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The Eye of Vargr crept through the mist like a ghost, its grey sails limp in the windless air. Euijoo squinted at his compass, its needle twitching erratically. “Tides are shifting faster than they should,” he muttered, more to himself than to Nicholas, who leaned against the railing beside him.
“You sure this is worth it?” Nicholas asked, thumbing the hilt of his dagger. “Feels like the air’s chewing on my bones.”
Captain K only hummed in agreement, his gloved hands steady on the ship’s wheel. But his eyes,sharp as flint, flicked to the water, where bioluminescent algae glowed faintly, painting the waves an eerie green.
Fuma, perched in the crow’s nest, called down, “No stars. No moon. Just… gray.” His voice wavered. “Like the sky’s been swallowed.”
Harua chimed nervously from the rigging. “I keep hearing… whistling? Or… humming?”
“It’s the wind,” Maki said, though he hesitated. “Right?”
But there was no wind.
Euijoo’s throat tightened. He’d studied every chart, every log about these straits and arch tunnels. Sailors called it The Throat—a passage that “digested” ships whole. He’d dismissed the tales as superstition. Now, though, the hair on his neck prickled.
The first sign was subtle - a melody woven into the creak of the ship. Jo abandoned his post by the mizzenmast, drawn toward the portside rail. “Do you smell jasmine?” he murmured. “My mother used to…”
“Jo!” Nicholas barked. “Stay sharp.”
Nicholas grabbed Euijoo’s arm. “Sirens,” he hissed. “This is that death trap strait from the tavern tales. Why’d you plot a course here?”
Euijoo’s knuckles whitened on his compass. “It’s the only route to the Black Tides Island. You think I’d risk us if there were another—”
A harmony of voices cut through the mist, sweet and whimpering. The ship lurched as if dragged by invisible hands.
Then the water erupted.
K slammed the ship’s bell. A sharp, dissonant clang rang out and the crew jolted to attention. But the mist thickened, and the humming grew louder. Not a song, but a pull, as if the sea itself were being inhaled.
The water began to move.
Not waves. Shapes. Silhouettes darting beneath the surface, too fluid to be human. Euijoo’s compass spun wildly. He gripped the rail, his childhood fear of dark water clawing up his spine.
“Nicholas,” he said, too quietly.
“I see it.” Nicholas’s voice was low, dangerous. He unsheathed his cutlass. “Fuma! Get down from there—”
Fuma was already climbing down, his eyes vacant.
K lunged forward, cuffing Fuma hard across the shoulder—his version of a wake-up slap. Fuma gasped, blinking back to himself.
“Ropes!” Nicholas roared. “Tie yourselves to something solid! Now!”
Too late.
Maki staggered toward the edge, tears streaming down his face. Harua followed, caught in a trance, humming the siren’s tune.
Euijoo’s breath hitched. This is my fault. He’d charted this course. He’d ignored the rumors. His eyes darted to the side of the ship.
And froze.
A hand, pale as moonlight, gripped the ship’s rail. Then a face rose from the water.
Nicholas.
The siren’s features were Nicholas’ exact mirror—same sharp angles, same dark eyes—but warped, hollow, like a reflection in a cracked mirror. Its lips parted, and his voice spilled out: “Joo...”
Euijoo’s limbs locked. He couldn’t scream. Couldn’t blink. He could feel it—the weight of the vision, the pull of its meaning.
Lessons on Siren number 1: Sirens in these waters are not mere monsters—they are echoes of drowned souls cursed to feast on the hunger of the living. Their power lies in reflection: they mirror the secret ache of their prey, luring them with faces, voices, or bodies that embody their deepest yearnings or regrets. The more buried the desire, the more potent the siren’s illusion. Those who succumb are dragged into the depths, their souls chained to the strait, forced to lure others in an endless cycle.
But there’s a cruel twist—sirens cannot mimic what does not already exist in the heart of their victim.
