Chapter Text
Deep water, roar in ire
Your Queen died and her King laid claim
On your most precious, boy of sapphire
Ungrateful lands, set our prince free
His lonely heart is too kind for thee.
---
Its eyes are clear
Its song you'll hear
From then, no rest
'Till your last breath, left
---
Water and lands
The quarrel ends
Only after lovers
Were found together.
---
Noah emerged in the moonlit night. His eyes scanned the bank in search for the earthly prince. His hearing was not as sharp as underwater, though he noticed hushed steps in the distance. A few moments later, the golden haired boy was in sight. Each one of his hurried exhales sent a tiny opaque cloud in the night. With a slow but firm swing of his tail, Noah had propulsed himself to the limit between ocean and earth.
"Your Highness."
"Your Grace."
Noah looked up at him, smiling amiably. Sometimes, he doubted Lucien truly knew of his lineage and only called him such in a cordial effort to reciprocate. He scanned the boy's beautiful features, while Lucien quietly submitted to the inquisition.
"You ran," he ended up pointing out, slightly reprobative.
"I didn't want to keep you waiting."
Noah reached up to move a few bangs away from the boy's eyes with his thinly webbed fingers. Merpeople weren't supposed to feel and humans generally did not care for them. Each of their meeting beautifully defied the odds.
"Imagine how long I would have waited if you had hurt yourself."
"I'm here, aren't I ?"
The pleasant reality softened Noah's blame. Though Lucien was naturally inclined to letting him close, the stories that had nursed him since his childhood caused him to be wary when they first met.
The Captain did not hesitate to threaten his dreamer of a son with merpeople bearing sharp teeth and no hearts, who had developped a special liking for drowning boys whose description fit to the last mole on Lucien's body and obstinately refused to fall behind their fathers's steps.
Lucien's guards had fended off his graceful assailant, not before his song had reached the golden boy's ears where it would keep resonating for years on. The encounter had left a disgraceful dark mark on Noah's tail, where his silver blood had seeped in the water.
Seeing the guilt in Lucien's eyes, he hid his tail under and settled for a sitting position instead of the lazy horizontal he has had until now.
"Tell me about your day," Lucien asked, longing for his voice.
"You won't turn away if I do," Noah answered, though he would love to talk with Lucien all night. Contrary to popular belief, there was no special voice he'd use when singing. His voice was lethal, however he used it. "Tell me about yours."
Lucien did not feel any less at home here, quite the opposite, but he still spoke: thoughts, events that punctuated this lonely string of hours not only of the day, but of those lonely years since their last meeting. Noah could never tell if he genuinely wanted to — part of him must have, surely — or was enthralled by the spell and following the kind order. Part of him must have, too, but not knowing which part was the greatest killed the merman.
"Thank you, Lucien," he whispered after the prince went quiet. "I love your voice."
Even coming from him, this was no mockery. He propped himself on his elbows then his hands to kiss Lucien on both cheeks. Their time was close to be over, until the next meeting. Still, he let Lucien lean against him and rest his head on his shoulder. He and his father's ship would be leaving the ocean soon, to go back further in land for trade. Though there were merpeople in the rivers, Noah wasn't one of them. He would return to his cold lover — the ocean — one way or another, Lucien knew, despite the chains holding him back at the moment.
"Come with me," Lucien still asked.
Noah heard three different words. Something prevented him from looking at Lucien now, as if the young sailor needed privacy and Noah was only there to protect it. Yet silence was too harsh for an answer.
"Hey, don't cry, please."
Though he lived surrounded with water, the wetness in the crook of his neck hit differently. This was what they did. Charm humans then either drive them insane, enough that the stories would be passed to the next generation or cause such great affliction that life itself would become unbearable.
"Lucien," he called with an even softer tone. "Beautiful Lucien."
The young man calmed down, impossibly. Noah had used this magical trick too often lately, when Lucien's unkind thoughts and the strong ocean would forbid him to rest at night. When they had last seen each other, they were kids. Lucien's skin had not grown hard despite the discipline Noah could guess under his quiet breath, the punishments, the expected cruelty. Having spent so much time under the sun, Lucien had tanned the amount his complexion would allow. Noah's skin had grown pale, almost translucid (except for the fading marks of the net that served his capture), fit for a life in an environment where the light was scarce and the temperatures, harsh.
