I set off an alarm in the east corner so the guards would all run there. I followed her pull until I was outside the door of a large office. I listened outside the door. I heard Dulaque speak first.
"Will she be satisfactory?" He asked in an almost bored voice.
"Yes. Half-Siren, she will be a fine edition to our group as well as the perfect queen for our king."
"And when King Titan falls?"
"She will be the wife of the leader of the new underwater world. The queen of Atlantis."
"And the trident?"
"Will be given to you in thanks for your help and resources."
"Then I will help in any way I can, my daughter will serve as a liaison between our peoples.
They will be married to seal our partnership. Have the arrangements been made?"
"Yes sir. King Darren will be coming to land for the wedding tomorrow."
Wedding? Queen of Atlantis? I would never see her again. Against my better judgment I threw open the doors. Inside was a man with webbed feet standing across from Dulaque. Next to Dulaque stood Jade. Her head had been down but she looked up when I opened the door. She frowned at me. Dulaque clapped his hands and put an arm around his daughter who flinched slightly at the touch.
"It appears my dear, despite the mysterious escape of the librarians yesterday, you've managed to trap one anyway." He went to the desk they were standing in front of and pulling a key from his jacket, unlocked the top drawer. He pulled from it a long, black, wooden box, it looked like it had water damage. He handed the box to Jade.
"I was going to save it for your wedding, darling, but I think now would be an appropriate time."
She pulled the lid off. Inside was an ornate dagger, adorned with blue and green jewels.
"It was your mothers. She used it to kill her prey, you have lived your whole life more like a human, than a siren. As queen of Atlantis you will need to be more of a siren. You have lured him in, killing him is the only logical step." Dulaque told her.
She took the dagger in her hand and twirled it in her fingers. Then she placed back in the box.
"Father, Ezekiel is not my prey. He's just another foolish man who fell for me. Foolish enough to return. Let him leave father. It is of no use to you to see him dead." She pleaded with him.
"It is of use. You need to start killing on your own or you will never survive in this world. Do not name your prey, it makes it harder to kill them." He pulled the dagger from the box and put the box on the desk. He thrust the dagger in her hand.
"Kill him." He ordered.
"Yes, father." She headed towards me with it. Only one thing came to mind, only three words left my lips. I knew they would be the last words I would speak and I knew it was the only thing I wanted to tell her.
"I love you." I told her. It felt like nothing I had ever experienced saying that to her, to anyone, for the first time.
She stopped short. She looked back at her father with a questioning look. He laughed loudly.
"Tell me Jade, what do you know of love?" He asked her.
"Love is evil. Love killed my mother. Love is foolish. Love is lies. Many men think they love me, that they would do anything for me, but they are only fooled by my siren half. A siren can never have love, because they do not know what is real and what is magical trickery, created by my siren D.N.A.. Love is a fairy tale written into history by fools, and only fools believe in it." She said as if she was reciting it.
"Very good, Jade. Why don't you ask him before he dies what he believes he means when he says he loves you. Listen to him babble on your beauty, listen to him promise you the world, hear him betray himself with the lies "love" has told him. Then when you realize what love really is, what I have always told you it is, stab the fool through the heart, watch him die still thinking he loves you, until that final moment of his life when your spell fades and he realizes how ugly you really are." He said this with a detestable smirk on his face. Jade turned to me and did as she was told.
"Tell me of your love for me. Prove to me you aren't just a fool." She almost looked like she wanted me to prove it, wanted me to discredit her father, but most of her knew it wasn't possible.
"Love is not as your father says. Love is not being drawn by your pull, by your beauty, although you are beautiful. Love is not giving you the world when you ask for it. It is escaping with my life and returning despite unavoidable death if I do." I pulled up my sleeves to reveal my arms covered in siren patches.
"Love is putting so many of these on that I could resist a full siren, that women are not only repulsive to me but kind of terrifying. So many that I would probably run in terror at the sight of a female but still thinking you are so much more beautiful than your father gives you credit for. Love is standing still in front of you, when I could run and save my life, love is staying here and letting you kill me, without running, without fighting back, because I would rather die at your hand than leave and never see you again. So, kill me Jade. Kill me knowing what love is. Kill me knowing I will love you until my final breath. Kill me knowing that my last thought will be of you. And I wouldn't have it any other way." With that I closed my eyes and waited for death.
I heard a scream, but I quickly realized it wasn't me screaming. As I opened my eyes I was being dragged down the hall only getting a glympse of Dulaque pulling the ornate dagger from his stomach. I ran with Jade hall after hall until we reached a dead end, a short hall with a locked door at the end. I tried to pick the lock, I could do it, but it was going to take a minute and I had no idea what was behind the door. Jade leaned against the wall and stared at the ceiling.
"Tell me more about love, Ezekiel." She said softly.
"I will. When we get out of here. There are hundreds of books I can give you, all about love."
"I never learned to read..." She murmured.
"Then I will read them to you." I stated blankly. I was trying to get the lock open before the guards caught us.
"It isn't any use. That door leads to an empty room." She told me. I opened the lock.
"Not anymore." I pushed open the door to reveal the library, or at least the annex. She stepped through with wonderment, I followed her and shut the door behind me. I looked around the room to see Stone and Baird practicing different fighting stances, Jenkins reading a book on sirens and Cassandra doing what I could only assume was advanced mathematical equations in her head.
"Hello?" I asked.
Baird looked up a second and Stone nodded at me.
"Hey Ezekiel." Baird said absentmindedly as she put Stone in a choke hold.
"I just went into the serpents brotherhood. I retrieved a person. And she's still breathing! I got out of there alive, and I brought her back alive! You'd think I was at the store buying milk! None of you were worried? Not even Cassandra?!"
Jenkins handed me a white envelope without looking up from his book. It had Jade's name on it. Jade was currently running around looking at books, holding them upsidown and trying to figure them out. Of course.
"Came right after you left, just sort of fell out of the ceiling." Stone grunted as he broke the hold and threw a punch at Baird only to be blocked.
"The library knew before anyone else you would both be returning." Jenkins told me.
"She's been chosen." I looked over at Jade who was biting into a peach Cassandra offered her. She smiled at me when I looked at her. Her perfect lips parting slightly to reveal pearly white teeth. I had never really spoken to the library, I kind of felt you were truely crazy when you started. Here goes. Call me crazy.
"Thank you." I whispered