The plan, for now, was simple. Mira would go back, and keep her eyes out for anything suspicious; Leo would hunt down further information, seeing as he didn’t know much when Mira questioned him. What did it look like? How big was it? Color? Shape? Anything?

How was she supposed to find something when she didn’t know what it was like? Regardless, she was going to meet Leo again at the beach the day after next to compare notes. She was hoping he would come up with something, seeing as she probably wouldn’t.

As she sat in class— Friday, thankfully— Mira skillfully ignored her lecturer to think about what was going on, both with Leo, and in the siren from her past. She didn't remember her well, the woman. Her hair was long and wild, a color that seemed to be the ocean itself, deep greens and rich blues that swirled around her. Her tail was green as well, a color that seemed to be lost in the water if you didn’t know what to look for. She was talking, saying something—

But the memories ended there. Mira didn’t know what happened. Years of belief had corroded her real memories with fake, created ones; and believing in mermaid was fine when you were eight, nine, ten…. But as she grew older, her belief was undermined.

Never destroyed though. Mira took a deep breath. She had learned not to talk about it, but also not to be surprised. And maybe, deep down, she wanted to see the glistening scales of a siren again. She tapped her pen on the desk thoughtlessly, mind wandering to Leo and his scales. He was a stunning, gorgeous man; his dark, deep eyes, the smooth, water-slick black hair…

“Mira, your pen, please.” She nearly jumped out of her chair as her daydream was shattered by the voice of her professor. He hadn’t even bothered to turn around to face her from where he was writing on the board, something about societal impacts on pop culture that Mira was paying no attention to.

“Sorry.” She sounded suitably chastised, at least. The next ten minutes were spent clock-watching, and when the bell rang she was already at the door. She had something to do while on campus.

Mira walked into the library, searched for every book on mythological beings she could find, and raided them. Unfortunately, there wasn’t much that was useful. The story of Odysseus was the first and most prominent reference in nearly all of the accounts, and that offered her nothing useful. That listening would bring her to her death? Well, she had listened, and was still alive. These stories were all made of rumors. There was one small note, though, a very small mention…

“Traditional mythologies state sirens to be all female, and, seeing as they cannot reproduce, immortal. However, more contemporary literature from the early A.D. Period starts to incorporate male sirens. With this comes the issue of reproduction…”

Mira murmured the words to herself as she quickly jotted it down from the book; both for thought and further research.

Traditional mythologies state sirens to be all female, and, seeing as they cannot reproduce, immortal. However, ore contemporary literature from the early A.D. Period starts to incorporate male sirens. With this comes the issue of reproduction, and many stories claim that sirens cannot reproduce with their own kind at all, and rather must find a fated mortal to mate with. How they find such a person is often unclear.

It left Mira with more questions than answers, but it was the first bit of unique information she had encountered. She was about to go look for further credible research when her phone began to ring.

“Emmi?” They never called each other, and she really shouldn’t be answering the phone in the library. “What’s up?”

“You never check the news Mira so I’m going to tell you before you do something stupid; I know you usually go for a swim after class on Friday but listen, you can’t go this week. Two people drowned this morning in the public swimming area, they’re thinking there’s some kind of crazy weird riptide going on, and—”

“What?”

Mira had been going to those beaches for almost a year now, and it was damn near the safest water she had ever seen. The sand bar stretched out for miles, so it was never too deep; the were almost no waves, to the continual laments of the wanna-be surfers, and most of all the area was protected by the shape of the land, nearly a lagoon; the currents were weak at best. No, there couldn’t be any natural drownings there, no way.

“That’s what I’m trying to tell you, it’s really crazy, so you'll just have to swim in your bathtub or something.”

“Right. Thanks for the heads up, Em, but I’ve gotta go I'm in the library. I’ll talk later.”

Mira couldn’t move fast enough. She had to get to the beach, now. She shoved her books bag in her bag as quick as possible, abandoned the ones she had pulled on the table, and ran for the exit.

There was no way in hell those were deaths by nature. They were goddamn murders. She had felt the tendrils around her leg, pulling her down and down no matter how hard she fought against them. It was smart; it acted like the currents, pulled when the water moved, but now she was absolutely sure something was happening. She wasn’t going to let it get anyone else.

She wished she had some way to contact Leo, to tell him to get the hell out of there. He wasn’t safe in that water any more than she was at this rate. Just because he couldn’t be drowned didn’t mean he couldn’t die—

Mira nearly slammed into the door as the thought hit her. Leo couldn’t die. He was immortal. But did that mean he couldn’t be killed? She would have to find out, and quickly, because he might be the key to helping her fix all of this.