"Well, uhh, you're not exactly the best at sailing, considering you're trying to sail the Gorgon Straits with only a wooden hulled vessel." The siren replied, and I scowled. "Like, I get it, you're trying to, I don't know, set a record or something, but the only record will be your deaths."

"Please, the Aster is unsinkable." I said. "She's been blessed by Anatha Seastiller for this journey." I saw his expression change, and I turned. What I saw was... Shameful. The fools were weighing anchor. I told them to wait before I left.

--

"They left you." Rickon, the siren, says, and I sob.

"They're going to die without me." I say. "And no one will ever--"

"Mourn them." Rickon says. "Anatha Seastiller won't protect them after their betrayal of you." Two days had passed since, and Rickon was kind enough to feed me and let me live with him.

I look at him, shocked. "H-how? How can you say that?"

"Listen, Aret." I close my eyes and the sound of shattering wood and screaming torment flutters into my mind. "The Kraken Queen has found their tribute unsatisfactory. She's feeding the crew to her spawn." I shudder at the thought, men and women being ripped apart by a crush of tentacles.

--

Months had passed, and Rickon had lured ships. Pirates, mostly. I put them to the sword as was required by my goddess, and used the wood to build a cottage. Mostly for me, since Rickon preferred the tidepools, but I'd come to... Care, I want to say. I'm not sure if I'd call it love, but it certainly felt like it. I heard a knock at my trapdoor, and opened it. Rickon was in the water, with a box.

"May I surface?" He asks, and I nod. He climbs up, and I see he's got a box in his hand. He walks up and kneels.

"Rickon?" I ask, but he merely shushes me.

"Aret, I... I..." He stammers a little, before giving me the box. "Willyoubemineforeverplease?" He blathers, and I blush.

"Rickon..." I say, and I open it, finding a ring of coral and gold, probably salvaged from the ships he lured to the isle. I slip it on, and turn away, retrieving from the end table near my bed a box of my own, and I offer it to him. "Only if you'll be mine." He smiles, and opens it. Inside is a similar ring, and I slip it on him, and kiss him.