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Kaveh had never encountered a creature so beautiful as the one he’d seen moments before he should’ve died.

There was a storm that night, and all things considered the ship he was riding never should’ve left port in its condition in the first place. Kaveh should’ve been safely in the seaside town they’d departed from, should’ve never been tossed into raging black seawater, struggling to stay afloat. Should’ve, should’ve, should’ve. Meaningless hypotheticals in the face of what did happen.

That reality was the one where Kaveh found himself freezing, muscles frozen in shock as he sank beneath the waves, unable to distinguish the depths from the sky above in the moonlight as his eyes stung with the salt. He eventually began thrashing, trying to reach oxygen again. It was a fruitless effort—and soon enough, his lungs burned enough for him to take a gulping breath of seawater. He was acutely aware of the fact that this was going to be the end of him. This dark sea would snuff out the flame of Ksharewar’s light, years before his time.

He was in immense pain, hardly able to fathom his own situation and the pressure of the deep water around him, when it all ceased. A glowing light had surrounded him, and something warm was covering his mouth.

An angel.

Once the oxygen flooding his lungs kicked in, Kaveh opened his eyes again, surprised to find that his vision was clear, unimpeded by the darkness of the ocean or the burn of the saltwater. Before him was a creature, lips pressed to his own.

He was the most gorgeous thing Kaveh had ever seen.

The moments that followed now exist in a blur of fantasy and delirium in Kaveh’s mind. The doctors he saw following his rescue told him that such an encounter was merely the product of hormones, the intense rush of feelings in a desperate survival situation. They said it was a miracle that he’d appeared on a beach miles away from where his ship had sunk—that none of the crew had survived, besides him. He was hardly the strongest among them, and not the most storied either. Newspapers and journals had been hounding him for a few weeks thereafter, hearing out his wild tales of storms, drowning, and magical seafaring creatures and wondering how he lives with the guilt of being a sole survivor until a new, exciting story of a catastrophic mountaineering disaster had cropped up instead, leaving him up to his own devices yet again, living in the wake of something incredible.

Every single person had said the same thing—his encounter was nothing more than a generous explanation given by the brain to justify Kaveh’s survival to himself. That it was proof of his ownership of a soft, thoughtful soul that he would be so stricken by emotion as to cause delusions.

Kaveh was less certain.

Despite the gaps in his memory, he remembered the image of his savior in almost perfect detail. He recorded it, drawing sketches of the man until there were so many of them that they littered the walls and drawers of his studio. As months passed, then years, the public noticed that his designs had shifted as well, mirroring the shapes and colors of nature, and of the sea. The public became thrilled over that as well, if only for a moment. And it gave him the opportunity yet again to share the story of his survival, and of the creature who’d saved his life.

What the public didn't know—what Kaveh kept carefully to himself—was that he'd returned to the sea not out of some noble commitment to his craft, but because he couldn't bring himself to stop searching. The architectural commissions on wealthy merchants and pirates' massive ships were nothing more than convenient excuses, ways to justify the risk his friends insisted was madness.

"You nearly died," they'd say, voices laced with concern. "Why would you go back out there?"

Because he has to be real, Kaveh would think, but never say aloud. Because I need to know.

The first commission after his recovery was a merchant vessel, and Kaveh threw himself into the work with a fervor that surprised even himself. He designed flowing lines into the interior quarters, installed porthole windows at unusual angles to catch the light on the water. He carved wave patterns into the railings with his own hands when the craftsmen said it would take too long. And when the ship launched, Kaveh insisted on being part of the maiden voyage, citing his need to observe how his designs held up at sea.

He spent three nights on deck, watching the moonlight play across the waves, searching for a glimpse of silver-green scales or luminescent eyes. The crew thought him eccentric but harmless, this renowned architect who'd rather sleep under the stars than in the beautiful cabin he'd designed himself.

Nothing appeared. The sea remained indifferent to his curiosity, vast and empty.

The second attempt came half a year later—a naval frigate commission that would take him further from shore than he'd been since the accident. His mentor had tried to talk him out of accepting it. "Your talents are wasted on military vessels," the old man had said, but there was worry in his eyes that had nothing to do with Kaveh's artistic direction. "Stay on land for a while. There are temples that need your touch, museums, libraries."

Kaveh had smiled and lied smoothly about professional opportunity and the challenge of working within naval constraints. He didn't mention how he'd specifically requested routes that would take them through the coordinates where his first ship had gone down.

During that voyage, a squall rolled in on the third day—nothing like the storm that had nearly killed him, but enough to send most of the crew below deck. Kaveh had tied himself to the railing and stood in the driving rain, hair plastered to his face, shouting into the wind like a madman. "I know you're out there! I know what I saw!"

A sailor had eventually dragged him inside, and the ship's captain had threatened to leave him at the next port if he pulled such a stunt again. Kaveh had apologized profusely, blamed it on lingering trauma, and felt something in his chest crack at the emptiness of the waves.

Still, he continued. A passenger liner next, where he designed an observation deck with glass floors that looked down into the water. He'd convinced the shipyard to install them by arguing they'd be a novelty that would attract wealthy clientele. Really, he spent hours lying on that glass, watching the schools of vibrant fish darting beneath, such lucky little beings, and the way light diffracted through the depths, hoping to see something that didn't belong to the natural world as the rest of the world understood it.