---
Chaos.
Harua thrashed, screaming for the siren’s image of his “sister”, who ran away from home when he was 10. Nicholas hauled him back from the rail, tying him to the mast with rigging rope. “Snap out of it, kid!”
Lessons on Siren number 2. Somehow being aware of what you’re seeing makes you less susceptible to their call. Nicholas heard the calls too, he isn’t immune to desire but he is immune to denial.
K moved like a storm, pistol-whopping Maki awake before he could jump.
But Taki was already half way overboard—Fuma dove after him, wrestling him back onto the deck as sirens clawed at the ship's edges.
Taki struggled against the rough hands that dragged him toward the mainmast. Fuma worked quickly, his fingers looping the coarse ropes with practiced precision, but his gaze was restless, flickering between the knots he tightened and the figure of K across the deck. His own pulse seemed to steady whenever he caught a glimpse of him.
Lessons on Siren number 3: Their power wanes if your heart is anchored to someone already present.
The air was thick with the eerie echoes of the sirens’ song, a haunting melody that seemed to claw at the edges of reason.
Euijoo stood paralyzed. A hand clamped over his eyes, as a sturdy chest crashed against his back.
“Don’t. Look.” Nicholas growled in his ear, dragging him backward.
Nicholas shook Euijoo hard. “Hey! Navigator! I need you!”
The real Nicholas—sweat-soaked, furious, alive—was everything yet nothing like the siren’s mimicry. The spell snapped.
“K! The cannon!” his voice rang out.
K understood. He grabbed a powder keg, lit the fuse, and rolled it into the sea. The explosion shattered the water, and the sirens scattered—but not for long.
The sirens adapted. Their faces shifted— mirroring the crew’s deepest longings: lost lovers, dead parents, childhood selves. Yuma’s voice tore through the air, raw and desperate, as a siren with his mother’s face—soft wrinkles and kind eyes reached out to him. He lost her to a village raid of robbers ages ago.
The sound of the canon going off broke him out of the daze for a second of clarity. He couldn’t bring her back, but he could honor her by surviving this.
Lesson in Sirens number 4: Loud, jarring noises can shatter their illusions. The sharper the sound, the quicker the spell unravels.
---
They lost count of time.
The ship was still under siege, the crew half scattered and struggling against their own temptations and half tied to the masts already, courtesy of Fuma and Nicholas, as K fought off the distractions.
Sirens crawled up the hull, nails screeching against wood. K fired pistols into the water, aiming for their throats. Fuma hacked at their hands with a hatchet.
But the mist was a prison. The crew was crumbling. Jo, usually the calm and collected one, was crouched near the helm, his hands pressed tightly over his ears, his face pale and drawn.
K’s gunshots rang out again and again, sharp and percussive, each one a lifeline. Somehow, the sound of his pistols cut through the illusions, the sudden, jarring noise breaking the sirens’ hold, if only for a moment. It was enough to give the crew brief glimpses of clarity, enough to keep them fighting.
Nicholas bound himself to the foremast, facing the ship's navigator whom he tied to the mainmast.
“If I start humming,” Nicholas said grimly, “punch me.”
Euijoo blinked, then glanced down at his hands, already bound tightly to the mast. He looked back at Nicholas, his expression flat. “...my hands are tied. Literally.”
K and Fuma hurled a final powder keg. The blast illuminated the straits exit—a sliver of moonlight ahead.
The ship lurched forward, sirens wailing as the Eye of Vargr broke free.
---
The ship rolled out of the strait and into the open sea as if spat out by the jaws of some great beast. Then came sunrise. Its light warm and forgiving, casted a golden glow over the calm waters.
The crew untied themselves, shaky but alive.
Yuma grinned, though his hands still trembled. “My siren looked like a giant pork bun. I’m not even mad.” Yuma was a bad liar, but nobody wanted to call him out on it.
