head in
bewilderment. “I’ll never leave you with the sirens. They’re
horrible, horrible… They should be stopped from killing more
innocent people.”

“Do mers eat human beings?” Dylan asked my
mother’s cousins.

“Most mers do,” Laurent explained. “But we
are a particular school that usually does not.”

“Usually?” Dylan asked.

“Sometimes we lose control,” he continued.
“Most of the time we feed on raw meat or live sea creatures. That
sustains us.”

“Can a siren do that?” I asked anxiously.

“I don’t know,” Laurent said in his musical
voice. “I don’t think they have ever tried. But because of your mer
ancestry, you should be able to do so with practice.”

“It’s not easy though,” Marine added in her
husky voice that came so naturally to her. “We’ll help you though,
Hailey. We’ll teach you things.”

“It gets easier,” Brigitte said, touching her
long neck lightly. I got the feeling she was remembering back to a
time when the challenge was greater. “When I first tried to refrain
myself from eating human flesh, I thought I was going to die, but
as I practiced the process became easier.”

“But we don’t want to mislead you,” Laurent
said putting his fingertips against his temples. “You will always
want humans, no matter what.”

I missed my mother and father terribly, but
the idea of leaving Dylan was too crushing to bare. “I want to kill
the sirens,” I whispered to Dylan. “Then you will be free and they
will be stopped from killing more human beings.” I thought about
how much I hated them for taking me from my family and tricking me
into being one of them. And how much pain they had brought upon my
family. They deserved to die. “I know it will be dangerous, but we
have to do it.”

Dylan tilted his head back and laughed at the
stars. I still couldn’t figure out what was going through his mind.
What was he doing? “Not a good idea,” he said to me with a smirk on
his stunning face. He sounded almost crazed. “Go with your family.
You have a way out.” His eyes looked almost maniacal.