Then came a research vessel bound for uncharted reefs. Kaveh had volunteered his services practically for free, unusual for an architect of his caliber, but the expedition leader hadn't questioned his generosity. They'd mapped coastlines and documented coral formations, and every night Kaveh had taken the small rowboat out alone, against regulations, rowing until his arms ached and the mother ship was a distant lantern on the horizon.

"Please," he'd whispered to the water on one such night, hands blistered and shaking. "Please, I just need to know you were real."

The ocean had offered no answer. Only the slap of waves against the hull and the distant cry of seabirds.

His friends began to worry more and more. His reputation for kindness and brilliant design remained intact—if anything, his sea-inspired work had elevated his status—but those close to him saw the obsession taking root. They saw the sketches that never stopped, the way he'd go silent mid-conversation when they passed a harbor, the dark circles under his eyes from sleepless nights spent staring at the waves.

"You're going to get yourself killed," his closest friend, Tighnari, had said bluntly after Kaveh accepted a commission to reinforce a lighthouse on a rocky outcrop known for shipwrecks. "This isn't about architecture anymore. You’re chasing a ghost."

"He was real," Kaveh had replied, and the conviction in his voice had been enough to make Tighnari fall silent, though the worry never left his eyes.

The lighthouse project took him to the edge of the known shipping lanes, where the water turned from blue to a deep, unsettling grey-green. Kaveh had spent three months there, ostensibly overseeing the renovations but mostly climbing the rocks during low tide, investigating caves and grottos, searching for any sign of habitation. He'd found sea glass and interesting shells and nothing else.

Nothing, nothing, nothing.

Two years passed this way. Kaveh's portfolio grew increasingly impressive, his name mentioned in the same breath as the great architects of the age. "The Light of Ksharewar," they repeated again and again, praising not just his technical skill but his ethics—his insistence on fair wages for workers, his donations to sailors' widows, his beautiful, thoughtful designs that seemed to honor the sea rather than attempt to conquer it in the ways of his predecessors.

No one knew he was hollowing himself out with longing.

The breaking point came during a commission for a luxury yacht. The owner was a pompous merchant prince who wanted opulence, wanted gold leaf and imported marble and excess. Kaveh had designed something elegant despite the constraints, but during the maiden voyage—which he'd again insisted on attending—the man had thrown a lavish party, guests drinking and laughing while Kaveh stood at the stern, watching the wake and feeling utterly, devastatingly alone.

He'd had too much wine himself, enough to loosen the careful control he usually maintained. When one of the guests had asked about his famous "delusion" from the shipwreck years ago, Kaveh had described it in painful detail—the way the light had surrounded him like an embrace, the impossible color of eyes that were both burning and lush and something altogether alien, the feeling of lips that had tasted like salt and salvation.

The guests laughed, delighted by the eccentricity of their celebrated architect. All except one woman, older, with the sun-weathered skin of someone who'd spent a lifetime at sea. She'd approached him afterward as he stood alone again, and spoke quietly enough that no one else could hear.

"My grandmother was saved by one once," she'd said. "Off the coast of Liyue, sixty years ago. She spent the rest of her life trying to find him again." A pause, heavy with meaning. "She never did."

Kaveh had looked at her, this stranger offering either comfort or warning, and felt something like despair settle in his bones.

"Did she regret it?" he'd asked. "Searching?"

The woman considered this, her gaze distant.

"I think she regretted that she'd ever been saved at all, by the end. It's a cruel thing, to be given a glimpse of something wonderful and then have it taken away." She patted his arm, almost motherly. "Be careful, young man. The sea takes many forms of payment."

That night, Kaveh had stood on the deck until dawn, considering her words. Wondering if he was already too far gone, if the search had become less about finding his savior and more about validating his own existence, proving he hadn't imagined the most meaningful moment of his life.

He'd been so lost in thought that he almost missed it—a flash of something in the water, there and gone so quickly he might have imagined it. But then it came again, closer this time. A fin breaking the surface, scales that caught the pre-dawn light and scattered it like prisms.

Kaveh's breath caught. He leaned over the railing, heart hammering so hard he thought it might crack his ribs, and for just a moment—less than a heartbeat—he'd seen a face looking up at him from the depths. Sharp features, knowing eyes, an expression that might have been curiosity or amusement or accusation.

Then the water had smoothed, and the yacht sailed on, and Kaveh was left clutching the railing with white-knuckled hands, laughing or crying or both, because he'd been right. He'd been right all along.

After that, the sightings became almost regular, though no less fleeting. A glimpse of silver between waves during a storm. A shape pacing his ship in deep water. Once, undeniably, a figure sitting on rocks near a harbor where Kaveh was consulting on a pier expansion, watching him with an expression of what might have been exasperation before slipping back into the sea.

It was maddening. It was intoxicating. It was proof that he wasn't insane, but also proof that his savior was choosing not to reveal himself. Choosing to watch from a distance, to appear and disappear like a phantom, to keep Kaveh in this state of desperate, aching uncertainty.

"Why won't you come closer?" Kaveh had shouted once into the spray of waves, alone on the deck of a cargo ship at midnight. "I'm right here! I've been right here!"

No answer came. Just the eternal stoicism of the ocean, holding its secrets dear.