"I'm sorry. . ."
"What for ?"
Noah held his face at the distance of a few inches. He noticed Lucien's struggle against the spell. Unfortunately, there was no escape, not when they were so close. Noah repeated his question, effortlessly overriding Lucien's will to keep the secret.
"I love you, Noah."
In any other world, the extorted confession would have made him the happiest person alive. Here, it only meant that Lucien did not have much time left. None, in fact.
"You know my heart belongs to the ocean," he retorted kindly.
Lucien did not seem more hurt than he was years ago when kneeling on the abrupt shore with red cheeks and tired eyes, after his mother had bid him farewell and let herself be swallowed by the waves. Noah had celebrated her return. The Captain had unkindly told Lucien she died, blaming her very subjects. Now, Noah wanted to tell him everything, that / he / should be the one to come — but that was certain to kill Lucien even faster.
"Then take me with you."
"You can't breathe underwater, Lucien. You'll die."
After a painful agony, at that. Noah has seen enough drowned men to be certain of the fact. He wondered distractedly, what had failed to anchor Lucien to his world; what had led him to merpeople and their cursed voices, finally, what had severed his last ties to life itself. He knew the answer to this question; was had inevitably led to his demise was the blue in his eyes, inherited from a royal from the oceans. Merpeople were not supposed to have a heart, yet Lucien felt so much and so deeply; Noah himself felt something similar break in him when hearing him speak. He pressed their foreheads together. Every mellifluous word that passed his lips strengthened the bond Lucien fell victim to.
"Then I will become one with the ocean. Isn't it the way ?"
"One of them," Noah nuanced without denying that if Lucien became the ocean, his heart would rightfully belong. He found it tragic that Lucien knew the curse yet refused to fight. The surrender was grand, idiotic. "The least fitting for you."
"What else is there ?"
"Kill me."
He envied Lucien's tears, their cristalline glimmer on his fair skin; Lucien's love, stubborn and forever one-sided. Merpeople did not feel, at least not the way humans did, so deeply and helplessly.
"You are truly cruel, Noah," Lucien retorted with a mix of anger and anguish, "to even dare suggest this. If empathy is still within your reach, kiss me like the ocean kisses the shore and present me to my fate."
Their noses touched. If Noah's heart could break, it wouldn't have to because Lucien would be loved back. If his eyes could shed tears, they would have over the joy of having found Lucien after so long.
"I have drowned many, yet you will not join the count."
"But I'm begging, can't you see ?" Lucien glanced over his shoulder, fearing a shadow would stand between the dark trees.
He exhaled shakily, with sad and pleading eyes. His warm breath reached Noah's lips. He did not have use for his heart and his breath without the sense of belonging.
---
Voices, hollering victoriously over the loot brought up by their net. No food, if the crew wasn't too desperate, but something just as valuable. People died for entertainment. Yet if the Captain had seen Noah — who fooled many by remaining calm even upon being handled, he would not have failed to notice the secrets coiled inside of him and would have put him to death before suffering from the whiplash.
While most sailors pointed out how odd it was that such creature would swim so close to the surface, Lucien knew as soon as he heard that it had been for him. Noah's widening eyes betrayed him once he has recognized his visitor. His fate was uncertain, but it seemed Lucien was a constant in it. Ironically, the Captain decided his son would be taking a turn of duty that night, unaware.
To live or let Lucien live? The world was utterly quiet when Lucien kissed him — goodbye, it seemed.
"Is this what you want ?"
Lucien nodded, readying himself. Noah found him too welcoming to death, for such a young age. He did not protest when Noah reached for the ring of keys he bore. Though his eyes spoke alarms, his lips were shut tight and his tongue, unwilling to disturb Noah's song. He heard many hurried steps growing by the second. An army had come to his rescue — or to reclaim their captive.
