Call of the sea

by sunsetsjournal

Hearts as strong as sirens

Chapter 3:

Hearts as strong as sirens

“It’s useless” Sonata sighed in disappointment: “no matter how many times I try, I always end up ruining everything.

As she was saying these things, her sister Aria kept staring at Adagio to see what her reaction would be, but the only words she heard were:“try harder”, then the siren swam away, leaving both of the youngsters in her lair.

“Oh” the girl wined once more: “I’m never gonna pull this off!”. Seeing her dear one in such state was something not even Aria’s usually blooded heart cold handle, so the siren neared her sister and sat next to her on a rock:

“Hey, Sonata” she whispered in her ear, trying to cheer her up: “It’s okay! You’ll manage”

“Easy for you to say” the other one answered: “You’re amazing at singing, while hi...well I sound like a blasted trombone!”

“That’s not true” went one saying her sister, wrapping her in her hooves closer to her chest:

“You’re not that bad, you just need a little practice: that’s all”

“No, no, no! That won’t happen: you saw what it was like the last time I tried to charm the sea ponies”

“How could I forget...”.

---

“So...” the youngest of the sirens questioned curious: “...all I have to do is make some music, then the magic will flaw straight into my gem?”

“Yes, it will” Adagio replied briefly, maintaining a firm cold expression on her face which made the little one tremble from fear.

Sonata gulped: Adagio’s stare was motionless, proud and conveyed an enormous impression of superiority. Those eyes had always frightened her, since the day she remembered seeing them for the first time: those pupils black as the dark floats of the night together with her irises, so similar to hers with their red violet tint, had often become in her sleep the most terrible of nightmares.

“Sonata!” Adagio intervened, interrupting the youngster’s day dreaming: “Are you going to get your prey or have you decided to let it escape?”

“No, no, I am going” Sonata quickly replied, shaking her head and laying her eyes on a little sea filly, picking flowers from the pristine sand:

“Good”.

Still feeling insecure, the siren turned around and moved forward the sea pony; her sister Aria was watching her from her hiding spot, behind a large blue coral, right next to Adagio, while thinking: “Good luck”.

As soon as she had gotten close enough, the young filly saw her figure, a thousand times larger than hers, but looked more curious than scared:

“Who are you?” she asked, looking at that peculiar stranger with her enormous lively eyes:

“Hello, my dear, my name’s Sonata Dusk, I am a siren, I’m here to feed...I mean I was just passing by and saw you, adorable one, were here all alone. Now tell, me: where are your parents, did you get lost? I can take you back to Seaquestria with me”.

While witnessing the scene, Adagio placed a hoof on her forehead in sign of desperation and began to shake her head: “she’s gonna blow everything up”.

“Not at all, nice lady” the cheerful filly answered Sonata: “I am not lost, I’m here to pick these” at this point the youngster showed her interlocutor a bunch of golden flowers she was holding in her pins.

“Oh my, they sure look stunning”

“Thanks, these sun corals are my mommy’s favorite, since when she was a little filly. Today is mother’s day, so I thought I’d sneak out of home a little early to get some: they’re the perfect gift for her, don’t you think?”

“Uh, they are pretty let me…” as Sonata let those words slip from her mouth, the distant clopping sound of Adagio’s hoof reminded her what she needed to do: “I mean: they look good, but flowers are so dull and predictable nowadays”

“They are?” the little one questioned disappointed:

“Yeah, how about we get your mom something more like a spectacular musical number?”

“But I don’t know the first thing about music”

“Quit the act” Adagio kept repeating, as if Sonata were able to hear her, despite being so distant from her: “Just sing”

“Oh, don’t worry about that, my friend. In fact I dare say that this is your lucky day, for I happen to be an expert in music!”

“What, for real?!” the sea filly asked, putting on an innocent expression of delight:

“Of course I am: wanna hear one of my tunes?”

“Sure!”

“Then please take a sit and enjoy”.

Once her pray had made herself comfortable on a rock, the siren lifted high up in the water, closed her eyes to focus, opened her azure lips and let her vocal cords sing.

At that moment a shrieking noise was heard, it was so high-pitched it could have shuttered a mirror into pieces:

“Ah” the filly shouted, covering her hears: “Stop please, I can’t take it any longer”. Not hearing a thing Sonata went on singing: “Please!” the sea pony repeated:

“What is she doing?” Aria whispered into her older sister’s ear:

“blowing up the plan”. Adagio arose from the blue coral and rushed to reach the sea pony who was already attempting to escape.

In the meantime Aria neared Sonata, placed a hoof on her shoulder to draw some attention, then said she had sung enough.

