Black Pearl

Chapter 3

I stood on the shore with the wind whipping my hair and my sisters huddled around me. I said goodbye to everyone individually, hugging my mother and a few of the girls that had always been kind to me. Everyone told me something different. The young girls who had only ever known the island gushed about all the things I would see and taste. The older women, our mothers and grandmothers, warned me of those who would seek revenge and how complicated and nonsensical the humans were. 

Once every siren had said her piece, we all stood together somberly, on the rocks.

"I've never seen a dress as fine as this," Oceana sighed, stroking the side of the bodice in wonder.

"That cape could be enough to make one of the younger girls a complete dress, it's rather selfish, don't you think?" River piped up.

At that point, our leader who had been silent and steady, stepped forward. "Ember is going to the human world as a princess. She must look the part. So few will no of her real identity. We need our alliances strong, and when she returns to us, one scrap of velvet will seem like nothing. Because of her, we will have vegetables some of you have never tasted, fruit bearing trees, and maybe some dried meat," the queen announced, putting a protective arm around my shoulders. "Ember is making a great sacrifice for us."

The pressure pushed down on me harder and harder with each statement she made. I couldn't do this. I should have backed out hours ago. I should have told her the truth. But I was a coward, a coward who wanted her secret to remain just that, locked away forever, never to be found.

At the very least I wished that I had fought harder to keep my dagger. Not only would it remind me of home, it would keep me safe. But it was stowed away, sitting in a velvet box. The queen promised I could take it with me when I returned.

"You will do wonderful things for all of us," Oceana enthused. She threw her arms around me in a tight hug and whispered in my ear, "I know the queen has said nothing, but all of the children who have been brought to this island are grown. We need human men to carry on our species. And it wouldn't hurt to have a new pair of shoes," she giggled. "You will be the first to experience so many new things."

When she released me, I knew she had spotted a ship on the horizon just by the way her face fell.

"Oh, quickly, your crown," the queen gasped. I had thought that she would hoist her own crown out of her hair, bestowing the tangle of pearls and shells into my hair. Instead, she retrieved a small box from a satchel and opened it.

It was just a small circlet made of interlocks golden circles, but all the girls gasped in surprise. When was the last time they had seen gold that was not on the queen's crown? Presumably never.

I should have felt honored, overjoyed. I was the first person to receive any kind of jewelry on this island in years, decades even. But when that crown was placed upon my head, I only felt like a fraud. At least if I had taken the queen's, I would have been carrying a part of my siren lineage with me. Now, velvet and gold were portraying me as something other than I was.

There were no tearful goodbyes when the ship finally arrived at our shores. My mother kissed my hair and told me she was proud of me. It seemed that the pride overrode any sadness that should have been there.

Oceana made me promise to be safe and to keep a diary if I could. She wanted to know every little detail and I was not allowed to forget anything. She sealed her meaning with an additional wink and hugged me one last time.

For everyone else, this seemed like some big, wonderful adventure.

But they hadn't been thrown down on cobble stone streets. They hadn't been harassed and assaulted. They hadn't stared at the sky and wondered if death was the punishment for leaving the island. 

Still, when two uniformed guards assembled a platform for me to board the boat, the girls behind me sighed with delight. All of the pent up hormones took control over the years of wary isolation. All they saw was fine clothing, clean boots, and handsome- distinctly male- faces. I saw the hands that curled with strength, arms that could move chunks of wood that weighed more than me.

"Be safe, Ember! Take care! Don't forget us!" the girls all shouted as I boarded the massive boat.

It was the first part of the human world that I would touch. I had seen them from afar, watched them bob by our island, saw them when I swam up to the human shores. Somehow, standing on the wood, being so high above the water and using the wind to command the beast seemed blasphemous. 

But humans didn't know the water like sirens did. They didn't have the power to ask amazing things of the liquid. My sisters could have snapped their fingers and the water would have rose and fell to their command. They could have even turned the water into sharp whips that snapped the air, cracking like thunder.

But I could do none of those things. Because, if I had any power at all, I would have raised the tides so high they would capsize the boat.

Then, I would have swam back to my sisters. I would have had another night with my sisters, maybe longer. Maybe I could have admitted my crimes and never been allowed to leave the island in the first place.

I was no great siren though. In fact, with a name like Ember and no powers to speak of, I wondered if I was a siren at all. 

My family and sisters faded away from me as the ship began moving. I waved at them as long as I could, willing the tears to stay at bay. Once they were no more than specks on the horizon, I dropped my arm, laid my head against the splintered wood, and began to sob.