Jo sighed. “Mine… was my mother’s calling me for some curry. I haven’t had it since I was six.” The crew laughed, too loud, too relieved.
Only Euijoo and Nicholas stayed silent. Euijoo avoided Nicholas’s gaze, scribbling mindlessly in his charting journal.
A quiet tension that no one dared to address.
Hours passed, the sun slowly dipping toward the horizon, painting the sky in hues of orange and pink. The crew busied themselves with repairs, their movements sluggish but purposeful. K’s voice carried over the murmurs of the crew, something about analysing the sirens.
—-
Nicholas cornered Euijoo by the empty cannon mounts.
“Dude. Why did that siren take on my image to try and seduce you? Is there something you wanna tell me?”
Euijoo stiffened.
The deck swayed beneath his boots, but the world felt unnervingly still. Nicholas’s question hung between them like a blade.
Why did it take his form?
He could still see it—the siren wearing Nicholas’s face. Not the Nicholas he knew, scuffed and sunburned and shouting orders, but a fever-dream version.
Siren-Nicholas had emerged from the water like an offering, a sacrifice laid bare before the altar of Euijoo’s deepest desires. His skin glistened, slick with seawater, every droplet catching the dim light as it traced the sharp cut of his collarbones, the taut lines of his stomach. His chest rose and fell with each heaving breath, the rhythm hypnotic, maddening.
His hair clung to his forehead, damp and disheveled, saltwater dripping down the curve of his jaw, his neck, pooling in the hollow of his throat. “Euijoo…” the siren rasped, its voice rough, low, like the scrape of a kiss against skin.
Even now, the memory burned, searing itself into Euijoo’s mind with a heat that made his chest ache. The siren’s fingers had curled over the rail, nails blackened and sharp, a stark contrast to the softness of its mouth.
Its eyes had locked onto his, dark and pleading, and for a moment, it wasn’t a monster. It was Nicholas—vulnerable, exposed, his walls crumbled to dust. The siren’s hand had reached for him, trembling, and Euijoo had felt the pull in his gut, the ache in his chest, the heat pooling low in his stomach.
He’d wanted to touch, to feel the warmth of its skin, to trace the lines of its body and see if it trembled under his hands. He’d wanted to close the distance, to press his lips to his, to taste the salt on its skin and see if it burned as much as he imagined.
Even now, as the ship sailed on and the sun had started to dip below the horizon, Euijoo could still see the siren’s lips, cheeks flushed with an unnatural heat that made it look alive, desperate, wanting. A Nicholas who’d strip himself bare, who’d beg.
And Euijoo had wanted to let it.
“Well?” Nicholas stepped closer, his usual swagger replaced by something taut, urgent. “You’re avoiding me.”
Euijoo’s throat dried. He focused on the real Nicholas—the one with a cut on his jaw from the fight, his shirt torn at the shoulder, smelling of gunpowder and sweat. The one who’d called him “Joo” before the weight of survival made them sharp.
“I’m not—it wasn’t you,” Euijoo lied.
Nicholas scoffed. “Bullshit. The sirens don’t trick. They reveal.” He’d heard the stories too.
“Don’t.” Euijoo’s voice cracked, the word barely a whisper. Anything would be easier than facing Nicholas now—than meeting his eyes and seeing the weight of what he’d wanted reflected back at him. Shame coiled tight in his chest.
“Land ho!” Fuma shouted from the crow’s nest, shattering the moment.
Nicholas stepped away and back, jaw tight.
—
The crew staggered into the dimly lit port tavern, their laughter too loud, their steps unsteady—a performance of normalcy. Harua and Taki arm-wrestled over a sticky table, Yuma critiqued the tavern’s stew with theatrical disgust while Jo nursed a bruised elbow.
Euijoo sat alone at the bar, a half-empty glass of rum in hand. His fingers traced the rim of his glass, but his eyes stayed fixed on the wood grain, replaying the siren’s taunting mimicry of Nicholas—that Nicholas, the one who’d looked at him like he was the only compass in a storm.