The worst part was that Kaveh couldn't even be angry. How could he be angry at something so beautiful, so impossible? How could he resent these glimpses when they were all that kept him breathing, kept him believing that the world held more wonder than the mundane reality everyone else seemed content with?

But he was tired. Gods, he was so tired.

Three years after the shipwreck, Kaveh accepted what would become his most ambitious project yet—a complete naval overhaul for a fleet of trading vessels, requiring him to spend six months aboard various ships, sailing routes that would take him further and longer at sea than ever before. His friends had tried to talk him out of it. His mentor had offered him a position teaching at the Akademiya instead, safe on land, prestigious and more comfortable than he ever could’ve dreamed.

Kaveh had turned it down without hesitation.

"This is my last attempt," he'd told Tighnari the night before he was set to depart. They'd been sitting in his studio, surrounded by years of sketches and designs, the documented evidence of obsession. "If he doesn't appear after this—if I don't find him—I'll stop. I'll accept a land-based position and I'll... I'll move on."

Tighnari had looked at him with such profound sadness that Kaveh had to turn away.

"I don't think you will," his friend had said softly. "I don't think you can."

Maybe he was right. Maybe Kaveh had tied too much of himself to this mystery, invested too much meaning in a moment that lasted mere seconds. Maybe he was already lost, had been lost since the moment those lips had touched his and given him breath and hope in equal measure.

But he had to try one more time. Had to know, definitively, if there was any possibility of bridging the vast distance between his world and that of the creature who'd saved him.

The first week of the commission passed uneventfully. Kaveh threw himself into the work with practiced efficiency, sketching improvements to cargo holds and crew quarters, consulting with the shipwrights he'd brought along. During the day, he was a professional—the Light of Ksharewar, generous with his knowledge and patient with the workers who looked up to him.

But at night, he stood vigil. Waiting.

The sightings had increased over the past months, frequent enough that Kaveh had begun to recognize a pattern. His savior appeared most often during storms or in deep water, always at a distance, always just barely visible. It was as if he wanted to be seen but not approached. As if he were... testing something. Or perhaps teasing.

The thought made Kaveh's chest tight with a complicated mixture of frustration and longing.

On the eighth night, the weather turned. Not a dangerous storm, but enough wind and chop to send most of the crew below deck. Kaveh remained above, lashed loosely to the railing—he'd learned that much, at least—and watched the way moonlight broke across the restless water.

And there, perhaps fifty feet from the ship, a head broke the surface.

Kaveh's breath stopped. Even at this distance, even in the uncertain light, he knew. The shape of that profile, the way the water seemed to cling and flow around him like liquid silver—it was unmistakable.

"Wait!" Kaveh called out, his voice nearly lost in the wind. "Please, wait!"

The figure didn't submerge. Instead, it turned to look at him directly, and even across the distance Kaveh could feel the weight of that gaze. Assessing. Considering.

Then, with a movement too graceful to be human, the creature dove beneath a wave and disappeared.

Kaveh made a sound that was half-sob, half-laugh. Three years of searching, and his savior was still playing games, still keeping just out of reach. The unfairness of it burned in his throat.

"Coward!" he shouted into the storm, knowing it was childish, knowing he was being ridiculous. "I've been looking for you! I've been—" His voice cracked. "I just want to thank you. I just want to know why."

Silence answered him. The ship rocked on, careless of his anguish.

Kaveh stood there until the storm passed, until the sky began to lighten with the threat of dawn, hope and despair warring in his chest. He'd been so close. So agonizingly close.

When he finally went below deck, exhausted and soaked to the bone, he found he couldn't sleep. His mind kept replaying that moment—the direct eye contact, the way his savior had paused before diving. As if he'd been surprised. Or perhaps... concerned?

The pattern continued over the following weeks as they made their way through Kaveh's commission route. His savior appeared with increasing frequency, sometimes multiple times in a single night. Always watching, never approaching. Kaveh began to feel like a specimen under study, observed and catalogued but never engaged.

It should have been infuriating. Instead, Kaveh found himself performing, in a way—working on deck whenever possible, speaking aloud to the waves about his designs and frustrations, hoping his savior was listening. He felt half-mad for doing it, but all the same more alive than he'd been in years.

During a stop at a port town to pick up supplies, Kaveh made a detour to a library and spent hours poring over every text he could find about sea creatures, legends, merfolk. Most of it was useless—sailors' tales exaggerated beyond recognition, mythology that contradicted itself. But buried in one ancient text, he found a passage that made him pause:

The deep-dwellers are not as we are. They do not love quickly, nor do they trust easily. To save a human is to mark oneself with that human's fate, to tie one's existence to the chaotic, brief brightness of mortal life. It is said that those who perform such rescues often grow to regret the connection, haunted by the knowledge that their saved human will age and die while they continue on, unchanged.

Kaveh had stared at that passage for a long time, something cold settling in his stomach. Was that why his savior kept his distance? Not cruelty or indifference, but... protection? An attempt to prevent deeper attachment to something that couldn't last?

The thought was somehow worse than being forgotten.

He returned to the ship more determined than ever. If his savior thought distance would make Kaveh give up, would make this easier, he was about to learn otherwise.

The breaking point came during the fourth month of the commission, when Kaveh's ship encountered an unexpected reef system that appeared on none of their charts. The captain wanted to navigate around it, but Kaveh—in a fit of reckless inspiration—suggested they anchor nearby so he could examine the formations.