Having gotten the chance, the oldest of the sirens hypnotized the pray with her singing, so she and the others could feed. After the sea pony’s negative energy had been completely drained out of her, the little one fainted on the ground, while Adagio laid on the young siren a stare Sonata would never forget.

---

“You don’t understand, Aria”, the youngster exclaimed: “You, you didn’t see her eyes. They were watching me like I had just fail the purpose of my entire life: so angry and penetrating”; Aria could not bare the sight of her sister crying:

“Does she frighten you that much?”, Sonata did not answer.

It did too a while till the young siren decided to speak again: “Ah, Aria?”

“Yes?”

“Do you think...I may be just not cut out for singing?”

“Don’t be so depressed” her sister answered: “You’ ll manage...eventually”

“Eventually isn’t soon enough. You saw how Adagio reacted the last time I failed: she hasn’t spoken to me since then and I am worried she could decided to do something worse, If I blow up everything again”

“You’re really afraid of that, uh?”

“Yeah” Sonata replied gulping:

“Hey” her sister exclaimed, seeing her, lowering her eyes again:

“Are you up for a story?”

“I am not in the mood for your teasing, Aria”

“I promise you will like this one, plus I swear no teasing is involved”.

---

Night had fallen from a while and the environment, surrounding Adagio’s lair, had become awfully silent, everything had been covered in darkness and the only things illuminating the area were the photophores, pending from the heads of the anglerfish looking for food.

Adagio was sitting on a bolder right next to the mouth of her cavern:

“Why have you brought them here?” she kept repeating to herself: “you already know how this is going to end don’t you? In your whole life you’ve done everything but looking after fillies, truth to be told you mostly caused them two to fight and fed off their negative energy and now you expect of yourself to take care of those two?”.

While she was reflecting upon these things, her scaly body was suddenly penetrated by a sensation of cold: “Brrr….” the siren whispered, grating her teeth: “You’d better go back inside if you don’t want to freeze: it’s chilly out here tonight”.

Adagio turned around and passed the large corridor, separating her from the deep hall where she used to sleep. When she got there she immediately felt she was not alone; right there next to her on a pile of seaweeds two youngsters rested peacefully: the first one was covered in azure scales and had a long dorsal fin, while the second’s body was purple as a violet bloom, her dorsal fin was shorter than her sister’s, nonetheless it was more spiky.

Both of them looked so calm that Adagio assumed they were having sweet dreams, so she decided to take a nap herself: even the strongest and most fearsome creature, living underwater, needed to rest her eyes a bit.

Despite her good intentions though, the siren was not able to get any sleep, not even for a moment.

“It’s useless” she complained after hours had passed: “it’s seems like I’ll have to skip sleeping tonight, too, might as well stand up”.

Adagio abandoned her rocky pillow to near the little ones and observe them: the were beautiful indeed, their scales shining in the same way as Adagio’s, their hooves looked small and delicate, their fines strong and their muscles well developed despite their young age. Their eyelashes were long and attractive, their oyster scent rather intense, the red gems on their chests shined in a lively light.

“Two other sirens” Adagio whispered to herself, staring at the asleep fillies: “two more creatures that will suffer from our mutual unfortunate destiny”.

As she moved her right hoof towards the youngest, this one opened her eyes and gaze upon Adagio’s with her red violet weepy sight.

“Blast it” the siren thought: “why does this one make me feel awkward all the time?!” The more she kept staring at the little creature, the more she felt weird and restless, even if she had turned around, trying to ignore her.

“Ah, fine, you win!” Adagio sighed in the end: “what is it? Why are you always looking at me like that?” no answer came from her interlocutor: “what, did something eat your tongue?”

“No” The purple one intervened, having woke up:

“Uh?” Adagio questioned curiously:

“she’s too young, she’s never spoken to anypony else, not even me”

“Too young, of course” the siren sighed at that moment.

“Can I ask you something?”

“You’re already doing so”

“Why did you bring us here?”

“That I still need to figure out myself”.

As the night went one, the little siren started wining painfully and trembling in her sleep; from the sound of her voice Adagio could clearly tell that something wrong was going on.

She neared the bed once more, then placed her hoof on the youngster’s forehead: “she’s caught fever” Adagio whispered in the end: “and her conditions are getting worse”.

Watching the little creature in her pain, suddenly caused something to wake in the siren’s soul, something she thought she had removed many years ago, but now she felt back again:

“You know what you have to do” a little voice said in Adagio’s head: “You know what must be done, even if it means you’ll have to cross the last front line and give up who you are to become somepony else.”; she did not need to hear any further.