“You’re brooding,” Maki said, sliding onto the stool beside him. “Worse than when you misread the tides off Kraken’s Maw. What’d you see out there?”
Euijoo stiffened. “Nothing.”
“Nothing?” Maki raised a brow. “Sirens don’t show nothing. Mine looked like my old dog. I almost jumped ship for Pandy.”
Across the room, Captain K leaned against the hearth. His gaze flicked to Euijoo, then to Nicholas—who was pretending not to watch Euijoo from the shadowed corner where the three of them sat while he played cards with Fuma. “Maybe, you guys should talk…”.
It wasn’t that hard to notice it but all three of them at the table understood that their navigator didn’t expect to be outed like that.
Euijoo stood abruptly. “I need air.”
—
The docks were quiet, waves lapping like a whisper. Euijoo leaned against a moss-eaten post, the rum hot in his veins. Footsteps echoed behind him—deliberate, familiar.
“You’re avoiding me, Again.” Nicholas said.
Euijoo didn’t turn. “You’re imagining things.”
“Am I?” Nicholas stepped closer. “Is it really so terrible? That I’m the thing you want?”
Euijoo’s chest heaved with what he assumed was mockery in his tone. He whirled, fist clutching Nicholas’s collar, slamming him against the post on the dock side. Moonlight caught the flecks of gold in Nicholas’s eyes, the same desperate heat the siren had mirrored.
The real Nicholas didn’t pull away.
His voice dropped, rough and raw. “That siren didn’t just wear my face, Joo. It wore yours too. For me.”
Euijoo froze. The air thickened, salt and sweat and the ghost of rum between them. He could taste it—the almost, the what if—before he shoved Nicholas back, hard. “Stop.”
The faint light of the moon carved Nicholas’s features into something dangerous. His shirt hung open at the collar, revealing the scar from the Skull Isle ambush, a pale slash against sun-bronzed skin. His hair, still damp from the humid tavern, curled at the nape of his neck. But it was his eyes that undid Euijoo—dark and unflinching
Nicholas laughed, bitter. “Yeah. Knew you’d be like that.”
Euijoo turned away, fists clenched. “You don’t know what you’re asking.”
“I’m asking for the truth!”
The words hung in the air, sharp as cutlass steel.
When Euijoo finally spoke, his voice was a ghost. “The truth will sink us.”
—
The tavern stank of mildew and regret. Nicholas leaned against the wall, a lukewarm ale in hand, watching the sailors' hands tremble as they recounted their stories. Their missing fingers and milky eyes told truths their slurred words tried to drown.
"Passed through The Throat at moonrise once," croaked the one-eyed man, his remaining eye darting to the tavern door like the sirens themselves might burst through. "Fog so thick it crawled down yer throat. Saw my first mate's daughter in the water - girl who'd died of pox three summers prior. She sang my name in her wee squeaky voice..."
His companion - a hulking brute with salt-crusted knuckles, and two digits missing on his left hand- slammed his tankard. "Quit yer shakin', Jory. They ain't here."
"But they are," whispered a third sailor, skeletal fingers clutching a rusted pendant of Saint Elmo. "In the strait. Always. They take your face, your voice, your rotten heart's desire..." His gaze snapped to Nicholas, sudden and feverish. "You lot plannin' to sail through?"
Nicholas kept his voice casual, thumb rubbing the chip in his tankard. "Might. How’d y’all survive?"
The one-eyed man barked a laugh that turned into a cough. "Tie yerself to the mast, boy. Ring the bell till your ears bleed. Better yet-" He leaned close, reeking of fish guts and despair, "-shoot the first man who starts hummin' their tune.
K materialized beside them like a shadow given form. "Superstition," K said, though his gloved hand flexed near his pistol. “
The brute smirked. "That what your pretty charts say, Captain? My nephew thought maps mattered too. Last I saw him, a siren wore his smile while pickin' his teeth with his own rib."