"For research purposes," he'd said. "Reef systems can provide valuable information about hull design and barnacle-resistant materials."

It was a flimsy excuse, but his reputation was such that the captain agreed to a brief stop.

As soon as the anchor was down, Kaveh had the crew lower a small rowboat.

"I'll just be gone an hour," he'd assured them, rowing away before anyone could object. He navigated carefully through the reef channels, supposedly observing the formations but really searching for signs of intelligent life. Caves, grottos, anywhere that might serve as a shelter where a human-like creature could live.

He was so focused on the rocks that he didn't notice the current had strengthened until it was too late. The rowboat caught on an outcropping, and before Kaveh could compensate, a wave lifted and flipped the small vessel entirely. He went under, the shock of cold water stealing his breath, and for a heart-stopping moment he was back in that storm three years ago, drowning in darkness.

Then strong hands grabbed him, pulled him up, and Kaveh found himself deposited roughly onto a flat rock, coughing up seawater and gasping for air.

"You," a voice said, and it was the first time Kaveh had heard it clearly, not muffled by water or distance. It was rich and low, with an unusual accent that made even simple words sound like they were being examined. "Are absolutely impossible."

Kaveh looked up, water streaming from his hair, and finally—finally—came face to face with his savior.

He was even more beautiful up close. His features were sharp, almost severe, but offset by eyes that were indeed that impossible hue of green Kaveh had tried and failed to capture in his sketches. His hair was dark with water but caught the sunlight in shades of silver and white. And from the waist down, his body transitioned into a powerful tail covered in scales that shifted between silver and teal and something that had no name in human language.

A merman. An actual, undeniable merman.

"You're real," Kaveh breathed, and then immediately felt stupid because of course he was real, he was sitting right there.

The merman's expression was difficult to read—something between exasperation and reluctant amusement. "I'm real," he confirmed dryly. "And you're lucky you didn't crack your skull on those rocks. What were you thinking, rowing into a reef system you know nothing about?"

"I was thinking," Kaveh said, finding his voice along with a surge of indignation at being lectured after three years of desperate searching, "that I needed to find you. I've been looking for you for three years. Three years!"

"I know." The merman's tone was maddeningly calm. "I've been watching."

"You've been—" Kaveh sputtered, temporarily speechless. "You've been watching me search for you, and you didn't think to just... appear? To let me know you were alright, that you were real, that I wasn't losing my mind?"

Something flickered across the merman's face. "I didn't think it would be this... persistent," he admitted. "I thought after a few weeks you'd move on. That you'd accept the rational explanations and go back to your life on land." A pause, those strange eyes studying Kaveh with uncomfortable intensity. "That would have been safer. For both of us."

"Safer?" Kaveh pushed himself to sit, ignoring how his soaked clothes clung to him. "I don't want to be safe. I want answers. I want—" He stopped, suddenly aware of how much he was revealing, but pushed forward anyway. "I want to know why. Why you saved me. Why you've been following me. Why you keep appearing and disappearing like some kind of ghost."

The merman was quiet for a long moment, his tail idly moving in the water. When he finally spoke, his voice was softer. "You were dying. I couldn't... I don't make a habit of interfering with human affairs, but you were right there, and I—" He broke off, seeming frustrated with himself. "I acted on impulse. It was foolish."

"Foolish," Kaveh repeated flatly. "Saving my life was foolish?"

"Yes." The merman met his eyes squarely. "Because now you're doing things like this—taking commissions that keep you at sea far longer than necessary, rowing into dangerous reefs, standing on deck during storms and shouting challenges at the waves like some kind of dramatic fool. You're going to get yourself killed, and it will be my fault for saving you in the first place."

There was genuine concern there, Kaveh realized with a start. Beneath the stoic delivery and teasing words, his savior had been worried about him. Had been watching not out of curiosity alone, but out of fear that Kaveh would hurt himself in his search.

It made something warm and complicated unfurl in Kaveh's chest.

"Well," he said, trying for lightness despite the way his heart was racing, "perhaps if you'd revealed yourself sooner, I wouldn't have needed to take such risks."

"Perhaps if you were less reckless, I wouldn't have needed to constantly monitor your ships to make sure you didn't drown yourself." The merman's tone was dry, but there was a hint of something that might have been amusement in his eyes. "You're very creative in your self-endangerment. That lighthouse project was particularly concerning."

"You saw that?" Kaveh couldn't help the note of pleased surprise.

"I saw all of it." The merman shifted, drawing closer to the rock. "Your work is impressive, even to someone who has no need of ships or buildings. The way you incorporate the ocean's forms into your designs, the care you take with every detail... it's unusual. Most humans I've observed treat the sea as something to rule, but you seem to want to exist in harmony with it."

Kaveh felt heat rise in his face that had nothing to do with the sun beating down on them.

"I was inspired," he said quietly. "By you. By what I saw, even if it was just for a moment. I wanted to honor that somehow."

The merman looked at him for a long moment, expression unreadable. Then:

"My name is Alhaitham."

It was offered simply, but Kaveh understood the weight of it—the trust required to give a name after three years of deliberate distance.

"Kaveh," he replied. "My name is Kaveh."

"I know," Alhaitham said, and there was definitely amusement now. "You've been written about in newspapers. 'The Light of Ksharewar, renowned architect and humanitarian.' They praise your skill and your moral quality in equal measure."

