Chapter Text
The sea has given me plenty of amazing things.
My power. My freedom. My wife.
Okay, it probably sounds crazy when I say it like this. But I can explain.
My name is Finnick Odair. I'm a sea witch. There aren't many people like me in the world. The ocean calls to me and I respond, and in exchange, I ask for certain things. I can summon its currents, raise its tides and understand its creatures. I know, pretty awesome. There are responsibilities to it, though, of course. Sea witches are servants of the sea, but, ironically, that is what made me free in the first place.
If it weren't for that, I'd still be in Capitol City, away from my home and still being controlled by them. Well, Mags helped too. She is a sea witch as well and the one who taught me everything she knows. She was also the person to take me away and back to the coast, where I belong.
And that is where I met my wife.
You see, most sea creatures listen to me. They recognise me and come to me if I need to call. In fact, I sense them from miles away. But one evening, I was by the coast when I caught sight of a teal fin, shaped the way a mermaid’s would, too large for any fish I’d recognise. My heart stopped beating and I quietly summoned my spiritual weapon, a golden trident that appeared in my hand. I started walking towards it, deeper into the water, finding that the tail was attached to a girl.
A beautiful girl with curly brown hair and deep sea-green eyes, who seemed very annoyed at me for pointing my trident her way.
“What are you doing here?!” she asked.
I looked around the depths of the sea where we were, confused about what she meant.
“Last I checked, you need an invitation to Atlantis, so there’s your answer, honey.” I shrugged, moving my trident away from where it was pointing at her, resting it over my shoulder. “But you’re no Atlantean.”
She simply rolled her eyes.
“I’m here to answer a–”
“Distress call,” we said at the same time.
I turned to her with wide eyes.
“You’re from land?”
She stared at me for a moment.
“...so are you.”
Yeah, apparently, we both were witches answering a distress call from Atlantis, the legendary underwater city. And neither of us wanted to step away from the mission. She wanted to establish good relations with them, since she was doing these duties as her sister had just abandoned witchcraft recently. And I was part Atlantean, part land creature, so I was the most obvious choice to help them. Fine, I also needed some trinkets for my own spells.
I wish I could say I’d been a respectable gentleman and backed away to let her take this mission on.
But I do believe in equality.
So we ended up doing it together. And what had at first been a very hostile first interaction led to us learning a lot about one another. She came off her siren form and would sleep curled up in blankets in my boat and I’d watch over her. I told her a bit about why I needed this mission, to prove myself after leaving Capitol City. She didn’t ask. Somehow, it felt like she understood without needing much more from me. I learnt a lot about Annie Cresta. In exchange, she got to truly know me, too.
She didn’t need anything from me.
So, I gave myself to her.
In the beginning, as very good colleagues. One thing led to the other and, once the mission was done and the Kraken had gotten his errands run for him, we gave one another a strange little look. We’d been working together for weeks.
“So, I’ll… see you around?” she asked, pulling some curls behind her ear.
“Uhm… yeah,” I said, feeling something tug at my heart. Something leading me back to her.
She’d begun swimming away when I called out across the water.
“Wait!”
Immediately, she turned around and looked at me with those impossibly green eyes of hers.
And I’d never been more nervous in my life.
“Should I sail you home?”
She tilted her head a tiny bit to the side in the darkness of the ocean.
“Uhm… you know,” I reached up to run my hand through my hair. “Since you’re… you must be tired after that spell.”
She blinked.
“Oh, yeah!” she started. “I am, it was very powerful… I should probably sleep. But you wouldn’t…”
“... I wouldn’t mind,” I quickly interjected.
And thus, I brought her to my boat once more and sailed to the coast in California where she’d been born and raised. Her grandmother had been the assigned witch of that city for years, specializing in herbology and potions. We’d spent some amazing days sailing. We cooked what I caught with my trident and what Annie harvested from under the waves. We made a very good team. And we laughed, talked, and fell into many comfortable silences.
Annie Cresta drew about a dozen pictures of different sea birds, telling me she was still figuring out how to fly on a broomstick. I called spectral familiar shapes of fish just to see her smile. Some nights by the end, she’d curl up to my chest and I’d smell the lavender from her soap and shampoo, resting my chin on her hair.
I felt like I’d found my shelter after a very complicated life.
Eventually, we saw the port. And she simply grinned nervously.
“You’re coming over for tea, right?”
“Oh… you’re so right.” I followed her lead.
“Mate, remember? From my Argentinian grandma? You can’t say no.”
We kept improvising.
First the tea. Then my boat needed a break, whatever that meant, only for me to stay at a haunted hotel, which led to another adventure by her side. After that we’d ended up covered in ectoplasm, sitting on the side of the street, watching each other glow in ghostly substances, waiting for an adorable elderly couple to finish making some gyros for us to take to her house.
“I don’t want to go,” I whispered.
