“Yes. Her name is Lorelei, and she’s as evil and hideous as you’d imagine. Her eyes glint like the brittle grey of broken glass. Her tail looks slick as a black eel’s skin, and her tresses are a grotesque blood red, rumored to get darker with each kill.” She shuddered. “And your father struck a deal to protect his crew. For every passage through siren waters, he would sacrifice five men to the Caviar Sea as an offering to her people. Lorelei accepted. That is why we hired men, and why they never showed their faces the night before we entered a new kingdom. Lianna and your father would throw them overboard.”

My nails dug into my palms. The tightness in my chest became so suffocating that I had to look away. “Why didn’t any of you tell me?”

Hannah shrugged. “It was your father’s secret, and he entrusted it with only Lianna and me. I assumed when you became captain Lianna told you, and that you’d made the decision it wasn’t right for your reign. To be honest, I was always grateful for your father’s deal with the siren, but those deaths still weigh on my spirit, and I was happy to have it abolished.”

I wagged my head. “I didn’t know. And even though it makes me hate him for lying to me and killing innocents, he was still my father. And Rylander killed him.”

“Yes, he did. But you haven’t heard how and why. When we docked at Cava’s port the day your father died, he went to The Lyre of Hermes Tavern for drinks with Lianna. It was a short trip, and most of the crew stayed on board that night, knowing we’d set sail the next day. Several of the townsmen who’d lost their kin to your father’s pact ambushed him outside and beat him within a breath of his life. They held Lianna captive and made her watch the whole thing.”

My stomach dropped, pulling my heart down with it. To imagine my strong, proud father brutally beaten and mangled in the street created a knot in my throat big enough to choke me.

Seeing my realization dawn, Hannah continued, “I thought she told you at least a partial truth. I know she wanted to tell you everything, but with his final breaths, your father made her promise she wouldn’t reveal the agreement he made with the enemy, why those men took their pounds of flesh. He was ashamed.”

I blinked back the pricking sensation behind my eyes.

“I’m so sorry.” Hannah’s voice quaked. “Rylander found Lianna and your father lying in the tavern’s alley. Lianna asked him to do what she couldn’t because of her love for your father.”

“A mercy kill?” The words cracked in my chest.