He added “Better keep your wits. One wrong turn into the rocks, and your crew’s bones’ll pave the seabed.”
K’s expression stayed flat as a blade. “We’ll manage.”
—-
Later, on the dock outside, Nicholas lit a cigarette, the breeze carrying the stench of low tide. K joined him, striking a match against the hull of The Eye of Vargr.
"You put stock in ghost stories now?" K asked, the flame illuminating the scar cutting through his lower lip.
Nicholas exhaled smoke toward the constellation less sky. "Those weren't drunkards. They were scared..."
K studied the glowing tip of his cigarette. "Euijoo's calculations account for tidal patterns. We'll clear the strait by dusk."
"Since when do numbers outrun nightmares?"
“Every strait’s got its ghost story.”
A beat. Waves slapped the dock pylons.
"What would yours look like?" K’s voice dropped, almost curious. "The siren."
Nicholas' mind flashed to last night's watch - Euijoo asleep at the navigation desk, ink smudged on his cheek, the vulnerable dip of his collarbone visible under his unlaced shirt.
Pathetic.
"Gold," Nicholas lied. "Enough to choke a king."
K snorted. "Mine'd be the sea herself. Simple’s safer." He crushed his cigarette underfoot. "Love makes fools of us all."
—
As The Eye of Vargr slid into the fog, Nicho’s skin prickled. The air was too still, too hungry.
Euijoo stood at the helm, crisp and focused as always, muttering calculations under his breath. "Currents deviate 2.3 knots from projections..."
You'd chart us straight into hell if your numbers said to, Nicholas thought, equal parts admiration and fury.
“Tides are shifting faster than they should.”
The words grated.
The strait's cliffs pressed in like tomb walls, weeping with luminous algae with yellow hue reflected from the ship’s lanterns. Harua's nervous giggle cut through the silence.
Fuma’s shout from the crow’s nest: “No stars. No moon. Just… gray.”
Nicholas’ hands were at his dagger before he realized. Tie yourself. Ring the bells. Fire a pistol. The tavern’s advice clawed at his skull.
Off to the side he could see Jo inching closer to rails. “Jo! Stay sharp.”
Nicho whirled, grip bruising. The navigator’s confusion—genuine, oblivious—ignited something vicious in his chest. “Sirens,” he hissed, the word a blade between them. “This is that death-trap strait from the tavern tales. Why’d you plot a course here?”
Euijoo’s knuckles whitened on his compass. “It’s the only route to the Black Tides treasure. You think I’d risk us if there were another—”
It started as a vibration in the wood, a wrongness in the creak of ropes into a melody. K rang the bell.
“ROPE!” Nicho roared, yanking rigging line from the barrel. His voice sounded foreign, frayed.
Maki staggered toward the rail, tears cutting through the grime on his face. “Pandy? But you… you drowned…”
"MAST!" Nicholas roared, yanking rigging rope from the barrel. "TIE YOURSELVES TO THE MAST, YOU IDIOTS!"
Nicholas rushed to aid his crew, stupidly falling for the deception. Harua put up a fight but Nicholas managed to sustain him. Off the corner of his eyes, he could see K cooking up a storm, firing left and right at the water and the creatures. Seemed like Fuma was alright too.
The water exploded.
A hand.
His hand.
Nicholas' breath stopped as the siren pulled itself out of the water, seawater sluicing off a body that mirrored his own - same scar on the right arm, same stance - but wrong. The hips swayed too fluidly, the eyes glinted with predatory hunger rather than his guarded cunning.
"Joo..." it purred in his voice, low and honeyed.
Euijoo froze.
Nicholas saw the exact moment the spell took hold - the dilation of Euijoo's pupils, the parted lips, the flush creeping up his neck. The siren's Nicholas-smile sharpened.
"Don't. Look!"
