Unicorns and the Siren
After their late breakfast, Uni and Jola took the children to a small wooded area near the horse paddock, but once there Jola saw a door sitting open in the middle of nowhere. Curious she called Uni over and seeing nothing dangerous they decided to take the children and explore.
The air was wonderfully clean, and the long grass was delicious, the butterflys kept the children amused as they chased them all over the clearing.
It was while she watched the children playing that Jola heard the singing, the most exquisitely beautiful song drifting across the clearing. Suddenly Uni’s and Sheen’s eyes glazed over and both started to walk jerkily towards the edge of the clearing, where the song was coming from. Jola and Kasandra followed them, sometimes moving ahead to see who it was singing.
A short while after she smelt salt in the air, Jola saw the shore of a sea, and the singing stopped, and then she saw an intensely beautiful girl rise from the water, her waist length black hair wet and lying against her back, her dusky coloured skin gleaming with the salt eater, and rivulets dripping from her small, perfectly shaped, naked breasts. She saw the girl pull herself up onto a rock on a small reef, not far from the shore, and begin to sing once more, the same intensely beautiful song they had been following.
Telling Kasandra to look after the boys Jola stripped to her underwear and dived into the water, after a few minutes she reached the girl as she sat on the rock, flicking her black, silver speckled tail in the water, and singing so beautifully that Jola felt tears come to her eyes.
“Why are you doing this?” Jola asked, trying hard to shake the effects of the song herself.
The girl’s beautiful black eyes opened wide in surprise, “It is my mating song, I’m calling for a mate. I am so very lonely, all of my loves have left me.” She said sadly, waving with her hand to show the bleached bones of men lying in the surf around her.
“But you can’t keep men here with your song, that isn’t right.” Jola said, sad for the girl.
“Oh no! The song’s effects only last a few hours. After that the choice to stay is theirs.” She said, the tears starting to run down her flawless cheeks.
Jola wrapped her arms around her and hugged the crying girl, gently rocking her, like a child. The girl told her that her name was Chenny, and Jola felt her pain as they sat together “men do not live forever, to those like us, their lives are over in a blink of an eye, but they all must have loved you very deeply, each stayed you until their deaths, never wanting to leave.”
Chenny, still crying, said through the tears, “But I loved them with all my heart, why wouldn’t they stay?”
Jola was almost in tears herself now. How could she explain death to someone who never died? Immortality had indeed become her curse. “I will look for an immortal whose heart is worthy of your love?” She said fighting back tears, but for now we will sit with you and listen to your song, until the effect wears off my men. She called out to Kasandra to let Uni and Sheen swim over and to come with them, and when they all arrived, they sat and listened to Chenny’s song of love, until finally the song’s spell faded and they regrettably left once more. This time to find a lover for a lonely girl.