Having left the cave, wearing a small glass bottle, attached to a shelf necklace, the siren swam up to the surface, where she had already been many times. She turned around and saw the sun, rising at the horizon:

“Time’s running out: you need to be faster” the little voice in her head kept saying.

Adagio neared the shore and in a flash she rose from the water and began to levitate in the middle of the air; her head was spinning: “You’re even out of practice, when it comes to flying: good. You’re really getting too soft”.

Ignoring the complaining of her subconscious, the siren moved quickly through the cool morning breeze, heading to a place only she knew of.

After a good fifteen minutes she saw a bunch of trees beneath her and realized she had finally reached her destination.

Once down almost at the level of the ground, Adagio look around till she found a particular green and white flower, wasting no time she picked it up:

“Now I only need fresh water”; luckily for her a stream run by the clearing she happened to be.

Adagio immediately collected a sample of its water and used it to mix up a solution together with the petals of the flower she had just collected:

“I hope this will work on her as well as it did on me”.

Once more she lifted her body up in the air, once more she rushed on the same way she had gone through to reach the sea, though this time she noticed something new.

While flying on her way, she heard cries and cheers, pleasant sounds and annoying noises:

“What’s with this fuss?” Adagio wondered, lowering her eyes. Right in that moment she saw a village right beneath her: it was so full of light and dancing ponies, one could say they were having a celebration of some sort:

“So here they live, interesting”.

Suddenly a malicious grin appeared on her face, like something wicked had come to her mind: she was definitely plotting something, but there was no time to loose: her little sister was waiting at the cavern.

Having come back to the sea shore, having made sure nopony was there to see her, the siren dove into the water and disappeared under the deep blow floats.

“I’m here” she said to herself, when she arrived at her hideout: “I’m here and now off to see how our patient is doing”.

In the dark underground hall where she had left her, the little one was having a terrible night, as Adagio pointed out, judging on her physical condition: she was there on the seaweed bed, sweating, crying from pain, her sister holding her hooves.

Seeing her like that, the siren felt a sense of ressentiment and remorse, devouring her heart:

“Move” she exclaimed, gulping, trying to hide the fear in her heart:

“No” the purple one replied: “I am not letting her go, like you did a few hours ago”.

Hearing those ungrateful words, Adagio felt a raging fire, slowly burning inside her chest, but eventually managed not to succumb to her rage: “I said move”, this time the other one obeyed.

Having approached the baby, the siren lifted her, taking her in her hooves: “It’s gotten worse” she thought: “I hope it isn’t too late”.

Having placed a hoof on the little one’s cheek, Adagio gently caressed it till the youngster opened her lips, then she made her drink the mixture she had previously brewed.

A terrible exclamation came out of the little one’s mouth: clearly the solution’s flavour was not to her liking, but at least she stop trembling.

“It looks like it worked” Adagio whispered to herself, once she had realized the siren had calmed down: “she’s gonna need a few days to be back in full health, but the risk is gone”.

“What did you to her?” the purple one questioned astonished:

“Nothing special”

“Nothing special?! I had never heard Sonata cry so hard before, but you managed to save her”

“I just gave her a medical remedy my own mother used to give me, whenever I felt sick: it’s always worked on me and apparently it did on your sister as well”.

“A medical remedy?”

“Exactly”

“What do you mean?”

“I brewed a mixture out of fresh water and white willow. You’re not familiar with anything of the sort are you?” instead of answering, the other one lowered her head.

“Guess not, look if you’re interested I could teach a thing or two on the subject, sounds good?”

“Sure” the youngster replied exited.

A moment of silence interrupted their conversation: “You said her name is Sonata?” the siren questioned, still holding the baby in her hooves:

“Yes, it is”

“I find it…very beautiful, while yours is?”

“Aria...Aria Blaze”

“Aria Blaze, it’ll be hard to forget”

“Great, now what’s your name?”

“Adagio Dazzle”. At that very moment, the baby started agitating again:

“What now?!” her sister asked nervous:

“A...Ad...” the little one struggled to say:

“A...da...gio”.

“Her firs words” Aria commented: “she said your name as her first words”

“Yeah” the other one intervened: “it seems that way”.

It was then that for the first time in many years a tear slipped from Adagio’s eyes and a brief sincere smile appeared on her face.

---

“What?!” Sonata shouted after hearing Aria’s story: “did she really do all those things for me?!”

“Yep, she told me so, while she was showing me all those natural remedies she had mentioned”

“If that’s so, why didn’t you tell me anything about it?”

“Adagio asked me to keep the secret between the two of us” Aria answered, lowering her gaze.

