“Alright, Penthoseren,” Jarissein said, panting. He barely managed to catch up to her. She was fast, even in demonic form. She sprinted through the trees in her leather archer’s attire, weaving among them like she could predict their placement.
He fell behind, bending over to put a hand to his knee and regain his breath. He panted and called out louder, “Hey, cat, where are you?!”
He heard a whisper behind him, “Jarissein,” calling his name. Fear shot through him as he whipped around to find an arrow pointed between his eyes, the sharp head only an inch from his flesh. He chuckled shakily. “You almost gave me a heart attack, you sneaky feline!”
She giggled and lowered her weapon, ears relaxing as she brushed away a strand of hair. It was so odd to watch her shoot—she was left-handed in everything but writing. He had never seen a left-handed archer, much less one that could put an arrow in the eye of a squirrel from six trees away against the wind. “Come, I want to show you something. Something only I’ve ever seen before. I’ve never even shown—him,” she said, whispering the last few words. Arielle had trouble saying his name. He knew that it killed her inside to not have heard word from him in more than three weeks.
But in that short time, Jarissein and Arielle had become close friends. Jarissein only ever showed emotion around the princess, locking it away around everyone else. He knew that if he did any different, it meant punishment. Possibly death, if they found out he was befriending his charge.
He let her tug him along, slinging her bow across her back and putting the arrow away. He noticed her leather corset left a strip of skin between it and her leather skirt, showing elegantly sculpted hip bones and strong back and abdominal muscles. She was so perfect for the Realm. She was warmly beautiful, unlike the cold Anora and the exotic Iressa. She looked like a human dryad, someone whose soul was married with the trees but not quite part of them. She could swim so well as to race the fishes of the fresh water, and wielded a bow as well as any huntsman, even better. And she was kind, always praying over her kills, wishing their Lightforms (Light’s part of the body that was similar in makeup to a soul, but made completely of the creature or person’s exact amount of Light in their bodies) away to the Light Guardian. Arielle Penthoseren was truly a queen to him. Much better than her oldest, vain sister would be, or her soft and emotional middle sister.
His train of thought was derailed when she lead him to a part of the island he’d never been. It was colorful in the twilight, but the air was strange. He heard no birds and smelled nothing but . . . was that silver?
She stood upon the white shore and immediately tossed her bow to the sand, stripping off her clothing. He shook his head. They were comfortable with each other now, both being shape-shifters. Once she had unlaced her leather corset, he began shedding his armor. “What are we doing, cat?”
She looked over her shoulder, through a curtain of light brown hair and smiled at him. “You’ll see.” He growled in frustration. She turned and leapt into the water of the sea.
He stood bewildered; the wind coming off the water was strangely cold. He noticed that the sun was shrouded through a thin veil of grey mist. “I know where we are,” he called after her, realization suddenly dawning on him. Her head poked up through the water, her bangs plastered to her forehead. “We’re in Penthafjeim. The Dream Shores.” She smiled big and beckoned to him, slipping back beneath the oddly grey water. He steeled himself for the cold, and leapt.
Jarissein could not have been more mistaken. The waters of the Penthos were surprisingly lukewarm. He came back up, gasping as the cold wind whipped his face. He noticed Arielle had gone further out, until all he could see of her was a pale dot bobbing on the surface. He took a deep breath and dove, swimming out to join her.
She was stunning against the grey, the teal part of her eyes shining against the water, the grey blending in. She floated on her back as he came up next to her. “The water here is magic. It shows you your dreams, the truth about yourself you may have never known. The future, if it is feeling generous.”
“I know the legends, princess,” he said. He bit his tongue as she looked at him sharply. More memories of that black-haired bastard. He hated that Germaine’s memory was hurting her. It was one thing he couldn’t protect her against.
Arielle laid back again. “What do you wish to see, my friend?” she said, closing her eyes.
He thought about it, floating next to her as the waves carried them about. “The truth,” he said finally. All his life, Jarissein Banviete had been a mystery to himself, a child raised by his uncles to be a warrior, nothing more or less. “I want to know who I am.”
Arielle smiled a little, and dove backward, disappearing below the water with little splash. Jarissein followed suit, but a little less graceful. He had never understood how Arielle could be so accustomed to trees and sky and sea, all separate and very different, but acting as if she had lived in them all her life.
