Chapter 18: Chapter 18: Intimate Confessions

I stare back and gulp.

How long has he been there? How much has he seen?

I am completely naked, lying here with my legs spread and my hand between my thighs. But my arousal, my need, all the intensity of it has subsided.

I am in control.

Whatever it was, whatever these last days were, it’s finally passed.

I sit up, pulling myself out of the water, and blink as I look at him.

“You left the taps on,” he says, and I can’t help but laugh.

He clears his throat as if he is struggling and then leaves the room, but I can still sense him in the space beyond.

I get out, pull the plug, and see all the water around the floor; it has flooded the place. He is right. I did leave the taps on, though he must have turned them off. No doubt while I was still in the midst of pleasuring myself.

I grab the robe and wrap it around my body before going to find him because if I don’t, if I don’t see him now and face this, I will never be able to look at him again.

He is in the sitting room seated on the couch. His impressive body is molded into it as if this furniture was made solely for his use. He looks up as I stand in the doorway, and I blush, only slightly, but we both know it.

“Sit if you want,” he says.

I can’t tell what he’s thinking. In truth, I am amazed that he was able to be in that room with me when I was sprawled like that and yet do nothing.

That he could resist what would have undoubtedly been an overwhelming frenzy of lust.

I walk over and sit opposite him, pulling my legs under me.

“About….” I begin.

“Is that what the water does?” he asks, cutting across me.

“No,” I say.

He frowns. “I don’t understand.”

“There is a part of me that is primitive, feral, wanton,” I explain.

I can’t look at him in this moment even if I want to. I have never told anyone this and I’m unsure why I’m telling him.

“You said that before. That you control it.”

“Yes, but not always,” I say.

“So, that’s what that was?” he asks

I sigh. “No. Yes. Sort of,” I whisper, wrapping my arms around myself.

I feel so vulnerable right now, but a part of me wants to be. I want to drop my walls for this man, I realize. I want to trust him.

“You don’t have to tell me,” he murmurs.

“And if I want to?” I say, finally looking at him, and a hint of something flashes in his eyes before it vanishes.

“Tell me then,” he says quietly.

“The other part of me is old. ~Very~ old,” I explain. “It’s what the gods intended me to be. Us to be. But we evolved from that to what we are now.

“If I let that part out, let it fully take over, then she will run riot. She lives for her own hedonistic pleasure alone. She doesn’t care for consequences.

“She is what everyone desires, what drives them mad, what calls them to their deaths.

“You said before your body has needs and it’s the same with mine. I need to control her, and the only way I can do that is by giving her what she needs.”

“But surely that means…”

“Touching myself is enough. Usually, it is enough,” I say.

I know my cheeks are bright red and it feels ironic to be embarrassed talking about something so natural, so instinctive, but I am.

“So how often does that happen? Episodes like that?” he asks.

“Never. It’s never happened before,” I admit. I’m staring at the rug again.

“Do you know why it did?”

“Yes,” I say quietly and then I force myself to look at him. “I found my voice. My ~real~ voice.”

“What?” he says. He is frowning hard at me now, his eyebrows low over his beautiful eyes.

“My song,” I whisper.

His eyes widen so much that I shake under his gaze.

A siren’s song is legendary. We both know that. It’s wrapped up in every legend about my kind. Every hero who has fallen because of us has only fallen because of our song.

If I thought the creature in me was dangerous before, if Helos thought I was a risk to his people for even one fleeting second, then we both know I am so much more now.

If I were to utter it, to even whisper out the ghost of what it was, then everyone in a five-mile radius would be drawn to me, lost to me, head over heels in their own euphoric mania.

And the chaos that would ensue would leave this castle a ruin. Almost everyone would die almost certainly with me, as they would fight each other to get me.

“Did you not have it before?” he asks.

“No,” I say.

My heart is racing again. Just admitting it, just saying it out loud is enough to make my body react, though thankfully right now it just feels like panic and confusion rather than anything more salacious.

“What does it sound like?” he asks.

I can’t help but smile. “It’s the most incredible thing I’ve ever heard,” I say before I can stop myself.

He is watching me, studying my face, and I can feel his unease from where I sit.

“I won’t sing. I promise you. I won’t let a sound of it escape my lips,” I say quickly.

I don’t want him to think I’m a threat. To decide that the best way to protect his people is to lock me away somewhere—or worse, have me executed.

“Kera—” he begins.

“No, please listen to me. I know what you must think of me because of how I am, but I am not reckless, I am not wanton. I am not like my ancestors.”

“I don’t think you are,” he replies. “But your song is a part of you. Surely you need it, just as your body needs…” We both know what he is referring to.

“I can control it. I know I can. And this creature in me is as real as that song is, but I’ve never let her out, never let her take full control,” I reply.

“Never?” he repeats. “Don’t you want to?” he asks.

I balk at the question. “I can’t. I know what she would do,” I state.

“But it’s part of who you are. What you are. You cannot keep half of yourself locked away,” he says.

I shake my head. “It’s how it has to be,” I reply. “You said yourself that we all have our parts to play, and this is mine.”

He sighs, still watching me. Still obviously trying to get his head around it.

We sit there in silence for a while. Suddenly, I am cold. My hair is still damp and having just this robe on is making me shiver.

As if Helos can see it, he gets up and starts a fire. I welcome its warmth as it roars into life.

There are so many things I want to ask him, but I don’t dare.

I want to know why he has changed, why he’s being kind to me, why he takes me out, and why, most of all, he hasn’t even attempted to touch me.

But as my eyes grow heavy, I let myself drift off.

Helos is still there, but I am not concerned about his presence. The fact that he walked away earlier tells me enough.

He scoops me up into his arms and he carries me through. He lays me on my bed, and for a second, in the deepest recesses of my mind, there is fear, but I am too tired to do anything.

And then he pulls the covers over me and quietly shuts the door.