Nicholas didn’t wait—he grabbed Euijoo, shaking him hard. “Hey! Navigator! I need you!”
The real Euijoo—sweat-soaked, confused, alive—blinked a couple times. Nicholas’ chest ached.
Okay focus Nicho!. Tie yourself. Ring the bells. Fire a pistol…..fire a…pistol? “K! The Cannon!”
Good thing they stocked up on those.
The fact that the ship was still rolling without the wind was probably a trick of sirens, or the will of the gods. In all that chaos, Nicholas was barely keeping it together himself, he hears the voices too but from the looks of it, the rest of them seem to not hear other’s sirens’ calls. They would’ve noticed the one calling him otherwise.
As he turned from tying the navigator to the post or “securing the goods” as Yuma would say it, another siren emerged - this one wearing Euijoo's face, lips swollen from kisses only Nicholas had imagined.
"Nicho..." it sighed, reaching for him.
He shot it between the eyes.
K will probably give him a good beating for stealing one of his revolvers from his cabin again.
—
Euijoo had been nervous the day he joined K’s crew. The Eye of Vargr was smaller than he’d expected, its hull scarred and its sails patched, but there was an air of danger about it that made his pulse quicken.
Nicholas stood at the railing, his back to the dock, a scarf wrapped around the lower half of his face. The fabric was faded, but it did nothing to hide the intensity of his gaze. His eyes were like flint—dark, unyielding, and sharp enough to cut. A jagged scar ran down his right arm, disappearing under the rolled-up sleeve of his shirt. Euijoo couldn’t stop staring at it, wondering how he’d gotten it, wondering if he’d ever be brave enough to ask.
Nicholas didn’t speak, just nodded once in acknowledgment before walking away.
He’s terrifying, Euijoo thought. And so cool.
Their first real interaction came a week later. Euijoo was hunched over a map in the galley, trying to memorize the coastline of the Caribbean, when Nicholas appeared in the doorway. He held out a small, wrapped square.
“Chocolate,” he said, his voice rough and accented. “From Mexico.”
Euijoo blinked, caught off guard. “Oh. Uh, no thank you.”
Nicholas shrugged and unwrapped it himself, popping it into his mouth. He didn’t say anything else, just leaned against the doorframe and watched Euijoo work.
It became a pattern. Nicholas would appear, offer something—a piece of fruit, a cigarette, a quiet “good morning” and Euijoo would take the polite option. He never figured out why the quartermaster was so hell bent on it but he didn’t hate it.
Then came the storm.
It hit in the middle of the night, waves crashing over the deck and wind howling through the rigging. Euijoo was jolted awake by K’s voice booming through the ship: “Everyone up! Secure the cargo!”
He stumbled into the hallway, only to collide with Nicholas, who was already dressed and heading for the deck.
“Euijoo,” K barked, pointing at Euijoo. “You’re bunking with Nicho. His roommate jumped ship in Tortuga, and we need the spare room for supplies.”
Nicholas didn’t react, just jerked his head toward the stairs. “Come.”
The first night was awkward. Euijoo sat on the edge of his bunk, clutching his journal like a shield, while Nicholas methodically cleaned his dagger. The silence stretched, broken only by the creak of the ship and the occasional rumble of thunder.
“So… how long have you been with the crew?”
Nicholas glanced up, his scarf still covering the lower half of his face. “Two and a half month.”
“Do you like it?”
A pause. “It’s work.”
Euijoo nodded, unsure what to say next. He opened his journal, pretending to study his notes, but his eyes kept drifting to Nicholas. The man’s movements were precise, almost graceful, as he polished the blade.
“You draw?” Nicholas asked suddenly, nodding toward the journal.
“Uh, yeah. Maps, mostly. Sometimes… other things.”
Nicholas set the dagger aside and held out his hand. “Show me.”
Euijoo hesitated, then passed him the journal. Nicholas flipped through the pages, his sharp eyes scanning the sketches—coastlines, constellations, the occasional doodle of a bird or fish.