He held his breath as he caught up to Arielle. She was floating about ten yards below the surface, eyes closed, hair floating around her like a protective aura. She opened her eyes as Jarissein came up next to her. “The water is fine,” she promised, somehow talking below the waves. Seeing his confusion, she said, “I can breathe here. I don’t know how. Maybe the water welcomes home its own blood. You try.”
Jarissein was afraid, but opened his mouth. Water flooded in, and he expected to feel the sear of pain as he drowned, but it felt like liquid air to him. He breathed in the Penthos as though it were oxygen. “How is this possible?” he whispered.
She shrugged. “The Sea is a part of us. All of us. We all were born of it. Maybe it thinks you and I have some sort of connection to it. I do not know. But I know it welcomes me with open arms.”
He looked at her, really looked at her, and realized how old she appeared. Young of face and body, but her soul and mind were aged beyond her years. He wondered how it could be so. Had she so much knowledge of the world?
“Jarissein,” she said. “We must find the water spirits that live here. Within the Sea of Dreams. They call themselves Sirens, a bastardization of the last half of my name, seren, which means ‘keeper.’” She turned without another word and swam further out to sea.
Arielle had visited the Sirens many times before. Now that she had someone with her, she doubted they’d show themselves. But still, she owed the boy of the Guard something. He had kept her company in these darkening days, and he had been kind to her.
She pushed further out, glancing back now and then to see Banviete following her. She smiled a little to herself.
The Sirens themselves were creatures of the moon and sea. They sang songs to noble sailors or fishermen and kept lonely islanders company out of sheer goodness. The Sirens were by no means evil, but they were indeed mysterious.
Legend had it that the Sirens were the true keepers of the Sea. But Arielle knew different. When the Realm was young, Qhetelkelen fell in love with a Siren by the name of Lalona. It was against the laws of the Siren. So, after Lalona gave birth to the first Penthoseren, whose name has been lost to time, she was executed.
Qhetelkelen, in his sorrow, asked the Sirens to keep the Dream Shores. With their magic, they held the future and past and present. They agreed to his terms, and stayed forevermore in the grey waters of Penthafjeim.
A sister of Lalona had told Arielle the story when she discovered the Dream Shores. She lamented the tale, and warned Arielle against using the term “Siren.” It offended the keepers of the Dream Shores, according to her.
So Arielle swam into the deeps of the Penthos, and asked knowledge of the Sirens. They granted her a vast collection of visions from the Guardians of the Infinity about the Realms. Arielle knew there were a limitless number of Guardians and Realms, and that she now knew only a sliver of the Realms, but she yearned for more. They, the Sirens, allowed her to return regularly to glean more knowledge of the Realms from them.
This journey was different. She had a Banviete with her.
In the days of Qhetelkelen, the Realm was at war with itself. It cost many of Penthos’ new occupants their lives, along with the sons of Qhetelkelen and his wife, Naranu. Qhetelkelen’s only remaining son was Lalona’s.
The final, deciding battle of the war was called the Battle of the Elements. The four elements of the Realm were at each other’s throats—air fighting water, water fighting earth, earth fighting fire, and fire fighting them all.
In the end, fire was put down, the other three rising up against it. The elements were split up among the new clans. Narientel, the dragons opposing Qhetelkelen’s rule, took upon themselves only the power of fire. The Banviete clan, whose beginner was a wolf-dragon that was born not from the ocean but from the soil, took a little of each element. And the other known clan, the Penthoseren—Qhetekelen’s family—took only three. Air, water, and earth. They viewed fire as corruption.
The surviving Banvietes and Penthoserens saw the hurt that the war had done to the Sirens. Though the Banviete clan had battled with the Penthoseren and Sirens, they begged forgiveness of the White Dragon. As a show of good faith, they set to healing the wounded water creatures—Sirens and Penthoseren clan members. Peace was had.
So she swam on, a descendant of the Earthdogs behind her, off to find her kin.
Jarissein followed Arielle for what seemed like hours. He swam tirelessly, as though he was carried by the current, but he could never quite catch up to her.
Arielle stopped suddenly, looking around. “They’re here. Whatever you do, don’t tell them your name. They’ll use it against you.”
“How—how do you know?”
She smiled. “Qhetelkelen was in love with a Siren. His child was half Siren, half dragon. The Sirens are very persuasive of song and words and body. I am part Siren. Why do you think my family are all beautiful? Oh, and don’t call them Sirens. They’ll kill you.” With that, she turned and loosed a high, sweet note. One that would shame her mother’s own singing voice. It pierced the water, vibrating outward as his lids fluttered closed and he succumbed to the music of her voice.