"You read newspapers?" Kaveh asked, momentarily distracted by the bizarre image of a merman perusing maritime journals.

"Shipwrecks often leave behind interesting debris," Alhaitham said with a slight shrug. "Including reading material. I've become quite familiar with your career over the past few years." He paused, then added with something that might have been teasing: "Your sketches are less accurate than the newspapers suggested. My tail isn't nearly that ornate."

Kaveh felt his face burn hotter.

"You've been watching me closely enough to see my sketches?"

"I told you. I've been monitoring your safety." Alhaitham said it as if it were the most reasonable thing in the world, as if he hadn't just admitted to three years of intense observation. "Someone needed to, given your apparent determination to test the limits of human survivability at sea."

"I wasn't—" Kaveh started to protest, but Alhaitham fixed him with a look that suggested he'd accept no arguments.

"You leashed yourself to a railing during a squall and screamed into the wind," he said flatly. "You took a rowboat into the open ocean at midnight, multiple times. You accepted a commission on a vessel that was barely seaworthy because it was traveling near where we first encountered each other." Each point was delivered with the precision of someone who'd been keeping careful track. "Did you think I wouldn't notice? Did you think I'd just let you drown yourself?"

"I didn't drown," Kaveh pointed out. "I was perfectly fine."

"You just capsized in a reef system."

"And you saved me. Again." Kaveh met Alhaitham's eyes, trying to find the right words for what he was feeling. "You keep saving me, but you won't stay. You won't let me—" He broke off, frustrated. "What do you want from me, Alhaitham? Do you want me to stop searching? To forget about you and go back to land?"

"Yes," Alhaitham said immediately. Then, quieter: "No. I don't know."

It was the first time he'd seemed uncertain, and somehow that made him more real than anything else. Not just a beautiful myth or a figment of Kaveh's desperate imagination, but an actual person—or person-adjacent being—who was also struggling to understand what existed between them.

Kaveh made a decision.

"I'm not going back to land," he said firmly. "Not permanently. The sea is part of my work now, part of who I am. You saw to that when you saved me." He softened his tone. "But I also can't keep doing this—searching and never finding, seeing glimpses but never getting answers. It's..."

"Driving you mad?" Alhaitham supplied.

"Yes," Kaveh admitted. "So either you need to tell me to stop outright, to never look for you again, or we need to find some kind of... arrangement. A way to see each other that doesn't involve me risking my life or you hiding in the waves."

Alhaitham was quiet, his tail creating idle patterns in the water. The sun was beginning its descent, painting the sky in shades of orange and pink that reflected off his scales. He looked, Kaveh thought, like something out of a dream.

"There's a cove," Alhaitham finally said. "Three days' sail from here, if your captain is willing to make the detour. It's hidden, protected by rocks that make it difficult for ships to approach, but there's a beach. I go there sometimes, when I want to be away from the deeper waters."

Kaveh's heart was suddenly beating very fast.

"A cove?"

"I could meet you there," Alhaitham continued, not quite meeting Kaveh's eyes now. "When you're between commissions, when your ships dock nearby. It would be... safer than you rowing into reefs or shouting during storms. And I could—" He paused, seeming to search for words. "I find that I'm curious about you as well. About your work, your world. It would be mutually beneficial. An exchange of knowledge."

An exchange of knowledge. It was such a clinical way to describe what Kaveh was feeling—this overwhelming relief, this joy at finally being seen and acknowledged and invited to stay. But he understood. Alhaitham was offering what he could, in the way he could offer it.

"And when I'm at sea?" Kaveh asked. "On my commissions?"

"I'll follow your ships, as I have been." Alhaitham finally met his eyes again. "I can't promise to appear often—there are risks to being seen by entire crews, and I won't endanger myself for your entertainment. But you'll know I'm there. You won't need to search anymore."

It wasn't everything Kaveh had imagined during his three years of desperate seeking. But it was something. It was a beginning.

"Alright," Kaveh said, and his voice came out steadier than he felt. "The cove. Show me how to find it, and I'll come. As often as I can."

Something that might have been relief crossed Alhaitham's face. "Your ship is probably searching for you by now," he said, glancing toward where the merchant vessel was anchored. "I should take you back before they assume you've drowned."

"Take me back?" Kaveh blinked. "You mean..."

"I'm not letting you row," Alhaitham said flatly. "You'll just capsize again." Before Kaveh could protest, he'd slipped fully into the water and moved close to the rock. "Hold on to me. And try not to thrash—it's undignified."

Kaveh slid into the water, acutely aware of how close they were now, close enough to see the individual scales along Alhaitham's shoulders, the way his hair floated in the water like silk. He wrapped his arms carefully around Alhaitham's shoulders, felt the strength in that inhuman form, and had to resist the urge to simply cling and never let go.

"Ready?" Alhaitham asked, and Kaveh nodded against his shoulder.

They moved through the water with impossible speed and grace, Alhaitham navigating the reef channels like he'd designed them himself. Kaveh kept his eyes open this time, watching the underwater world blur past, feeling the power in each movement of Alhaitham's tail. It was exhilarating and terrifying and perfect.

Too soon, they were approaching the ship. Alhaitham slowed, surfacing near where the crew had congregated at the railing, shouting and pointing. When they spotted Kaveh, a cheer went up.

