Chapter Text
The lighthouse keeper stands at the edge of the pool, swaying slightly in the wind, looking down upon the siren, a shivering, shaking thing. Sarmenti has never seen him so very close before, and while he holds no weapon, nothing that could easily bring him harm, but still his heart crawls up to his throat and stays there. The human goes onto to clothed knees and reaches down for him. And the siren can’t help but flinch away. Words lodge deep into that lump, squirming. Uncomfortable. Can he not?...
“Ah…” is all that he can force out, trembling still as he stares up at him.
But the human doesn’t pull away, doesn’t seem to reconsider.
“I can feel a great storm coming. I would hate to imagine what would happen if you were to stay here.” The keeper doesn’t seem to know, or care, what the siren is. But Sarmenti's mind rattles that the man could be planning something, panic swelling like a wave about to break across the shore. “I can help you.”
Trapped on the rocky shore from the only real home the lonely siren has ever known, he doesn't really have a choice.
He reaches out a shaking hand and grabs the human’s wrist, shuddering when another hand warps around his elbow as he’s pulled up, up and out of the shallow pool and rested upon the rocks. Sarmenti quakes and trembles, still panting from the past attempts to escape. He so badly wishes to flee to the waves that still crash against the shore, but the exhaustion is too great. Leaving him to just be a wet, vulnerable thing at the man’s mercy. Like he was all those years ago… He can’t help but flinch when the man bends down again and-
Breath gets stuck harshly in his throat, and claws dig into supple flesh as he’s hoisted up, lifted. Held. Touched. Heart pounding so hard, surely the man that holds him can feel it too. Sarmenti can’t help but whimper as he snaps his head up to stare at the human with wide dark eyes, breathing picking up to a fast and unsteady pace. The siren’s head is getting light as panic and relief overtake him in equal measure. Fins reflexively fan out, poking and prodding the lighthouse keeper. There isn’t any way the man can’t know, can’t tell, can’t feel the slicked scales pressed against calloused palms. That he is holding something other than a human being. There is an urge to lurch forward, seize the man’s shoulders, and bury sharp teeth into the man’s throat. To spill blood over the rocks. But that would leave the siren stranded on a shore without the ability to even save himself.
“I’m sorry-” Sarmenti doesn’t know why he apologizes, the words tumbling out before he even knows what he’s saying.
There are few other people he’s ever spoken to, with even fewer where he had done so without his charm. And it leaves him even more uneasy, and unsure of what to do or to say. He’s terrified of being dropped, of falling down onto the rocks of the shore, of being at the mercy of this man he doesn’t even really know.
Honey-brown eyes look upon him, and he is given a smile, the human softly murmuring, “It’s alright. Let’s get you inside before the storm arrives.”, and Sarmenti doesn’t have the courage to argue nor the nerve to try to convince the human otherwise.
Not willing to risk being cast upon the stones and left to die. So the siren lets the man carry him towards the lighthouse.