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As always upon returning to our house on Cape Cod I first followed Alex’s heartbeat to surprise him with a kiss. I found him doing a Sudoku in a chair on the deck observing the dunes. Only someone walking on the dunes would see him here. I came to a hard stop when I was inches away from him. He tilted his head upward and kissed me on my mouth.
“You didn’t even flinch.” I raised my eyebrows.
“The first five times, my heart stopped for a moment when you suddenly appeared next to me out of the blue. Then, I told myself I should get used to it, having a Siren as a girlfriend. So, for the next hundred times, I was simply a bit irritated.” He lay his arms around my neck. “Now, however, it’s quite predictable as you’ll be gone between eight to ten hours and none of your other family members play such tricks on me.”
I sighed. “You’re officially immune to Siren magic.”
“Hah, not all of it, I believe. You’re clearly the most beautiful girl on this planet.”
“Aw, I bet you said that to all your past girlfriends.” I smiled.
“Perhaps,” he laughed. “But with you, it’s definitely true. No human woman could match your beauty or that of one of the other Sirens in your family.”
I shrugged. Talking about my beauty still made me a bit uncomfortable. As a human, my looks had been completely average. Getting noticed because of my appearance was stranger to me than not having slept in the past two years.
I gave Alex another kiss and then let go of him to check on Rey who was still lying on the couch like a dead person. I held my hands over his body, feeling an energy radiating from within him. This energy had become stronger over the past days. Even though I had never witnessed the birth of a new Siren, I felt he’d wake up soon. Only then I noticed Melissa’s husband who was doing pushups in the corner of the living room. I had never seen him working out before but now the muscles in his well-built arms were even more prominent.
“Luke, what an unusual sight. What are you doing?” I leaned against the wall next to him.
“I don’t know.” He looked up at me with his unnaturally dark eyes with some spots of bright yellow. Unlike us female Sirens he hadn’t managed to turn his pupils into something less prominent. Any human would flinch at this sight. Part of why Melissa and he had lived kind of a loner life out on Cape Cod even before the whole thing with the Night Flu started.
Luke continued with his activity. “Now that nobody is left living in our street and Alex is the only heartbeat around, I feel so energetic.” He pressed out between a couple more push-ups. Luke was one of the few lucky male Sirens who was in control of his senses and didn’t kill a bunch of innocent people. However, he’d always had more troubles than any of us with accepting the constant background thudding of human and animal heartbeats. Our instincts were very sensitive about hearts and his were even more sensitive so that too many humans in one place gave him headaches.
Luke lowered himself to the ground and groaned. “I didn’t think it would make such a difference. Maybe I’d have been better off further away from people after all.”
“You were doing fine.” I waved off. “Plus, now that the whole world feels like a prison, your behavior fits as well. At least in all the prison movies I have seen, the prisoners are working out at some point.”
Luke rolled onto his back and laughed before turning serious again. “So, nothing new from Roisin?”
“Nope.” I grimaced.
“I didn’t expect so anyway.” He ran his hand through his dark hair. “Anything else?”
“Some humans do everything in order not to have to go to a shelter. In addition, harbors have been closed.”
“Ah really? First airports, now harbors.” He jumped to his feet as swiftly as only a Siren could do it.
“It was almost creepy to approach our house. It looks as deserted as all the other ones along the road. This gray paint does its job.” I said and glanced at the barricaded window.
“It’s depressing from the inside as well”, Alex remarked, joining us in the living room. “Candlelight is losing its romantic touch.”
I sighed.
Luke retrieved another candle from the cupboard to replace a dying one. “Which reminds me, I have been in this dark hole long enough. I’m off to Eastern Europe.” He put a pin on the world map. We had scratched all the areas we had searched so far with black marker. “I’ll be back early though in case something unforeseen happens.” Luke threw another checking glance at Rey. “See you two lovebirds later.” He waved.
I rolled my eyes and took the pen to mark the islands I had visited as he disappeared.