"Current caught my boat," Kaveh called up to them, the lie coming easily. "I'll need help getting back aboard!"

As crew members hurried to lower ropes, Kaveh turned back to Alhaitham, suddenly aware this might be the last time he saw him for days or weeks.

"The cove," he said urgently. "How will I find it?"

"Three days north by northeast from here," Alhaitham said quietly. "There's a rock formation that looks like a broken arch. Navigate through it at high tide. I'll find you." He paused, then added with that dry amusement: "Try not to shipwreck yourself before then."

"I'll do my best," Kaveh promised, smiling despite everything. "Thank you. For saving me. Again."

"Try not to make a habit of needing it," Alhaitham replied, but his tone was softer than his words. Then, before Kaveh could respond, he'd released him and slipped back beneath the waves, disappearing as completely as if he'd never been there at all.

Except this time, Kaveh knew where to find him. He had a name and a promise and the memory of arms strong enough to carry him through rough water. This time, he wasn't searching blindly into an indifferent sea.

The captain was uncertain about the detour to the cove, but Kaveh was persuasive—and more importantly, he was paying well.

"There are rock formations I need to study," he'd explained, spreading out charts with annotations he'd made based on Alhaitham's directions. "For a new harbor design I'm considering. It will only take a day, two at most."

Three days later, as promised, they found the broken arch formation. Kaveh convinced the captain to anchor outside the reef and took a small boat in alone, his heart hammering against his ribs as he navigated through the narrow channel at high tide.

The cove was perfect. Sheltered on three sides by high rocks, with a small beach of fine sand and tide pools full of bright anemones and darting fish. The water was impossibly clear, graduating from pale turquoise to deep sapphire where it dropped off near the entrance. It felt secret, liminal, like a space that existed between worlds.

Kaveh pulled his boat onto the sand and simply sat for a moment, overwhelmed. He was here. After everything, he was here, and Alhaitham had invited him.

"I was beginning to think you'd gotten lost."

Kaveh turned so fast he nearly fell off his seat. Alhaitham was there, hauled partially onto a flat rock at the water's edge, tail still submerged but upper body fully visible in the afternoon sun. He looked... different in this light. Still beautiful, still otherworldly, but somehow more solid. More real.

"I didn't know if you'd actually come," Kaveh admitted, climbing out of the boat on shaky legs. "I thought maybe you'd change your mind."

"I said I would be here." Alhaitham watched as Kaveh approached, something unreadable in his expression. "I don't make promises I don't intend to keep."

Kaveh sat down on the sand near the rock, close enough to speak comfortably but maintaining a respectful distance. He had so many questions, three years' worth of curiosity and confusion, but now that he was here he didn't know where to start.

"You're quiet," Alhaitham observed. "That's unusual, based on what I've observed."

"I'm trying to figure out where to begin," Kaveh said honestly. "There's so much I want to ask, so much I want to understand. But I also don't want to—" He gestured vaguely. "I don't want to ruin this. Whatever this is."

"This," Alhaitham said slowly, "is two beings who are curious about each other trying to bridge a rather significant gap in experience and environment." He shifted on the rock, adjusting his position to face Kaveh more directly. "Ask your questions. I'll answer what I can."

So Kaveh asked. He asked about the ocean depths and what lived there, about how Alhaitham could breathe air and water, about the light that had surrounded them during the rescue. He asked about loneliness and whether there were others like Alhaitham, about what it was like to see ships pass overhead, about the kiss that had haunted him for three years.

"It wasn't a kiss," Alhaitham explained patiently. "Not in the way you understand it. It was air sharing, a technique for keeping humans alive underwater. The contact is necessary for the transfer." He paused. "Though I'll admit I was more... thorough than strictly required. You were dying, and I wanted to be certain."

"And the light?"

"Bioluminescence. It's not all that rare among my kind, and it is useful for navigation in deep water." Alhaitham seemed slightly self-conscious about this. "I didn't realize it would be so dramatic from a human perspective."

They talked until the sun began to set, until the light turned golden and then amber and finally violet. Alhaitham, in turn, asked his own questions—about Kaveh's designs, about the structures humans built on land, about the cities and people that existed in the world above the waves. He was particularly fascinated by Kaveh's descriptions of architecture, the idea that humans created beauty not just for function but for its own sake.

"You're an idealist," Alhaitham said at one point, and it didn't sound like an insult. "You believe the world should be beautiful, so you try to make it that way."

"Is that so strange?" Kaveh asked.

"Not strange. Just... uncommon." Alhaitham's eyes reflected the dying light. "Most creatures are focused on survival. Beauty is secondary, if it's considered at all. But you—you nearly died, and you spent three years creating beauty inspired by what saved you. It's irrational and impractical and completely fascinating."

Kaveh felt his face warm.

"You say that like it's a good thing."

"It is," Alhaitham said simply. "The world needs irrational idealists. Otherwise, who would make it worth living in?"

As the stars began to appear, Kaveh realized he needed to return to his ship. The captain would worry if he was gone after dark, and he didn't want to jeopardize future visits by being irresponsible now.

"I'll come back," he promised as he prepared his small boat. "Between commissions, whenever I can. And when I'm at sea—"

"I'll be there," Alhaitham confirmed. "You won't see me often, but you'll know I'm near." He was quiet for a moment, then added: "Be safe, Kaveh. Your work is important, and your life is valuable. Not just to me, but to everyone who depends on your skill and your kindness."

