Siren Songs and Black Market Sails ~ Roses & RippledStatic

[Abovetheroses]

The moon was full, hanging high in a starless sky over the large coastal city. Silver tendrils danced on the calm waves as the moon's distorted reflection was carried out in all directions. A cool breeze blew in off the water, cooling the city down from the heat of the summer day but most of the people were asleep by now. And those that weren't were busy packing up their shops, preparing for their bright and early openings in the morning.

The city was the stronghold of the Donagall Kingdom. It was peaceful prosperous kingdom, not really involved in many wars or rebellions but like any place they had their fair share of thieves and black market scoundrels. King Hector ruled with a kind and merciful hand, alongside him was his wife, Queen Hannah. Their kindom survived on mostly trading and fishing, being on the cost, it was a great asset. It was also great tactically, but they never really had a need for it. For years The king and queen ruled happily, but something was missing from their life. An heir. The queen, unable to conceive grew desperate. She knew if anyone found out a child not of their blood were to take the thrown, it could cause chaos, but they needed an heir…

That’s when they found Lile.

With their keep situated on the beach, it was easy to spot the shipwrecked woman on their shore. When the guard came to them, the king and queen rushed to the woman only to discover a horrifying secret. She was no survivor, but some creature, half human half fish, and the babe in her arms was just like her. The Queen begged her husband to spare the child so he did and Lile survived but her mother was slaughtered and returned to the sea.

For the next twenty years the king and queen raised the baby as their own. They discovered a way to hide her secret and raise her as a human. But still they kept her secluded from most of the world. At last they had an heir. Now the only problem would be finding someone they could trust enough with her secret. They had already killed numerous people who had gotten too close to finding out.

~​

Lile took a deep breath of the cool night air as she stepped out onto the private beach beside her family’s keep. It was a small secluded place that once had walls and fences but during her teenage tantrum years she convinced her parents to tear them down. Unknown to her, the consequences of removing those barriers resulted in more then a few passersby catching a glimpse of the bathing princess and therefore the king had them executed.

It was the same ritual she did every night though, to keep her body calm and what her parents referred to as ‘normal’. Her guards knew better than to disturb her so once she was alone, the young woman stripped off her dress and let it fall to the almost white sand around her feet. Golden hair almost glowed in the moonlight as she stepped into the cold water. She shivered, goosebumps breaking out across her pale skin but she smiled before she dove in the whole way.

That’s when something miraculous happened beneath the water. Scales ruptured from her skin along her wrist and elbows. More showed up along her spine and hips as her legs fused together and created one strong thick muscle coated in shimmering blue-green scales.

Every night the princess bathed in the ocean. It rejuvenated her, rehydrated her. If she failed to do so her body would start to show her scales and revert back to this, its natural state, on dry land. Lile never knew she was any different from the rest of the world. Her parents didn’t let her have friends so she just assumed that everyone had to do what she did to survive. It was the only life she knew so she didn't know any better.

The woman broke the surface of the water and smoothed her long locks out of her face, grinning a pearly white smile. She loved the water and loved swimming, but another rule, she wasn’t aloud to stray too far. Bright sapphire eyes scanned the ocean as she floated, just enjoying her respite from her parents. She longed to swim out further, deeper into the black abyss but she loved her parents so she obeyed. She only pushed the boundaries a little bit every night, swimming just a few extra yards out, diving just a bit deeper than before.

 

[RippledStatic]

The city sleeps and those in its underbelly awaken, as prosperous as the kingdom was, as peaceful as it’s capital could claim to be, in the darker corners and the deep recess in the cracks of it’s flagstone roads, the city of Donaport had it’s secrets and shady tradework. The last time he had set eyes on the city he had been only a boy, the streets were dirtier back then, the food scarcer but even in its lowest points the city had been powerful and prosperous. Years changed people just as it wore away at the stone keep, the man was no longer a boy and the streets weren’t his home nor his playground any longer, they were nothing more than veins, arteries to drive the people of the city to his wares.