“So, how are you doing?” I joined Alex at the dining table. “I brought you some oranges.” I placed them in front of him.
He wrinkled his nose.
“Sorry, there was nothing else.” There was no time to sneak into abandoned houses on this trip and the provisions from former stores are watched too well by the VCP.
“Thanks anyway. I never liked fruit, but I guess I can’t be too picky nowadays. I’d give a lot for a nice piece of meat though.”
“If you haven’t eaten it for long enough, you won’t even remember you once liked it. I speak out of experience.” I gave him an encouraging smile.
“That doesn’t count.” He started peeling an orange, most likely hungry after all.
“So, I met this boy on the orange plantation today.” I let go of a breath and shook my head. “He looked savaged. Nobody should have to suffer like that.”
Alex played with the orange peel and rolled it into a ball. “Yet, it’s good to know that some humans are willing to take on hardships in order to keep their freedom. We’d have a much better stand if there were more of them.”
I shrugged. “I told him he could make life easier for themselves. They could go into a shelter and then start a revolution from the inside.”
Alex narrowed his eyes and I saw his mind rumbling. “You know, that’s not even a bad idea.”
“I didn’t mean you!” I exclaimed. “We need you out here.”
He took a deep breath. “Do you? Fact is, when Rey wakes up, I have to get away from here in case he can’t resist human hearts. There isn’t anywhere I can go because if I do go out I will be discovered and I will land in a shelter anyway. And if not, who are we kidding? I wouldn’t be able to survive on my own without you guys bringing me something to eat. This isn’t the best area to steal food or water.”
I tried to stay calm. Even if he didn’t want to hear it, I needed Alex here. He gave me at least somewhat of a sense of normality. “The goal is that Rey can cope well and then you can come back here like before.”
“To do what? I’m only a burden.” He pursed his lips.
“No, you aren’t. Like you said, it’s good to have supporters outside. Plus, if you were in a shelter, we wouldn’t even be able to talk to each other. It would be like with your family.”
He sighed. “I know.”
We hadn’t heard anything from any of our friends or his family since they had gone inside the shelters. At least I was still able to check on my family in Switzerland. Even though they didn’t know I was alive, I could observe them from a distance. They still lived in their own house. However, the VCP controlled the curfew from 9 p.m. to 6 a.m.
Visiting them without showing myself to them remained a challenge. To see my sister change into a young woman and not being able to give her tips about boys and school was hard. Or not to be able to be there for her when she was scared. To be so close to them but not actually be able to talk to them sometimes tore me apart. It was like a drug. Although it hurt a little, I needed to see them. I needed to know they were okay. A status which could change quickly at the moment.
I reached into my pocket to feel the cold metal of the two remaining dragon racer whistles. They had been given to me by a family of magicians and if you blew them, a protective force field would form around the person for about a minute. I meant to give them to my family to keep them safe. However, the Orbiters made sure I wouldn’t get in touch with them until I fulfilled my part in their plan. How unfair was that? They expected of me to set an end to PaNacea and Dr. Palmer’s destruction of the magical world, but they wouldn’t even let me protect the ones I loved most. I blinked away my tears before Alex would notice them. They weren’t tears of sadness but tears of anger. The Orbiters were so powerful that I had to follow their orders and PaNacea was showing their cunningness and malice on a daily basis. On both sides, I didn’t really know who my opponent was and how I’d be able to get everyone out of this alive.
I closed my fingers around the two whistles and brought them up on the table. “Alex, you should take them as well. You might need more than one.”
Alex reached for a whistle and explored it with his fingers. “I’m too curious if this really works or if these wizards lied to you to give you some kind of placebo effect.”
I shook my head. “It will work. Have them ready wherever you go.”
In a fast movement, he pulled the whistle which he wore on a shoe lace around his neck to his lips. Then, he held his breath in order not to accidentally blow it.
I tilted my head. “Not yet faster than a bullet but with a head start, you’d at least stand a chance.”
After that, it was just waiting. Waiting for Melissa and Luke to return and waiting for Rey to finally wake up.