The Silver Siren (27 page)

Xiven. I couldn’t help but use what
little physical energy I had left—

To slap him.

Chapter 26

“
Ouch! What in heaven did you do that for?” Xiven grunted as
he continued to keep a hurried pace as he jogged away from the hall
where Sevril and Tomac were fighting.

“
Put me down! Put me down
before I kill you,” I seethed. His hands loosened and I dropped
unceremoniously to the ground. My feet barely caught me.

“
Now, Thalia! It’s not
like you think. I mean…it is like you think, but really it’s
not.”

“
You work with Talbot.
You’re part of the Septori,” my voice carried loudly and echoed.
Xiven winced and looked around helplessly.

Feet pounded down the hall, and then
an out of breath Sevril appeared. “Quick, let’s move her before
Tomac gets up. I hit him hard, but he could wake up in a
rage.”

“
Where are the Elite when
you need them?” I called out as I picked up my skirt and followed
Sevril up a staircase and down to a landing. Xiven stayed right on
my heels.

“
They’ve learned not to
deal in family affairs,” Sevril huffed as he continued to run. He
went to the third door and pushed it open, waiting for us to pass
through before he closed it. After locking it, he stepped away from
it. After a second thought, Sevril pushed a large trunk in front of
the door for added support.

I glanced around the room and was
quickly able to deduce it was Sevril’s personal suite. A very large
four-poster bed stood in the center of one wall, with curtains all
around, drawn to keep the light out. A sizeable table covered with
scrolls, quills, and journals was off to the side. Candleholders
littered every space available with candles, long since burned out.
A hefty plate filled with half-eaten food sat forgotten on a
stool.

All of these were signs that Sevril
probably slept through the day and spent many nights awake. Xiven
ran his hands through his hair and took a deep relieved
breath.

An animal-like scream erupted from the
hall as a heavy body was thrown against the door, and Xiven
jumped.

Laughter followed by a singsong voice
carried through the thick wood. “Come out, come out! It’s time to
play!”

I found myself stepping farther away
from the door in terror, eyes glued to the rattling
handle.

The pounding continued.

None of us spoke as we waited for
Tomac to stop. It was a half candle mark later when we heard him
call out to a passing servant.

“
Hey, is that a cobbler I
smell coming up from the kitchen?” Someone mumbled an answer. “It
is? Oh boy! I love cobbler.” A few seconds passed and then he
called out again to the servant. “You haven’t seen my brother, have
you?”

Then we heard nothing.

“
What was that?” I
whispered, letting the fear show in my voice.

Sevril turned to look at me. “An
episode. It seems that we all get moments of blackouts where we do
terrible things and hardly remember them. It’s why we were
desperate enough to turn to Xiven and the Horden journals for
answers.”

Xiven moved forward, but I pointed my
finger up at him. “Not you! You can sit over there, where I can see
you. And you, Prince Sevril, can start at the
beginning.”

Sevril looked taken aback, but he
rubbed his chin and then asked. “Okay, so how much do you know
about Sirens?”

“
Gideon dumped that
information on me a few hours ago. We’ve got Denai, Sirens, blah
blah blah, and Sirens have no power and are going crazy. But that
doesn’t explain what
he’s
doing here.” I pointed to Xiven again, who had
moved the tray of food off of the stool and sat there, waiting
patiently as instructed.

“
I am kind of a mystery,
aren’t I?” Was he trying to lighten the mood?

“
Shut it.” I turned on him
and he looked down at his hands and stayed quiet.

Sevril snorted in response. He moved
to the table, picked up a cloth napkin, and poured water from the
pitcher onto it. Then, he handed it to me. I stared at it with a
look of confusion.

Sevril looked at me sheepishly and
then glanced at the floor. “Uh, your neck.”

How could I have forgotten the wound?
It had stopped bleeding, but now I was streaked with blood and my
dress had stained a dark black. I dabbed at the bloodstain, but
when I pulled the cloth away, it was still black.

“
Blistering son of a
scorpion, why is it still black?”

“
It’s just you. It’s who
you are.” Sevril stated. I wiped at my neck furiously, but the
cloth kept coming away black.

I could feel myself start to panic. It
was the dreams—the dreams were becoming real.

Xiven glared at Sevril in obvious
frustration. He came over to me, grabbed a knife off the table, and
made a quick slice down the palm of his hand. He held up his hand
and I could see rich, red blood making a fine line across
it.

Prince Sevril winced at Xiven’s
actions, but held up his hand for Xiven to pass him the knife. A
second later, Sevril mirrored Xiven’s actions and held up a hand
lined with dark black blood. “Do you want any more proof you are
not human or Denai? You’re Siren.”

“
But it wasn’t always like
this. You did something to me!” I tossed the wet and bloody napkin
on the table and went and sat down on an empty stool. I made sure
to turn just enough that I wouldn’t have to make direct eye contact
with Xiven.

Sevril let out a rush of air and tried
to explain, “If you had grown up in Sinnendor that would have
always been the color of your blood. It would have eventually
turned black like mine—a sign of royalty and a sign that you are
indeed Siren. It was only because you lived in Calandry and away
from our lands that you showed more human characteristics. There
were rumors that the Valdyrstal clan living in Calandry weren’t
exhibiting the same traits as us. The only thing we could think of
was that maybe the trait had died out genetically. Or somehow,
because they were living on Denai land, it balanced it
out.”

There was that word again.
Balance.

He shifted in his seat and continued.
“Thelonia went looking for your father as a means of escaping her
own curse. We don’t know if she found it or was ever cured because
she died a few years later. But it seems she succeeded in raising
an heir to the throne that isn’t…well, useless like me.” He smiled
feebly and his hands started to scratch at his skin, like something
was crawling under it.