She turned her head to me. She’d been struggling a lot with the substance, with her nose scrunched up in disgust. I knew she couldn’t wait to take a shower, but I needed to get this off my chest.
“Then don’t go,” she said.
“But I gotta… you know. Find my city. For Mags and I.”
Traditionally, every city, town or village has a witch. Mags had just retired from her job as a sea witch near a harbour, with her mentee Percy taking over. And now we were apartment hunting and city hunting. Someone must need us, we knew that much, but we didn’t know where.
However, the more I spent time with Annie the more natural it felt. And the more I realised that I couldn’t stay away from her.
So, as she was glowing, I’d said it.
“I just don’t want to go too far away from you.”
Her fingers found my hand, all sticky from the ectoplasm. I felt my heart rushing, bracing for impact. She’d tell me that we’d been stretching this for too long and it was probably about time for the two of us to move on. And yet, she grinned, with that glowing little smile of hers that had nothing to do with the ghostly residue.
“You know, it’s weird. But… I get it. I feel like– like I know you, you know?” She squeezed my hand and my heart twisted inside my chest.
Yes.
I knew.
“You do know me,” I said, with my voice softening.
“Maybe from another life,” she mused, as if trying to piece it together. She was a wonderful detective, so it made sense that this mystery in specific caught her attention. Because it did with me, too. “You know me, too.”
“I know you, Annie,” I said, almost as if I was pronouncing the words from an old, sacred poem.
Her eyes didn’t look away from mine.
I’m not sure who moved first, but her words died down against my lips, letting out the softest, most adorable surprised little sound instead. Inside me, it felt like everything finally clicked together as I kissed her. Again and again. Only for her to move back, scrunching up her face in disgust.
“You taste like ghost goo! Ew! I need to shower, I need–”
She met my eye and I gave her a playful little face.
We both burst out laughing.
It couldn’t have been more perfect.
However, the kiss after that, when we were clean and had finished eating our gyros was incredible. And every kiss that followed.
Annie and I began working together as colleagues, learning a lot from one another. She came to stay with Mags and me for periods of time, we’d go sailing on some occasions and to visit her family on others. The seasons went by, and I only became more, and more charmed by her. Annie and I truly did know one another, and yet, we were always surprised with each other.
She was my home.
I started writing poetry about her. She made me sweaters with boats in them. When she was struggling to get her degree as a marine biologist, I stood by her side. When I went to trial for what happened to me in Capitol City, she stood by me. She also made a few protective spells and hexes. We found a dog for Annie to help her with some mental health issues and he became our favorite creature in the world.
Day by day, we built a life together, just by choosing one another.
I never once worried about her dying.
I know, a weird concern to have, isn’t it?
It doesn’t feel as odd when you learn what happens with Annie and I. We both come from families that have been cursed to kill the person we fall in love with, as long as they are human. Annie has it on her mother’s side, a side effect from having mermaid blood. I have it due to old enemies and hexes. It once made me feel like I would never find anyone. But, of course, Annie had a way to show me I was wrong.
I proposed to her in Atlantis after a mission. We were both breathless, but it quickly became my favorite memory. My hands were shaking so much that we lost the ring and needed to do a spell to find it. Later in the year, we married by the sea, who also blessed our future. It was a fairly intimate affair. It was everything. She told me she’d be by my side for all eternity.
I still can’t believe how I got to be so lucky.
And that takes us to now.
We’ve been married for a couple of years, and parents to a one-year-old. Annie had our lovely son last year on a rainy day, and when he opened his eyes and I looked into them, I promised him I would give my life for my family. He didn’t say anything. Of course, something like that would leave him speechless after just arriving into the world. But it’s alright. I didn’t expect him to say much anyway. He didn’t have to.
Now he babbles all the time. He loves swatting my nose and pulling my hair, and sleeps against his mum’s chest whenever he’s given a chance. He makes the house alive. And alongside Annie’s service dog, Puff, they’ve become an unstoppable force whenever he’s decided it’s time for an extra snack.
I love my little family.
It’s been odd to settle into one place, given Annie and I traveled a lot to offer our services as witches and paranormal detectives. However, it is so lovely to simply exist with our family. We’d even considered beginning to begin looking for cities to offer our services as their permanent witches when Grandma Dulse called.
Annie has been pacing around the entire house with the phone floating near her ear, humming and responding to some very long-winded explanations that all could be easily summarised in a sentence.
“...we’re moving?” I repeat once she’s hung up the phone and told me about it, with her standing in front of me as I sit on the couch.
“Well, only if you want to,” she says. “Grandma Dulse needs someone to help her for a few months. She says she and Mags have a few missions to tend to and they’ve always wanted to travel the world…”
Annie is glancing off to the side nervously. My fingers find her chin, gently turning it so she looks at me.
“So, we’re becoming the witches from Fourville?” I ask, watching her cheeks turn into a lovely shade of pink.
“I kind of offered…”
“I’d heard,” I say with a smile.