Noah had known, the moment he saw the blue in Lucien's eyes, so alike to his own, that he did not belong; in a similar manner, Lucien had known, the moment he saw the kindness in Noah's, that he did not either. There was no world fitting for them, aside from each other. Noah knew this, but was denied the feeling. Wishing their reunion didn't mean the end of Lucien — and what end, among cold and fear ! — was as close as he could get to loving him, in the sense that he wanted his happiness.
Like the ocean kissed the shore, Noah kissed Lucien and did not stop. Not upon hearing the harsh orders to kill. Lucien was a dead man regardless. If Noah did not want to drown him, the Captain himself would punish him, perhaps with a fate even worse. Could Noah do that ? Leave Lucien to be drowned in a way, or overworked with ugly tasks while bearing bad treatments, until the lively light in his eyes went off ?
"You owe this to me," Lucien uttered, the moment Noah stopped singing.
Noah summoned a strong wave that allowed him to pull Lucien overboard while fending off the rest of the vociferating crew. He wouldn't call what he did to live breathing. Water did not exactly serve the same purpose as air, mostly drawing the limits of his environment. Lucien, however, breathed. Short exhales, releasing tiny bubbles towards the surface. Noah wondered; the boy had certainly gone under some sort of training. He could wait Lucien's stamina out. The most bitter of his kind would let their preys suffer in such manner, adding confusion to their last moments. Eventually, Lucien would still find himself in need of oxygen and unable to extract it from the element surrounding him. However, he owed Lucien the honors.
He shoved the young man against a rocky outcrop before his survival instincts kicked in. The shock emptied Lucien's lungs, sending a few bubbles towards the surface and more importantly, breaking his mastery of apnea. A pirate ? Seeing him like this, Noah would shrug with amusement at the mere idea. His hands betrayed a lack of inclination towards manual work, although he had been forced to go against his nature or even hide some aspects of it in numerous occasions. They might never find out who Lucien truly was before that ship left the docks, before finding a bit of himself into Noah.
Water was their weapon, albeit serving different lethal purposes. The end made sense in a 'live by the sword, die by the sword' way. Noah was agonizing too, along with Lucien's breathless struggle. He manipulated the current to go against Lucien, so he would be unable to fight back, exhausting him with the unseen water flow. The idea that any part of Noah would survive Lucien was extraordinary. Lucien held onto him, tight for as long as he could. All those years, he had been looking for Noah and unknown to him was the fact that Noah had been looking back. Yet he still wasn't loved, how unfair ! Even now, the merman did not shy away from his task. Even if Lucien was released now, he likely couldn't make it to the surface anymore.
It felt like a lifetime, while he had only been holding the sailor down for a few minutes. Objectively, Noah was not even tired. The ocean was on his side, restraining his victim and muffling his protests until they had dwindled enough and died. Had Noah not shoved him like this, he would still have had enough breath to keep fighting for a few minutes. Eventually, his arms followed the flow. The tide casually tousled Lucien's curls. Noah felt hollow, unable to cry or mourn. He felt / dead / and also like he did not deserve the sweet escape, his hands being tainted with the purest blood. Whatever his previous sins were, this was Purgatory. The cold, the absence of tears, of heart, of feelings, the unescapable loneliness.
He kissed Lucien's parted lips and found them unresponsive to touch. The ocean was cruel, he thought. It had claimed his heart once, then his all, sacrificed. Carefully, he removed the earthly gold, the tight gilded vest, the ornate shirt, the embroidered belt and its a pistol holder. He did not feel more for the sword that pierced the flow on its way to rock bottom than he had for the ornate belt and shoes. Finally, he removed a blue flower from his own hair to place in Lucien's. He still hadn't resolved to release him and effectively let the deep waters claim his body too when the boy shuddered, impossibly.
Noah felt like 'cough' was more appropriate to describe what just happened, although it felt very impossible as well. Lucien looked as surprised as him, with a bonus of being disoriented. He pulled Lucien up and against him before he had sunken low and following the string of unlikely occurences, saw their tangled legs with a vision getting blurrier by the second, felt a dissonant rythm play between their bare chests: Lucien's heart beating vigorously along with his own.