It had cost a hefty sum of Donals to keep the captain quiet, he had slipped off with one of the lifeboats stocked with his wares as the large galleon settled just off the harbor to wait for the morning so they might dock. Several large bags and crates weighed the small boat down causing it to ride low in the inky water. He rowed and rowed, the original plan had been to get as close to the walls as possible before slipping past them but as he got closer he saw a golden chance.

A long beach, enclosed into part of the cliff face and only very slightly exposed, what better way to enter the town but from such a smugglers delight? He smirked to himself as he rowed ashore, beaching the small craft and beginning to unload it when he spotted something.

A dress...

Not just a dress but one of the finest he had ever seen, laying carelessly in the sand near the water just before the tide threatened to pull it away, it set his mind into alert mode and he drew a long knife from his waist, some noblewoman and her lover? hiding on the secluded beach to keep their affair a secret? it could be no good and he had half a mind to start loading the crates back onto the small craft before he could be seen. But Klein had already been spotted, as the princess returned toward the shore she would see the man dressed in dark clothes, a mess of brown hair pulled back loosely into a ponytail and sharp intelligent green eyes, he was tall but lithe. If she had ever pictured an assassin or a a mugger or a bandit in her mind he would fit the bill almost perfectly.

“Damnit...” he cursed under his breath and turned to look out to sea, the moon glimmered off the slowly curling waves, a perfect moment if an odd shape had not broken the image up.

She was swimming...the owner of the dress was swimming in the night ocean.

 

[Abovetheroses]

Lile was beneath the surface when the small vessel had rowed passed her. The princess had found out a log time ago she could hold her breath for a rediculously long time. Just how long, she never pushed. But she stayed unde the water as the little boat passed her and landed on her beach. It was curious. No one was ever awake this late. Once he was on shore, Lile surfaced, just her head, and watched him.

He was unloading things onto her sand, boxes and crates of some unknown content. She wondered what it could possibly be that he'd need to offload at such a late hour. Bright eyes watched him. Yet, she was even more curious as to what he was like. She had such little experience with people outside the palace walls. Her parents kept her so isolated. Even the guards treated her like a doll. What would it be like to talk freely with a man who knew little of her or her circumstance? She eyed him as she swam towards the shore. He was tall and lean, his dark attire lending in to helping him hide in the shadows. Mysterious. Dangerous. But was he really? She knew she could just swim away if he was indeed so.

Knowing she had been spotted, she sighed. Unsure of how to proceed. On a normal night she'd change and walk out of the water, naked and dry in the warm night air before dressing and returning to her home. But now...

"You seem to have me at a disadvantage sir." She called out over the gentle waves as she stayed where the water kept her covered. Lile let her body start to change back to one that would match his. Her scales dissolving into her skin and her tail separating into two strong thighs and legs before her toes sank into the sand. If needed she could dive and swim away, change again.

Lile offered the man a small smile. "Might I ask you to give me a moment so I can clothe myself?" She did hope he'd want to stay and talk. It'd be nice to talk to someone not of royal stature.

 

[RippledStatic]

Klein seems to consider her for a moment, barely able to make out anything with the moon behind her. An alluring feminine shape but little else. His mind toys with the idea of taking the dress and telling her to come out nude, it's a fun idea but he finally decides against it. "Of course, Of course" the dark man says as he moves to his boat and sits on the side of it, facing away from her and the dress. The smuggler crosses one leg over the other and sighs, admiring the moon and the dark ocean. Who is this woman? despite her obvious disadvantage he doesn't let his guard down, half expecting a knife to his throat he sits with a hand on the hilt of his knife in as non-aggressive a pose as one can do when still being ready to fight.

"You're out here alone?" he pries "awfully strange for a woman to be out on the beach alone at night...sure you aren't up to no good?" He chuckles, stealing a quick glance behind him, half due to curiosity half for safety. Who was she? he wracked his mind for something, any reasonable excuse for why she was out here other than for the pure pleasure. It was the only thing he could think of and as odd as it was he reasoned that this beach certainly was private. Perhaps the young woman thought it her own private little escape and he had so rudely interrupted her time to herself.

