Total pages in book: 111
Estimated words: 106107 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 531(@200wpm)___ 424(@250wpm)___ 354(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 106107 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 531(@200wpm)___ 424(@250wpm)___ 354(@300wpm)
As such, I am no longer a priest. My relationship with God, whoever that may be, hasn’t changed much, but I can’t, in good faith, be a man of…good faith. I can’t be a willful hypocrite preaching from the pulpit. I slaughtered my own congregation. I am not fit to spout God’s word.
You also nailed Larimar to the cross and drank her blood, I remind myself. Truth is, I was never fit for the job, but we all knew that.
“Ah, do you see what I see?” Abe says excitedly. He points up the bay toward the port of Quintero, where a black ship appears jutting out from around the coastline. “That’s the Nightwind.”
“It’s a ship…” I say, not entirely convinced. Our eyesight is better than a human’s, but it has its limitations. But even as I say the words, I see how fast the ship is moving, despite how the seas are calm and the air is still.
And as it gets closer still, white sails full of magic wind, I begin to feel excited for the first time in a long time. There’s a perverse sense of hope too, as if this will actually lead me to Larimar. I have no idea if she was with the colony before I found her or if she returned to them after—she was quite secretive about her whereabouts, which often made me wonder what she was hiding—but either way, this will do more than I did on my own. Even with wings, I could only do so much flying over the icebergs of the southern seas. Syrens don’t need air, and there’s no reason for them to come to the surface.
Which is also why I find the idea of Syren hunters intriguing. How exactly do they find them when the oceans are so large and deep?
I suppose I’m about to find out.
If they’ll have me.
I look at Abe. He’s grinning to himself with excitement, adjusting his hat anxiously. The poor sap has been through so much, pulled from his lofty work at the monastery to come down and babysit me once again. I’m sure some part of him wanted to leave me to my own devices—but being an immortal, the chances of me dying, even as a monster, were slim, and even if he didn’t feel some sort of sentiment toward me as a friend, he does seem to have this strange urge to want to protect humanity from blood-suckers such as ourselves.
This will be good for him, I think, a chance to be away from the demands of rehabilitating monsters. Maybe the pirates need their own moral compass on board.
But will it be good for me? That remains to be seen.
If I do end up finding Larimar, what will I do to her?
Will the monster make another appearance? Will he be worse to her than he was before? Will he kill her and then disappear, leaving me to deal with the consequences? Or perhaps he’ll take over for good. I might be so despondent that I’ll fully hand over control of my body, mind, and soul.
“They’re going to ask me what I know about Syrens,” I say to Abe as I pick up my satchel with my meager personal belongings, swinging it over my shoulder. “How much should I divulge about Larimar?”
“As much as you wish,” he says as we start walking down from the ridge we’ve been standing on, heading to a winding footpath that leads to the beach. “What you tell them is up to you. On the one hand, if you’re honest, they’ll know that you didn’t join their crew just to siphon their catch. On the other hand, if you’re honest, they might think you’re there to sabotage them.”
“Why would I do that?”
“Well, you fell in love with a Syren. If they end up catching Larimar, are you telling me you wouldn’t stop them from eating her?”
A hot coal of anger burns in my gut, and I clench my fists at the thought. “She’s mine, Abe. No one else’s.”
“So you say. But if you tell them you were intimate with one of the Syrens they are hunting, there’s a chance they might toss you overboard into the oceanic abyss. They would consider you too compromised.”
I press my lips together in thought as we reach the shore. “They would be right.”
“Then perhaps we don’t tell them,” Abe says.
“They’ll want to know how I got my expertise…”
He sighs, staring out at the ocean as the ship gets closer and closer, sealing our fate. “Tell them the truth. It’s easier that way. You saw what she did to the villagers. You captured her, you brought her to your house, you fed from her, and she managed to escape one day. No need to mention the part about giving her legs. They don’t need to know about your magic yet.”