“Good,” he said finally, handing it back.
Euijoo’s chest warmed at the praise. “Thanks.”
After that, the tension eased. They started talking more—short, stilted conversations at first, but gradually longer ones. Euijoo learned that Nicholas had grown up near the north of Taiwan, that he’d learned to sail before he could walk, and that he hated the taste of rum. In return, Euijoo shared stories of his childhood in Jeju, his love of maps, and his dream of discovering a treasure no one else could find.
One night, after a particularly long watch, as they sat together on the crows nest, watching the stars, Nicholas handed him a piece of chocolate.
“Try it,” he said.
This time, Euijoo didn’t refuse.
—
“The truth will sink us,” Euijoo said, his voice low, like he was trying to convince himself as much as Nicholas.
Nicholas tilted his head, his sharp eyes narrowing. “Then let’s sink,” he said, his tone casual, as if he were suggesting they try a new route on the map.
The moonlight caught the faint tremor in Euijoo’s hands, the way his gaze darted to the water like he was considering jumping in just to escape this conversation.
His gaze flicked to Nicholas’ scarred arm, then to the faint smirk playing on his lips.
“And here I thought you only had eyes for your maps.”
Euijoo’s eyes focused downwards, lips pressed into a thin line, but a faint flush crept up his neck. “It’s not that simple.”
“Is it not?” Nicholas’s voice dropping to a murmur.
He reached out, his fingers tilting Euijoo’s face upwards. The touch was soft, almost casual, but it sent a jolt through both of them.
Euijoo’s breath came quicker now, his chest rising and falling in shallow bursts. “And what if you’re wrong?”
Nicholas’s voice a low rumble. “Then prove me wrong.”
For a moment, Euijoo just stared at him, his dark eyes searching Nicholas’ face for something—doubt, maybe, or a sign that this was all some odd joke. But all he found was certainty, sharp and unyielding.
“You’re impossible,” Euijoo muttered, but there was no bite in it.
Nicholas chuckled, the sound warm and low.
“Maybe. But I’m also right.”
The breeze off the water was cool, carrying the faint scent of salt and seaweed. It ruffled Nicholas’ hair, loose strands falling across his forehead as he leaned against the dock post to where Euijoo had shoved him.
Euijoo stood barely an arm’s length away.
Nicholas pushed off the post and stepped closer, his movements unhurried. He’d always been like this—when it's just the two of them.
Nicholas reached out, his hand brushing Euijoo’s cheeks for a moment before cupping Euijoo’s face, his thumb brushing over the navigator’s cheekbone. His other hand snaked around Euijoo’s waist, pulling him in just enough to close the distance between them.
Euijoo’s hands came up to rest tentatively on Nicholas’ chest, fingers curling into the fabric of his shirt. The warmth of Nicholas’ body seeped into his palms, steady and grounding.
Nicholas’ touch was firm but gentle, his fingers brushing a stray strand of hair from Euijoo’s face. They were close enough for Euijoo to feel the warmth of his breath.
Euijoo’s gaze dropped to Nicholas’ lips, then flicked back up to his eyes. There was a vulnerability there, a flicker of fear and longing that made his chest ache. Nicholas smiled, soft and reassuring, as if to say, It’s okay. I’ve got you.
For a moment, they just stood there.
And then, abruptly, Euijoo closed the gap. Not with tenderness, but with the jagged hunger of years of stolen glances and bitten-back words. Euijoo’s teeth caught Nicholas’ lower lip, a sharp, punishing nip that drew a rumble from the man’s chest.
His hands flew to Nicholas’ neck, fingers tangling in the hair at the nape as he entwined their lips together. The kiss was desperate, almost clumsy. Nicholas’s back hit the moss-slick post, Euijoo’s knee slotting between his thighs to brace him.