There was still the matter of his cargo, his lack of a travel permit and his late night arrival into the city, all of which were highly illegal and very questionable, he'd let her dress but worse come to worse it might very well be the dress she dies in. He couldn't take any chances, his cargo was too valuable to toss he wouldn't be able to make the money he had spent on it back for years, he'd starve before he could manage that again. His fingers closed tighter around the grip of his knife. Was it worth killing for? he hadn't killed anyone in his life and he was mildly proud of that fact. Sure a few stabs a few cuts and more than a few punches but he'd never ended any life.

No...he'd maybe threaten her a bit, maybe even a bit of fun...that'd be enough to scare her into silence. It seemed the most reasonable course of action and with that Klein stood and turned to her "so what's a pretty young lady doing out here all alone in the nude? give's a man some pretty fun ideas...."

 

[Abovetheroses]

When he turned, Lile cautiously exited the water. She watched him for a moment where he sat on his boat, back to her before she grabbed her dress from the sand and gave it a small shake. The princess frowned, she was still dripping and with no real way to dry the dress would surely be uncomfortable and cling and all sorts of ways but such was the circumstances. She carefully stepped into the dress and wiggled her wet skin into as best as she could as she heard him speak. "Oh! Of course I am here alone." She said as if it should have been expected. "It is my beach after all." She then added. " No one else ever uses it."

It was a bit of a struggle, getting the fine fabric to settle into its proper place on her skin. It was insistent on clinging and sticking which only amplified her form more than it was meant to. But before she could tell him it was okay, he had turned around himself. Color flooded her pale eatures as she stood before him, a petite woman, her pale hair, even wet seemed to glow in the moonlight.

He was trying to intimidate her? She wasn't too sure how to feel, no one had ever done that before. Was this a game? She felt a smile pull onto her lips. "I'm always out here alone. And always nude." She winked at him. "I told you it's my beach. So I can do as I please." This was fun, having a silly banter with someone who had no idea who she really was. "Men always have silly ideas about what women should or shouldn't do.... I'm more curious about you." She said honestly.

"No one has ever shown up on my beach before." She looked at him a bit puzzled. "What exactly are you doing out here so late? I am quite intrigued." She tugged at her dress a bit, still rather uncomfortable with how it was clinging to her damp skin.

 

[RippledStatic]

"your beach..." he scoffed, she spoke as if that was the most obvious thing in the world that this small stretch of sand was owned by this girl. The only place anyone even lived that was nearby was the castle itself, had he caught a lady of the court skinny dipping? He dug trails into the sand with his boot as he thought, the night air was cool and comfortable. It was a perfect night for such things but that made it no less odd for her to be out alone without a companion, who did things like this alone?

She was beautiful, very much so...like a siren yet imperfect and somehow only moreso because of it. Klein was as any man who spent alot of time on the sea might be, coming ashore and seeking companionship. He stood and turned fully to face her now as she finished adjusting her dress, it was well made, very well made and beautiful to boot, even in the dark he was able to reason that he could get quite a bit for it... He moved to the opposite side of the boat to be nearer her and he sat down again, crossing one leg over the other as he debated what to do with his strange discovery. The woman went on and seemed to have a smile in her voice, was this a joke to her? or was she truly so naive that she wasn't aware of what he might be "yes yes your beach and I'm so very sorry for arriving uninvited" he said dripping with sarcasm and lightness "some of those things come from genuine care and concern...being out of doors this late at night is dangerous for a woman, let along stripping nude... I could have taken your dress and made you come to me just as you swam and then what sort of fun might I have had hmmm?" he mused but no real danger came from his tone.

"I've never noticed it before though now that I think about it I rarely dock in the capital at all and if I do only on cloudy nights or foggy nights, can't say I'm surprised I never saw this little haven before..." Klein stood now, walking toward her and tilting his head casually "I'm doing exactly what you were doing, trying to keep my head above water so I don't drown." of course he had no idea of knowing that this simply wasn't the case with the odd girl and that she had no fear of such things. "I'm a seller of fine things, rare things and pretty things." He walked past her as he spoke and spun around to return back the direction he came "you're probably better off not knowing more than that."