Blue

The Strawberry Moon

The Ensigns had to shuffle between the water and the beach to avoid tourists and beachgoers every day. It was strange to wait with the sirens and to watch them swim and chatter together. They swirled around like water sprites, stopping only to speak to each other. Adam had long made note of the fact that the sirens seemed to have an incessant need for activity; if they paused to speak, their hands were occupied. Sometimes, this was focused on food, ripping it, bringing it to their mouths, passing it to each other, and sometimes, it was as simple as one siren creating intricate hairstyles on another as she spoke to a third.

The Ensigns watched them silently.

They had tried to speak to the Ensigns a few times, but there was too much of a disconnect between the hearing and non-hearing. Curtis had begun to attempt to teach one of the sirens their sign language, but it was tedious just to watch and thus Blue was the only other siren to attempt learning with them. Adam spoke lightly with Blue, though it was... unfulfilling. It took too long to get her to understand what he was trying to say, and if she brought another siren into the conversation, he had to do double the work. It was a feat of patience and disappointment to try and speak to her. She would cut things out entirely if she had to repeat things too often, and would never explain if she and a siren were laughing about something, claiming that it didn't really matter. Adam supposed that it didn't matter, but there was just something so... isolating about the way she wouldn't even try.

On the sixth day of this, Adam didn't bother to move over to Blue. She looked at him, a question clear on her face, but he just shook his head. She moved over to where Curtis was attempting to teach the other siren. He shifted his back towards them, facing the open sea. He knew Blue was shooting him that worried look still. In some ways, she was exactly the same. She had always been able to read him like a book, but what was the point in that? He couldn't even understand what she was saying most of the time. A sudden shiver sparked uncomfortably across his spine. What if she was never able to learn? Perhaps it was only for the Ensigns, who were dead in every way that mattered, a magic reserved only for the soldiers of the sea.

It was a relief when the waxing gibbous finally conceded and the full moon rose. The Ensigns crept onto the beach, hiding their dripping bodies behind the driftwood structure they had slowly constructed. Adam waited, his eyes peering through the openings to look for anyone coming onto the beach. The Ensigns did not speak, did not move, and hardly breathed.

A car was pulling up in the distance, visible only by the sharp, prodding light of the headlights. It must have been a black car, as Adam could hardly see the body of it at all. He gripped the sword tightly in his hand, feeling the reassuring clench of it like the handshake of an old friend. This was his final battle. The anticipation was killer.

A man stepped from the car, his hair glimmering silver in the moonlight. It was the only visible thing about him at that distance, until he opened the trunk, bathing his face in light, and wrenched someone out, her body fighting weakly. He plodded down the opening to the beach, looking alertly from side to side, checking to see if any bystanders were milling about on the empty beach as he dragged the girl across the sand.

So he was still careful, after all this time.

The girl's feet skidded helplessly across the sand, finding no place to take root as she struggled. They moved closer to the waves, granting Adam the first sight of the silver haired man's face.

He looked like anyone else.

There was nothing remarkable about him. He wasn't particularly young or old. Other than his empty, nasty expression, there was no particular feature that would have marked him as individual, or evil. He was a man. A man in his mid forties, if Adam had to guess. There was no way to figure out his career or his past times. How he knew about sirens at all, or why he was killing women in order to create a siren army. The only notable thing about him was the strange silver blonde shade of his hair, and the fact that he was dragging this girl across the beach to the waves, one hand gripped tightly in her hair and the other on the rope that bound her wrists.