It was the most open emotion Alhaitham had shown, and it made something in Kaveh's chest constrict.

"I'll be careful," he promised. "And you—stay hidden. Stay safe. I don't want to be the reason you're discovered."

"I've survived this long without being caught," Alhaitham said with dry amusement. "I think I can manage."

But as Kaveh rowed back through the arch, he looked back to see Alhaitham still there on the rock, watching him leave with an expression that might have been longing or might have been simple contentment. Either way, it made Kaveh's heart ache with the knowledge that this was no longer a desperate, one-sided search.

This was mutual. This was real. This was something worth protecting.

The pattern established itself over the following months. Kaveh completed his naval commission with renewed focus and energy, no longer distracted by desperate searching. He knew Alhaitham was there, keeping pace with the ships, and occasionally he'd see evidence—a flash of tail in the distance, a particularly helpful current that pushed them through a difficult passage, once even a grouping of fish that spelled out something that might have been words in an underwater language Kaveh couldn't read but appreciated the beauty of nonetheless.

Between commissions, during his brief returns to land, Kaveh would make excuses to visit the cove. Sometimes he could only stay a few hours; sometimes he could remain for a full day. They would talk, sharing their vastly different worlds, and slowly the wariness between them transformed into something warmer, easier.

Alhaitham, it turned out, had a dry wit and a tendency toward brutal honesty that Kaveh found both frustrating and endearing. He was brilliant in ways Kaveh hadn't expected, well-read from years of salvaging books from shipwrecks, curious about everything from engineering to philosophy. He asked questions that made Kaveh think, challenged assumptions Kaveh didn't know he had, and listened with an intensity that made Kaveh feel truly heard.

And Kaveh made Alhaitham laugh. It didn't happen often—Alhaitham's amusement was usually expressed through subtle changes in his expression or dry comments. But sometimes, when Kaveh was being particularly dramatic or telling stories about his disastrous early commissions, Alhaitham would actually laugh, and the sound was like nothing Kaveh had ever heard. Rich and genuine and utterly transformative.

"You're good for me," Alhaitham admitted one day, several months into their arrangement. They were in the cove again, and Kaveh had brought a waterproof sketchbook to show Alhaitham his latest designs. "I spent a long time in isolation before I found you. I'd convinced myself it was better that way, safer not to get involved with surface dwellers. But you're..." He paused, seeming to search for words. "You're the most recklessly alive person I've ever encountered. It's contagious."

"Recklessly alive?" Kaveh repeated, caught between amusement and offense.

"You throw yourself into everything with your whole heart," Alhaitham said. "Your work, your relationships, your searching for me. You don't do anything halfway. It's terrifying and admirable in equal measure."

"I could say something similar about you," Kaveh pointed out. "You saved a drowning human on impulse, then spent three years secretly following him to make sure he didn't die. That's not exactly detached behavior."

Alhaitham had the grace to look slightly embarrassed. "I may have become more invested than I intended," he admitted.

"Good," Kaveh said firmly. "Because I'm invested too. Very invested. And I'm not going anywhere."

They looked at each other for a long moment, the unspoken understanding passing between them. This had become more than curiosity, more than a simple arrangement. This was friendship at minimum, and perhaps—probably—something deeper that neither of them was quite ready to name.

But they had time. Alhaitham's lifespan was far longer than Kaveh's, but Kaveh was still young by human standards. They had years ahead of them, years of meetings in the cove and silent companionship during sea voyages. Years to figure out what this was, what it could become.

"I have something for you," Kaveh said, reaching into his bag. He pulled out a waterproofed package and handed it to Alhaitham. "I've been working on it between commissions."

Alhaitham opened it carefully, and his expression shifted to something Kaveh couldn't quite read. Inside was a book—bound in treated leather that could withstand saltwater, filled with Kaveh's detailed illustrations. Sketches of Alhaitham, yes, but also designs for underwater structures, theoretical adaptations of surface architecture for ocean environments, pages of notes about marine life and currents and the way light moved through water.

"It's a collaboration," Kaveh explained, suddenly nervous. "Between your world and mine. I thought—I thought maybe it could be the start of something. A way to share what we're learning from each other."

Alhaitham looked at the book for a long time, carefully turning pages, studying each illustration with the attention he gave everything Kaveh created. When he finally looked up, his eyes were impossibly soft.

"Thank you," he said quietly. "I'll treasure this."

"There will be more," Kaveh promised. "So many more. I want to document everything—the cove, the reefs, the way the water looks at different times of day. I want to create a record of this, of us. So that even if—" He stopped, not wanting to voice the fear that always lurked beneath his happiness. That someday his human lifespan would run out, and Alhaitham would be alone again.

"Even if," Alhaitham echoed, understanding. "But let's not think about that now. Let's focus on what we have."

What they had was this: a secret cove where two impossible beings met and shared their worlds. A merchant ship making its way across calm seas with a merman keeping pace below. A brilliant architect and a curious scholar finding in each other something neither had known they needed.

What they had was enough.

Two years after their first meeting in the cove, Kaveh received a commission that would change everything. A wealthy patron wanted him to design a seaside estate, complete with an elaborate system of sea walls and protected harbors. The work would keep him land-based for at least six months, potentially longer.

