Free Children of Poseidon: Rann by Annalisa Carr Page A

London for, anyway? Horrible place.” He shuddered.
    “Will you see Maya?” Lila interjected.
    “I hope she’ll let me stay for a few days,” Rann said. “Jewel’s with her.”
    “Jewel?” Lila’s brow furrowed. “I thought she was on your island.”
    “She wanted to see her mother.” Rann shook his head. “I’m not sure why. Something about closure.”
    “Kara’s a weird woman.” Lila’s brow wrinkled. “I got the impression she resents Jewel. She never paid her much attention. I always felt a bit sorry for her.”
    “She’s all right.” Rann didn’t want anyone pitying Jewel. She was fine, strong; she’d escaped the misery of her home life. “But I don’t understand why she wants to leave the island.”
    “Leave?” Lila raised her eyebrows. “Permanently?”
    “She says she wants to make a life for herself.” Rann sounded disgruntled even to his own ears. “Why can’t she do it on the island? It’s her home.”
    “She’s been there for nine years,” Lila sounded thoughtful. “Maybe she wants to try something else. After all, the original idea was that she should stay there just for the year of her banishment. Is she thinking she might rejoin the coven?”
    “Not her mother’s.” Rann shook his head. “She said she’d look for another, somewhere with decent weather.”
    “She’s young.” Lykos interrupted. “Maybe she wants to stretch her wings. See something of the world outside your little kingdom.”
    Rann’s domain covered the whole of the Indian Ocean. He scowled at Lykos, who grinned.
    “She said she had a crush on me.” Rann hadn’t meant to say that; it just slipped out.
    Lykos smirked. “And she left anyway?”
    Lila elbowed him.
    “So why didn’t she want to stay? I’d have been good to her.” He scrutinised Lila. “You’re a witch. Why did she tell me that and then leave?”
    Lila looked thoughtful. “Jewel’s had a poor home life. You saw what her mother’s like? You know how she got mixed up with that rogue mage, Micael. I think she doesn’t trust herself. She probably doesn’t want to give her heart to anyone in case she gets kicked again.”
    “I love her.” Rann’s voice rose in outrage. He’d never treated any of his people badly; he loved them all and cared for them all. His former lovers still felt the same affection for him that he felt for them.
    “You love everyone on that island of yours. It means nothing.” Lykos held his hand up as Rann opened his mouth.
    He couldn’t believe his half-brother had said that.
    “I meant that Jewel is not one of your people. She probably wouldn’t like to be one of many. Witch women like to be exclusive.” He glanced at Lila. “Isn’t that right?”
    “Exactly right.” Lila put her hand on Lykos’s thigh. “Mine.”
    Rann shook his head. “I don’t understand any of you.” He sipped his coffee, pushing Jewel out of his mind. “Anyway, I needed to talk to you about something serious. What do you know about seawitches?”
    “They’re extinct, aren’t they?” Lila lifted an eyebrow. “Have been for a thousand years.”
    Lykos shook his head. “That’s not quite true. Circe’s still hanging round the Pacific.”
    “Circe’s different, though,” Rann said. Circe wasn’t just an ordinary seawitch. If anyone knew, it would be Lykos. She had paid him a visit over a thousand years ago and fooled him into thinking she was in love with him. She’d stirred things up in the oceanic communities, caused a war, and then taken off for a remote island near Tahiti.
    “Yes.” Lykos nodded. He slipped his arm round Lila’s shoulders. “I heard she has a couple of the seawitches still living with her. I’m not sure how true it is, but my sources are usually reliable.” He lifted his coffee to his lips, put it down, and eyed Rann curiously. “Why do you ask?”
    “A woman turned up in my territory last week. My mother caught her. She told me she was a seawitch. Tamsin agreed. I’d like to