“Oh, why’s that?”

“You see...she’s fighting a battle against her own self”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean that, while she might be sweet and caring on the inside, there’s still a part of her that values strength even more: that’s why she won’t reveal anything, even if you look up to her the way you do”

“Wait, how do you...”

“Please, it doesn’t take a genius to get how much you admire Adagio, every time you see her in action, even if that means your humiliation”

“I understand...”Sonata whispered slowly before heading back to her dark corner.

“You could still impress her, y’know?” Aria suddenly added:

“How so?”

“Don’t know, you’re gonna need to find that out yourself” and with these very last words the purple siren went to bed.

“Impress her” Sonata constantly repeated in her mind: “Impress my big sister, but how?”.

Having made up her mind, the young one headed to Adagio’s favorite spot of the cave, where the siren kept a few things, and took a rock tablet and a spiky stick, then sat down and began to write.

No matter how much her head would hurt, no matter how painful her hooves would feel from all that writing, no matter how many times she would need to clean that tablet and restart all over again: she was keen on doing her best to accomplish her objective.

She finished after hours, her eyes felt heavy from lack of sleep: “I did! I actually did it!” Sonata shouted excited, waking up her older sister:

“What’s with all the fuss?! I’m still sleeping here!”

“Aria, I did it, I managed to create something that would make Adagio see me as a completely different siren”

“I’m happy for you, but it looks like she hasn’t come back home, yet”

“Oh, yeah” the little one noticed disappointed:

“Y’know...” Aria went on saying: “...If I were you, I’d try to find her at the anemones field right behind the cave”

“Anemones field, got it!”.

Fast as lightening, Sonata headed to the cavern exit, but stopped after just a few seconds, then went back to her sister: “Thank you, Aria... for everything. Please, don’t think I value you less than her, you’ll always be my best sister-friend forever!” and with these words she hugged her tight.

“Oh, c’mon now: you’re making me blush!” the other one giggled: “weren’t you supposed to be going somewhere?”

“Oh, right, I’m going”.

Having reached the mouth of the cave, following Aria’s instructions, the little siren reached the field behind the lair: every inch of it was covered in magenta and purple anemones, shining in the water, still only partially illuminated by the light of the rising sun.

“There she is” Sonata pointed out, noticing her older sister, sitting on a bolder, keen on staring at that magical view:

“A...Adagio” the youngster whispered, approaching the siren who did not answer her:

“Still mad at me, are you?” Sonata questioned, frowning: “I am sorry about what happened yesterday, I don’t know what happened to me, I was just really nervous and...”.

Seeing her apologies did not effect Adagio, she stopped talking for a moment: “Ah, even if you don’t forgive me, could you at least take a look at this song I wrote? It’s for the next time I sing, if you’ ll ever give me another chance”.

Hearing those words, the other one took the rock tablet from her sister’s hooves and looked at it:

“Nice tune” was what she said, after doing so:

“Oh, great” Sonata exclaimed: “I guess I’ll go practice then, I need to warm up before my performance, so I’ ll have a better chance not to blow everything up again”.

“Sonata!” Adagio said, seeing her going away:

“Yes?”

“You don’t have to leave”.

Noticing the other one had left some space for her on the bolder she was sitting on, the little one rushed next to her:

“Y’now something, Sonata?” the siren said after a moment of silence:

“What?”

“They say singing is often a reflection of your soul’s feelings, so no matter how hard you try, it won’t help, unless you’re happy with yourself”

“Oh, I guess that’s true”

“Is there something bothering you?”; the youngster shyly nodded in response.

“Do you wish to tell me what this is about?”

“Maybe”

“Then, I’m listening”; at that point, despite her good sense suggesting her not to say a word, Sonata opened her heart to her sister

After she had heard everything, Adagio did not say a thing in response, so Sonata thought that it would be better to change the subject: “Why didn’t you come home last night?”

“I stayed here to admire the beauty of this place, it looks even better at night”

“Why do you find it so special? There’s plenty of anemones elsewhere”

“You’re right, but this place reminds me of my home”.

Seeing her, putting on a scowling expression, Sonata attempted to cheer up her mood by gently placing her head on her sister’s shoulder: unusually Adagio did not swam away from her, but kindly shook her head with her hoof instead.

Later on that day, Sonata’s new tune was a success and, while her sister Aria kept congratulating her all the way back home, the young girl had the impression that, even if ony for a brief moment, a smile had appeared on Adagio’s lips.

Comments

[Boltstrike58]

Just an FYI, that form of "prey" is spelled with an e, not an a.