---
The old fisherman cottage didn't have a door or windows, leaving the sleeping lovers exposed to the coast's winds. Carrying Lucien had been an arduous task for each step felt like it was taken on so many sharp knives. Noah decided this was a fair punishment for his last victim. When sweat beads shone on Lucien's forehead, he stood to get a clean rag to dab over his skin. Before his lips had dried, he had gone to the shore and back with fresh water. How had he not left bloody footprints all along ?
Eventually, Lucien woke and his awakening made the pain worth it. There were no curtains to shield his sensitive eyes, so Noah hurted along with them. Lucien saw him and smiled. They had turned the curse around, hadn't they ? Noah's gills were gone, along with his skin's scaly areas. Lucien's heart was not so tormented anymore.
"Your Highness."
When Noah did not reply, Lucien rolled atop of him to kiss his lips. Noah held him and kissed him back. They tasted like salt, sweat, worn fragrance.
"Your Grace."
His voice sounded different now, beautiful even without the intoxicating magic. He sat up. Surprisingly, placing his feet on the ground did not hurt. He took a few steps in the middle of the room and found they didn't hurt either. Lucien was on his back when Noah joined him once more in bed. He straddled the boy's hips, laughing. The curse was over.
None of them knew how much time they had spent running away, then healing until Lucien had woken. It could have been a few days or a few weeks. Their slow rediscovery of each other — the world — was interrupted and Noah, brutally torn from his earthly half. Life, it turns out, did not stop for magic.
"Stop!" Lucien's command was imperious enough that the trigger wasn't pulled, although the pistol remained armed against Noah's head. "He's not the one you're looking for."
The young sailor winced. They were tying him, which meant that they did plan on taking him back — maybe to let the Captain carry on with whatever sentence his betrayal would be met with, but Noah was obviously not meant to share this luxury.
"How would you know ?"
"He has legs !"
Their advantage in this was that even though those men's physical abilities were pushed to great levels, not the same could be said about their minds. In doubt, they brought Noah on board — though he had been silenced first, for safety. Lying to vaguely educated pirates was a thing. Lying to his father, a ruthless commander, was another.
"Who is that ?"
The disdain in his voice when referring to Noah hurt. Lucien heard a pistol being armed next and, still held back, forced to leave Noah exposed. The young man's chances of survival seemingly thinned as the story was told. The Captain summed it up like this; either Noah was what he thought, was made prisoner and killed the next moment or Noah indeed wasn't, but was still found laying by Lucien's side and thrown overboard like the liability he was.
After a few minutes of thought, he had appointed weights, ready to be attached to Noah's feet. He gestured at the men to release Lucien and step back. Still without having made his decision known, he had Noah brought to him.
"Dad, don't—"
Fortunately, the pistol did not serve his main use and the Captain hit Noah hard enough with its rear instead of shooting. His captive faceplanted the deck. Lucien knew the facts better than anyone else; he only had to state them and pick Noah's poison.
"Which one is it, Lucien ?"
---
Surrounded by rot and barrels, forbidden to move or speak — but alive, Noah was surprised to have woken. A few moments into vigil and the stench of blood had caught to his nose, strong and acrid. To discard the piece of cloth tied around his head was an arduous task, but he managed to at least shift it enough.
"Hey. . ."
"Fuck, thank God."
"Lucien, are you —"
Noah yelped. Lucien / was / bleeding, having refused the choice presented by his father. His eyes adjusted fast enough to the low luminosity and he saw Lucien's hands hooked too high above his head.
"I'm fine." He wasn't.
"Why are you here ?"
"We will be executed at dawn," Lucien quoted. "Mutiny and. . . witchcraft."
Noah did not laugh. He squirmed, hands, feet and only hurt himself further. "You're his son. He — he's trying to scare you."
"I have outgrown ghost stories, Noah."
Noah felt tears of rage rolling down his cheeks, amid sweat and sticky dampness. Lucien's resignation made it worse. "You were not meant to be a pirate."
"I'll sure die like one," Lucien grimly pointed out. "With my treasure."