"I can't take it," Kaveh told Tighnari when his friend urged him to accept. "It's too long away from the sea."

"Away from him, you mean," Tighnari said gently. They'd had this conversation before—Kaveh had finally told his closest friend the truth about Alhaitham, and while Tighnari had been skeptical at first, he'd come to accept it. "Kaveh, you're turning down the commission of a lifetime. This could establish your legacy permanently."

"My legacy is already established," Kaveh pointed out. "And he—Alhaitham needs to know I'll be there. That I'll keep coming back."

In the end, it was Alhaitham himself who convinced him to take the commission. They were in the cove, and Kaveh had been explaining his dilemma, pacing on the beach while Alhaitham watched with patient amusement.

"Take the commission," Alhaitham said firmly. "Your work is important, Kaveh. I won't be the reason you limit yourself."

"But six months—"

"Is not that long," Alhaitham interrupted. "Not in the scale of things. And it's not like I can't reach you on land if needed. The estate is coastal, yes? I can visit the shoreline at night, and you can meet me there. It's not so different from our current arrangement."

"You'd do that?" Kaveh asked, surprised. "Come to the surface near a populated area?"

"For you?" Alhaitham's expression was unbearably gentle. "Yes. I'd risk it."

So Kaveh took the commission. And true to his word, Alhaitham came to him during those six months, appearing at the rocky beach below the construction site in the hours after sunset. Sometimes they could only speak for a few minutes before Alhaitham needed to return to deeper water. Sometimes they had hours together, talking by moonlight while the distant lights of the estate glowed behind them.

The commission itself became some of Kaveh's finest work, infused with all the oceanic knowledge he'd gained through Alhaitham. He designed sea walls that worked with the tides rather than against them, created protected coves for small boats, incorporated natural reef formations into the harbor's structure. The patron was thrilled, calling it revolutionary.

Kaveh knew it was more than that. It was a love letter—to the sea, to his work, to Alhaitham. Every stone placed, every curve of the walls, every carefully planned sightline was informed by five years of learning to see the ocean not as an enemy to conquer but as a partner to respect.

When the project completed and Kaveh was finally free to return to the cove for an extended visit, he found Alhaitham waiting with something that might have been eagerness in his usually composed demeanor.

"I have something to show you," Alhaitham said, and there was excitement barely contained in his voice. "Can you hold your breath for two minutes?"

Kaveh blinked.

"I... think so? Why?"

"Trust me."

So Kaveh took a deep breath and let Alhaitham pull him under, down past the reef, into water that should have been too deep for a human to reach safely. But Alhaitham's bioluminescence activated, surrounding them in that familiar protective glow, and suddenly Kaveh could see clearly despite the depth.

There, nestled in the reef, was a cave—and inside, carefully arranged on natural stone shelves, were dozens of books. All waterproofed, all meticulously preserved. Alhaitham's collection, salvaged from decades of shipwrecks.

And on one shelf, positioned prominently, was the book Kaveh had made him. Surrounded by volumes of human knowledge Alhaitham had saved from the deep.

Kaveh's lungs were starting to burn, and Alhaitham quickly brought him back to the surface. When they broke through, Kaveh was gasping and also crying, though he couldn't quite explain why.

"You kept it," he managed. "You kept it with your most precious things."

"Of course I did," Alhaitham said simply. "It's my most precious thing. A record of something impossible—a human and a merman who decided the distance between their worlds didn't matter as much as what they'd found in each other."

Kaveh kissed him then. It was impulsive and probably foolish and definitely complicated by the logistical issues of human-merman anatomy, but Alhaitham responded, pulling him closer despite the awkwardness, and it was nothing like that first desperate exchange of air underwater. This was intentional, and perfect.

When they finally broke apart, both breathing hard, Alhaitham's expression was wonder and terror in equal measure.

"This is dangerous," he said, but he didn't let go. "You'll age. You'll die. I'll have to watch it happen."

"Then let's make it worth it," Kaveh replied. "However long we have, let's make every moment count. Let's build something together—not just in the cove, but everywhere we can. Let's prove that we existed."

Alhaitham studied him for a long moment, those grey-green eyes seeing through to every vulnerable hope Kaveh held. Then, slowly, he smiled—a real, unguarded smile that transformed his entire face.

"Alright," he said. "Yes. Let's do that."

And they were. For all the years that followed, they maintained their arrangement—meetings in the cove during Kaveh's time on land, Alhaitham's silent presence during sea voyages, stolen moments at coastal construction sites. They built a library together in that underwater cave, mixing human and mer-folk knowledge. Kaveh's designs continued to revolutionize maritime architecture, informed by perspectives no other human architect could claim.

They were careful, always careful. But within the bounds of caution, they built something extraordinary: a relationship that spanned two worlds, a bond that refused to acknowledge the impossibility of its own existence.

The Light of Ksharewar had found his inspiration, his muse, his impossible salvation. And in doing so, had given Alhaitham something equally precious—a reason to believe that curiosity about the world above wasn't foolish but worthwhile, that connection was worth the eventual pain of loss, that humans could be more than the brief, chaotic creatures Alhaitham had always found them to be.

An unlikely meeting, an obsessive search, and a bond forged in fire and seaspray. Two creatures of opposite domain, living and loving in tandem.

That, improbable as it was, was enough.