Beautiful Cries

Chapter Three: Captivated

June 6, 1841

"I don't suppose you'll provide any consideration about this would you?" A young man's voice shouted as his small boat floated across the glassy sheen of the Aegean Sea.

"You supposed right young man," the older gentleman replied over the swaying docks. "I have better things to do than associate my business with a child. Find someone more foolish than I to take you on, and maybe you'll earn enough money to buy a himation."

The long, boisterous laugh followed the sea captain's words as he strolled towards his ship, leaving the young man to grumble under his breath as he pushed his anchor over the side.

"Moron," he barked in Greek, making his way to the head of the boat.

Boats rocked back and forth in the surging waves as clusters of wind pushed them further towards the docks, but not Damari. As he raced to the sails to set them on their proper course, he tossed his tattered fishing net into the waters, securing it tightly against a notch in the side of his boat.

Pulling out a small bronze coin, Damari held it in front of his body and stared out across the waters, the moon's hazy glow reflecting against his sun burned face as his thoughts drifted.

"Tyche," he whispered, his thumb rubbing over the coin's filmy surface, "please grant me the fortune of bringing home sustenance for my family. We need this desperately and I need to prove myself to them...that I can take care of them."

An uneven sigh left him as he tossed the coin into the glittering masses, watching it slip and slide to the bottom of the sea.

"It was worth the try," he grumbled, dusting off his hands as he moved to the front of the vessel. "Maybe she'll decide to hear me this time."

He propped himself against the railing of his boat and tipped the chair he was sitting in back, dropping a thick cloth over his stinging eyes.

A short time later, a small ringing like that of a child's laughter wafted across the breeze. Damari jerked out of the chair to see the net's small tin bell shaking on its cord as darting

"Perhaps the Goddess really is looking out for me," he laughed, hauling in the net furiously with his leaden weights, eyes widening at the fish that flopped on his deck in hopeless attempts to reach the water.

Mirth danced in his vivid electric blue eyes as he began counting the fish that he would keep for his family and sell to the merchants in the port near Athens. A splash alerted him to movement at the from of the big, but he continued hauling in the net, for he was too involved with the number of fish on his deck to care if a small turtle or shark had managed to swim by.

However, it was none of these creatures, but the distinct flash of gold and silver beneath the surface of the water couldn't have been anything else than the servants bound to Demeter's burning curse...

Sirens.

~~~~~~

Alena had found her way into the populated coves of the port in search of food as another siren skirted just at the edge of her tail. Jesenia was her name, but that was all the siren had been willing to say a few months before when Alena had discovered her caught in the clutches of a barbed net.