Lydia the Siren's Arc

Chapter 6 of 37

Lydia rose from the pond with the memory of the ocarina still ringing in her. Her song alone had not brought Gregorio. He was no lost merchant. He had faced dragons without flinching. A voice on the wind would not be enough. She needed him to see her and want to stay. So she sat with her back to the stone and set her mind on a new task. She would make herself something he could not turn from. She pulled a wooden case from a dry ledge. Inside sat small wells of dye, each ground from plants and stone she had gathered over the years. Deep red. Dark green. A rich purple like a bruise. She had collected them and never had a reason to use them. Now she did. She wet her finger and worked the purple across her lids, over the burgundy she always wore, until her eyes looked deeper. She smeared red high on her cheeks. She darkened her lashes with the near-black powder. The pond gave her a dim mirror. She leaned over it and studied her face. Better. But not enough. She wiped it clean and started again. She mixed the yellow with a pinch of the orange to warm her skin. She lined her mouth in the deep red until it looked full. Hours passed. Her fingers stained. She did not care. Between each try she sang. She was building a song to match the face. Not the wide call that pulled strangers off the road. Something smaller. A close song, meant for one man who had already come near. She wanted it to sound like the tune he played by his fire. Low. Aching. A song that said, stay. She hummed it, changed a note, hummed again. By the time she stopped, the case was near empty and the pond water swam with color. She leaned over it one last time. The woman looking back was not the same one who caught fish in the dark. Her eyes were dark and sure. Her mouth was red. Every freckle stood clear against warm skin. She smiled, and the smile looked exactly as sharp as she meant it to. Then the sound reached her. Boots on stone. Slow and heavy, the tread of a man in armor. It came from the road, closer than any traveler had come in days. Her close song had drifted out through the passage without her meaning it to. Someone had followed it. Lydia went still. Her heart beat hard against her ribs. She had built the face and the song for one man. She did not yet know if he was the one at her door. She wet her lips, smoothed her hair, and rose to meet whoever climbed toward her.