Ursula regained composure and closed her eyes. There was no need to panic, really: she could always find Zelda thanks to their pact. Plus, the house was in order, and the dead birds supposed to watch over Zelda were unmoving - if something had happened, they would've awoken from the dead to warn their master. Moreover, all the spells Ursula put on the house to protect it were still in place. All these facts pointed to Zelda leaving on her own, not being kidnapped by the people who wished to harm her. No reason to panic really.

Still, her heart insisted on slamming against her ribcage.

She did not want to leave Zelda alone. Not for such a long period of time. But she couldn't bring her along, not when she knew Nate was in such a killing spree.

The first one she witnessed after she was exiled was maybe two hundred years ago - maybe (time was tricky when you were immortal). She had been exiled a long time by then, already had her reputation established. When she crossed his path in a little village, the later was on the verge of collapse. The siren had always been this violent when he started draining life energy, once he started he couldn't stop. And she had no intentiond of stopping him - why should she care about the lives of unknown people? Humans died anyway. But the man that summoned her had only one wish: 'Stop the monster that is destroying this village, and you can have my soul.'

So she stopped Nathaniel. She could've killed him but clearly still not had what it took to kill her past siblings just like that (a weak spot? Definitely, but what could she do?). So she locked him in her basement until the withdrawal was over. It was messy and brutal and he didn't talk to her once. The day Triton killed Althea and banished Ursula, he made it clear that no one was even allowed to talk about Ursula, let alone try to talk to her. Of all the siblings Nate is the one that lived by that rule the most fiercely. He went on pretending Ursula and Althea never existed. Never once mentioning them even when his siblings tried. Maybe it was the curse of being adopted - always thinking that he was one mistake away from being rejected and left alone. So no, he did not talk to her... Until the second time it happened. This time, he called her himself.

Nathaniel didn't know why he couldn't control himself. All the sirens he knew could. They hunted when they wanted to, how they wanted to. But him... When the hunger came and he couldn't control it anymore, he did not even turned that siren hypnosis charm on, but suddenly it was on and everyone gravitated around him - from approximately five seconds before ending up dead. He did not like it. He was afraid of it. But he's always been this way - that's why Triton tried to stop him when he was just a kid and already decimating villages on his own. He almost managed to control this level of hunger, but something about seeing his mother get executed just brought it all back. He hid it from everyone (the nice thing about being the second 'son' was that you could always leave for a few weeks) but it was getting harder and harder to control the crisis. That's why he was thankful for Ursula. She was not kind or gentle, pretty much the opposite. But she stopped him everytime and made sure he survived the withdrawals. And maybe some part of him was healing a little bit at secretly getting to spend time with his big sister again.

❝Got it!❞ She said, opening her eyes and dragging him out of his thoughts. ❝Of course she's with him. I'm going to fucking kill him when I get there. Not even leaving a note? Now that's just rude!❞

Ursula did not leave time for Nate's questions. She used the shadows to open a portal and ignored her brother's complains. She dragged them both in the void and the next moment she was facing Viserys and Zelda peacefully eating together, while Nathaniel was facing the floor, trying to recover without throwing up. Zelda startled and was probably about to speak but Ursula cut her.

❝I'll deal with you later, young lady.❞ She said, which was the most mom thing ever she realized before turning to Viserys.

She had tried to contact him so many times since she found Zelda. None worked. Viserys was a bit tricky. She couldn't find him anymore since their pact was broken, and he was the only living being to be completely immune to all her location spells or dead spies. Something about fate fucking them over from the return of his soul blablabla- it was infuriating. But here he was now. At least she knew that Zelda had been safe. Still, she had to turn the panic she felt into anger now.

❝I spent months trying to reach you, unsuccessfully, and the first thing you do when you come back is taking my daughter out of a house protected by a hundred spells to a hut in the woods where anyone could come and kill you at any given moment? And you don't even leave a fucking note behind?!❞