When he opened his eyes, a swirl of silver was circling them. Hundreds of beings, skin the color of the moon, twirled and twisted and sneered at them. They all had silver hair and eyes, the pupil white as their skin. They wore milky strands of seaweed for clothing, and looked like ghosts to him.
Arielle floated in the center, calm and smiling, as if welcoming home friends. “Kin sisters, we have come to inquire of your services.”
He caught many soft, sultry voices, whispering all around. “He smells of the earth,” “He’s a wolf!” “Why did she bring him here?” “His kind is forbidden.”
“What do you mean, my kind?” he asked, suddenly confident, but insulted.
One broke the circle and swept by him, her face inches from his. “You are Banviete. Earthdog,” she said. He looked to Arielle for specification.
“You are a Banviete,” she repeated. “They are said to have risen from the earth, whereas Penthoseren rose from the sea. My kin do not take well to Earthdogs.”
He smirked. “And yet they allow me in their watery realm, alive.”
They stopped, drifting slowly. “Your ancestors healed us when we were harmed. We hope you are like them.” He noticed they spoke in unison, like mindless drones. “Speak your wish, Sister,” they said to Arielle.
“It is not my wish, blood of my ancestors. It is the earthdog’s.” She turned to Jarissein, looking at him with solemn teal-grey eyes. “Speak it.”
He looked from her to the circling mass. “My wish is to see the truth about who I will become, dear ladies of the sea. I know I am not worthy of such a gift, being from the earth, but I would be grateful if you granted me the knowledge.” He had no idea where the words came from, but they were there, flowing from his mouth like the water he inhaled.
The Sirens tightened the circle. “Are you certain this is your wish? Once you have seen into the Path, you will not be able to change it,” one of them spoke, alone. He nodded. “So be it.”
They isolated him from Arielle, but she seemed to take this very well. Then, the attacked him, singing loudly. They pulled at him with their hands, tugging hair and flesh and everything they could hold on to. Their tune was as chaotic as their motions. His shouts were muffled by the water, and he felt his mind slipping. Then, they were gone as swiftly as they came, taking his consciousness with them.
He awoke in the water, floating freely beneath the surf. No one was around, and as he shouted, he heard nothing but his own voice.
When he turned, he was startled to find one of the Sirens floating behind him. Her hair would have been down to her feet if she had been on land, but it floated around her like a cloud of moonlight. “Jarissein Banviete,” she said in a soft voice.
“How do you know my name?”
She smiled. “We are of the Sea. There are some things even a princess can’t shield her mind from. Her kin are one of them.” She waved a hand over his face. “Before you are the images of your future. See them, and admit them to your heart, for they are what is coming. And there is no changing it.” And she disappeared.
The water before him shimmered, and pictures floated by. An image of Arielle, round-bellied and laughing. An image of himself being relieved of his Oath to the Guard. An image of himself kissing Arielle. An image of gore and death and something small and lifeless in his hands. One of the Narientel, crazed as they fought. Arielle, dying slowly, bleeding from her abdomen. The Realm crumbling. A white light and then nothing.
He shouted as the nothingness brought him out of his dream state. He gasped, tasting water and feeling the same weightlessness beneath the waves. He looked around. The Sirens were gone, and Arielle floated next to him. Her hair haloed out, giving her an angelic look. He reached a hand up to brush her cheek, whispering her name, before he lost consciousness again.
Arielle smiled as he said her name, kissing his forehead. “Sleep, earthdog. I will bring us back to shore.” She took him beneath the arms with her tail, wrapping it around him, as she glided through the water, back to shore.
Dragging him out proved harder than she thought. Not to mention she was suddenly tired. But then, she was always tired after dealing with the Sirens. They seemed to steal the energy from her, sucking life from her marrow. It was an enigma, one she would never solve, but she always expected it.
Once upon land, she shrugged into her archer’s attire and folded his clothes, setting them next to him. With a smile in his direction, she was gone.
Jarissein woke alone. Arielle was gone, but he was on the sand with his clothes beside them. He put them on, shivering into the cold silver armor. He was distracted as he plodded through the trees back to the palace in search of Arielle.
The Siren had told him that what he had seen was true. It would happen. Those gruesome, happy, sad, and dangerous sights he had seen would happen. But how long did they have left before the dreams came true?