Nicholas chuckled against his mouth, the sound warm and low, but he didn’t pull away. His hand slid from Euijoo’s waist to the small of his back, holding him steady as he kissed him back, slow and deliberate, like he had all the time in the world.
Euijoo’s grip tightened, his body pressing closer as if he couldn’t get enough. Nicholas smiled into the kiss, his thumb brushing over the navigator’s cheek again, soothing and grounding before travelling down to his neck.
The navigator broke the kiss to press his lips against the other's neck and leave trails of what will be dark purple down to his collarbones, teeth scraping the pulse point beneath his ear.
Like a ship finding its anchor, he calmed down to catch his breath and rest his head against Nicholas’s shoulder. It’s like he had finally gotten back his senses to put a stop to his own actions before he lost his last bit of shame.
When they finally broke apart, Euijoo’s face was flushed, his chest rising and falling like he’d just run a mile. Nicholas, on the other hand, looked as calm as ever, though there was a softness in his eyes that hadn’t been there before.
He leaned in, pressing a quick kiss to the corner of Euijoo’s mouth before pulling back, his hand lingering on the navigator’s waist. The breeze picked up, carrying the sound of distant laughter from the tavern, but neither of them moved.
“Not so hard, was it?”
---
The captain shouldered through the tavern doors, the raucous laughter and fiddle music spilling out into the damp night air. Fuma followed, squinting into the foggy dock.
“Where’d those two idiots—” K began, then froze.
Fuma followed his gaze. Down the dock, backlit by the moon’s milky glow, two figures stood entwined—Euijoo’s broad frame caging Nicholas against a post.
“New orders,” K barked, turning on his heel. “We’re bunking at the tavern. Got a… rat infestation on board. Needs fumigating.”
Behind them, Taki stumbled out of the tavern, cheeks flushed with ale. “Why’re we stoppin’? Thought we were headin’ back to the Vargr—”
Harua clamped a hand over Taki’s mouth, “We’re not.”
“But the ship’s right there—”
Harua draped an arm around Taki’s shoulders, steering him toward the tavern’s glowing windows. “C’mon, kid. I’ll buy you a pork bun. Extra grease’ll help with the vision problems.”
K lingered, glancing back at the dock. Euijoo had buried his face in Nicholas’ shoulder now, the Quartermaster’s hand carding gently through his hair. His mouth quirked. “About time,” he muttered, before following the others inside.
—
The Eye of Vargr cut through the predawn gloom, her sails fat with wind. Nicholas leaned against the mainmast, a half-peeled orange in hand, watching his joo sketch in his journal. The navigator’s brow furrowed in concentration, his glasses slipping down his nose as he charted their next course.
“You’re staring,” Euijoo said without looking up.
“Am I?” Nicholas lobbed an orange peel at him. It landed in the journal’s crease.
Euijoo flicked it away, but the corner of his mouth twitched. “Annoying.”
“You like it.”
Before Euijoo could retort, Fuma’s voice barked across the deck. “Stop flirting and trim the sails! Storm’s brewing northeast!”
Maki hauled a line past them, grinning. “Save the squabbling for the berth, yeah?”
Harua, balanced in the rigging, rolled his eyes. “They’ve been squabbling since dawn. Someone gag them.”
Nicholas stuck out his tongue at the younger one.
Euijoo flushed but kept his eyes on the map. His pencil drifted to the margin, sketching not coordinates, but the curve of a smirk he knew too well.
In the crow’s nest, Yuma squinted at the horizon. “Hey, Nicho! If you’re done stealing snacks, there’s a siren-shaped cloud over here. Looks real familiar—”
A cannonball of laughter erupted from the crew. Even K’s mouth twitched under his scarf.
Nicholas flipped them off, but his hand lingered on Euijoo’s shoulder as he passed—a touch too deliberate to be casual.
The ship creaked onward, the sea stretching endless and hungry ahead.
Euijoo closed his journal, the ghost of a smile on his lips.