“
What about the
Septori?”

Xiven leaned forward. “My story was
similar to yours. All I know is the Septori—they are my family. Or
were.”

“
You admit this and yet
you want me to trust you?”

“
No, I just want you to
listen.”

I was about to say more but pinched my
lips together and crossed my arms.

“
I have no memories before
my time with them. I don’t even know how old I am.” Xiven paused
and stared at the back of his hands as he held onto his
knees.

I nodded my head in encouragement for
him to continue. Having no memories was something that I could
relate to.

Xiven continued, “They ingrained in me
their convictions, their mantra, and their cause for a better
future for the Denai. I had no reason to argue with them. They
convinced me that they had the key to helping the Denai regain
their former glory.” Xiven stood up, lifted up his shirt and turned
around to show me the Septori brand on his upper back. “We have to
be willing to be branded, to show that we are willing to inflict
pain as well as endure pain for the good of Denai kind.”

I flinched and had to look away. It
was uncomfortable for me to hear this, making me feel sympathy for
those who did this to me. I couldn’t allow my feelings to be
swayed. But his words made sense, they were doing this for the good
of Denai and the map with the tokens centered around Haven filled
my mind.

Xiven saw my hesitation and spoke.
“Thalia, if you don’t want me to continue, I’ll stop. Just say the
word.”

“
No, I need to know what
else happened. I want to know what you know,” I
answered.

Xiven looked grim but kept
going. “I think I was a scholar’s apprentice or something before I
lost my memories, because I know how to read complex formulas,
translate ancient texts and languages, and build things.” He
clenched his hands together in frustration. “They used me to
translate these journals and I was kept on a tight leash. I didn’t
complain, because I was completely fascinated by the whole idea and
process. Of
course
I wanted to see if it worked. I was only allowed to set it up
and watch. It didn’t take long to figure out that what they were
doing was wrong.”

“
Of course it’s wrong.
People died.” I stated. My skin crawled when I looked at Xiven—and
at the realization that he may have seen me being
tortured.

“
Not you! Not Kael,” Xiven
answered, a knowing look appeared in his eyes.

“
Luck,” I said.

“
I had heard about you
long before I met you. You surprised the Raven, Talbot said. You
reacted differently than the others, differently than the Denai.
Sirens thrive on pain, anger, and destruction. Your anger made you
stronger. More volatile, and that was intriguing. I heard that in
one of the sessions, you actually destroyed the machine.

“
No, I didn’t. I would
remember that.”

“
I’m just telling you what
I heard. You didn’t show evidence of any Denai traits at the time,
because you were definitely not Denai. That’s what alerted the
Raven to the existence of the Sirens here in our world. I had found
the name of the race repeated over and over in the Horden journals.
You were just proof that they truly existed.”

“
I thought I was turning
into a monster,” I sighed and rubbed my arms, trying to make the
goose bumps running up my spine go away.

“
All I can say is that the
news of your escape traveled fast. The Raven wanted you captured
quickly and silenced. There was even a bounty placed on your head,
but the attempts to collect you kept failing. Thanks to the
SwordBrother.” Xiven smiled slightly.

“
Yeah, Kael takes his job
very seriously.”

Xiven wiped his palms on his pants and
looked at me. “They didn’t know he was a SwordBrother. They thought
he was part Denai, so you could just imagine their shock when they
accidentally bonded the two of you. Now you are a hybrid of the two
races. Which made the Raven value your gifts even more. Not only
were you collecting more traits than any of the others, your Siren
powers were coming through and you were bonded to a SwordBrother.
You were the ultimate threat,” Xiven started to chuckle
wanly.

“
Why did you leave? Why
are you here?”

“
I didn’t want to be a
part of what the Septori were doing. I started to feed the Septori
false information in the translations of the journals. Which
unfortunately led to more failed experiments.”

“
Deaths of innocents.” I
snapped. Xiven flinched as if my words physically hit
him.”

He licked his lips and continued,
“Raven was beginning to distrust me, so he sent me with Talbot and
Mona for collection.”

“
Collection?” I let the
word slip out.

“
Kidnapping. It was all
the same. We needed Denai.” He shrugged his shoulders and gazed at
the ground. “What the machine actually did was slowly strip a
person’s power and convert it into a liquid serum. Ultimate power
in a bottle. Sometimes the Denai lived through it and sometimes…”
Xiven shivered. “All that was left was a hollowed shell of a
being.”

“
Why? Why would you do
something so horrible?”

Xiven stood up, his eyes blazing in
indignation. “I didn’t know any better. I felt trapped. I stayed
until I learned all I could. I pretended to go along with
everything, translating the books, writing up plans, and then I
watched what they did and I felt sick to my stomach. When I saw
with my own eyes how powerful you were, I realized the Raven wasn’t
going to stop with just you. There were hints, things said, that
lead to a much larger plan. And since the secret of the Sirens was
out, I had to act. In Skyfell, in that moment of chaos when I
thought I’d killed you. It was my only chance.”

“
You left me to die!” I
screamed at him. “If it wasn’t for Hemi and Fanny, I wouldn’t even
be here.”

“
I know. It was wrong of
me. But I did it. And I fled to Sinnendor. I had learned enough to
follow the Siren bloodline and went to the source.”

Prince Sevril leaned forward and
scratched the back of his head. “He admitted freely what he had
done and we began to talk. We believe we can alter the machine to
help with our Siren curse.”

“
By breaking the seal on
your power?” I asked.

Xiven shook his head no. “We don’t
want to make Sevril stronger by injecting him with Denai gifts.
Instead, we’ve chosen a safer alternative. We’ve just decided to
strip every essence of Siren blood from him. We do it in small
steps, not as painful. And much easier to monitor.”