Syrena

let the water take me

Syrena isn’t that skilled with empathy. She vaguely notes the underlying sadness in the girl’s laugh, but she’s not entirely sure what to do with that sentiment. Syrena carried enough sorrow and regret with her to last a lifetime, and she hardly wanted to deal with someone else’s. But she also knows she’s supposed to be playing nice. Pretending to care about things like the problems of others. It’s the way to make friends, and friends are stepping stones to a better life. Which, at this point, Syrena barely has. A life, that is. She mostly wallows around the Falls pretending like she belongs, or is vaguely useful. Not that she is actually either of these things.

But then the girl speaks, the sadness formed into actual words. And this, Syrena knows, she cannot ignore (well, she can, but shouldn’t). One ear flicks in the girls direction, listening, though nothing like pity crosses her face. But what good is pity anyway? It hardly gets either one of them anywhere, but just makes them both sad. “Come,” she says after a moment, not explaining, but wading deeper into the sea. The salt water requires some effort to stay afloat, but not as much actually standing.

Thankfully, the sea is calm today, the waves relatively gentle. Syrena leads the girl deeper into the sea until they get to a place where the water is deep enough to float, but not deep enough to drown. “Is that at all better? The water is kind to joints and bones.” She’s no healer, but she knows the sea. She knows how tender the waves can be, how the water will caress and take away the pain. She may not be all that kind, but she will share the joys of the sea. It is the only thing that truly makes her happy, and at least in this, she is not selfish with that joy.

“Could you not find a magic that gives you strength?” Her passive magic is not draining. Her skin simply changes colors, and out this deep, she’s almost completely painted in shades of blues and purples. But this skill does not tired her, does not take energy or strength. But she asks the girl, because it’s not as if she understands the finer points of diseases and how they work. So the question is, actually, just a question, and not an accusation.

The girl talks more of magic though, admitting to liking dark things. This perks Syrena’s interest. Someone who wasn’t afraid of the shadows? What of monsters?, she wonders, finding it terribly strange that she’s fallen so easily into a conversation with a child. “What sort of dark magic’s have you come across?” she asks, actually interested. Go freaking figure, a little girl is quickly becoming one of her favorite companions.

"words"