She watches it grow.
“Finnick!”
“You mean, if I say no, you’ll just go on your own?”
“I’d have to. They need witches in Fourville. And Grandma Dulse is staying in a beautiful, tiny village…”
“Ah, yes, the one where you’d mentioned there was a population of ten,” I tease.
She meets my eye. She knows that I’m going with her. Of course she does. And still, she asks. Because Annie always asks.
“Do you want to?”
I lean my head back and stare at the ceiling.
“... you’re asking me to go to the tiniest village, next to another tiny village, near where we both grew up, where nothing ever really happens, to keep guard for everyone and make sure there isn’t any sketchy business, while Grandma Dulse and Mags just go off to explore the world?”
“I–”
I use the hand gently grabbing her chin to pull her closer, guiding her so she is sitting on my lap and I tilt my head down, pressing a kiss to her lips. It’s very soft and short, but it tastes like raspberries and Annie, and it makes my heart bounce over my ribcage even now.
“Annie, my love,” I whisper once we move away, resting my forehead over hers. “You’re asking as if there’s anywhere in this world I wouldn’t go for you.”
Her cheeks are tinting a soft shade of red as she stares at me. Still concerned.
“But it’s boring.”
“Nothing is boring with you, your dog-bear mutation and our kid.”
“You mean it?” she questions quietly.
I smile.
“I married you so I’d have the privilege of spending the rest of my life with you. Don’t try to stop it.”
My hands reach for her sides and tickle her until she is giggling and curling on top of me. As much as it makes sense for Annie to worry, all I know is that I would do anything just to be by her side.
Besides, we have been to Fourville before. Kind of. I grew up in a town just by the village where Annie grew up. It was very quiet and uneventful until I was recruited as a model and taken to Capitol City, but it seems like a really nice place to settle down.
And thus, we work on it.
Annie gets accepted to do a research project that could benefit from the sealife around Fourville. I look into jobs fishing and find a few vacancies. Puff gets his harness packed and Nacre his little outfits. In a matter of a couple of weeks, we made our way to Fourville and to Grandma Dulse’s shop.
Mags beat us to her, because when we arrive, we find a bottle of white wine on the table and two very cheerful elderly ladies showing each other pictures in the living room.
“He was a wow-bow,” Grandma Dulse says. “Shame there was nothing in his brain.”
“Well, he did have that alien parasite… Oh! Finn, Annie!”
Mags opens her arms and I let myself snuggle up to her one last time before she goes on that trip.
“Don’t do anything stupid,” I say, pressing a kiss to her cheek.
She barks out a laugh.
“I should be the one saying that!”
I pull back and give her a look that makes her and Dulse laugh further. Annie spends some time with her grandmother before she leaves us to settle into her house.
“They’ll be alright,” I mutter, with Nacre lifted up in my arms and propped against my chest.
Annie looks out of the door, where they’d gone with their brooms. She seems to consider it for a moment before nodding.
“Yeah. They’re powerful! They’re just…”
“... very unpredictable,” I joke.
That makes her corners of her lips raise and she lets out a soft, amused sound.
“But that’s probably the greatest part about them.”
I turn around, with Nacre reaching in the air, making grabby hands at everything. This is our home now.
Grandma Dulse’s old apothecary.
Annie seems to read my mind.
“Well, this is the start of a new adventure,” she whispers under her breath.
I move closer, leaning down to press a kiss to her temple. Then, we hear a crashing sound coming from upstairs. My eyes widen.
“That wasn’t important, was it?”
Her expression shifts to pure horror.
“I don’t know! Oh, no… Puff!” she calls.
We’re answered by another crashing sound. We know it’s our cue to run upstairs and make sure her service dog hasn’t turned into an ant or magically painted himself green. Nacre giggles as we run upstairs, making my heart swell.
A new adventure indeed.
★・・・・・・★-
After we’re done with half of the boxes, Nacre has decided he’s had enough of waiting around and it’s time for us to explore Fourville. We’ve caught him trying to escape through the garden four times, and for someone who doesn’t know how to walk or run, he’s very fast.
So, Annie puts on her grandma’s straw hat to protect herself from the sun. It’s a very warm September. Nacre curls his fist around the collar of my shirt, playfully pulling at it and babbling.
Fourville is enchanting. It’s the kind of town that could’ve only raised someone as wonderful as Annie. Everyone seems to know one another and know everyone’s life story. It has magic flowing all around. A nice little bakery with delicious pineapple tarts and a huge port where most fishing ships are docked. There are beaches all over the area, disrupted by some cliffs up north where we find a tall, old lighthouse, painted in white with a red rooftop. After a long day of exploring every corner of the town, we head that way.
“Do you like this place?” Annie questions from beside me.
I grin.
“I like the girl it gave me,” I respond. She rolls her eyes and swats at my arm. “Ouch! Hey! I was being charming.”
“Too charming,” she teased, wrapping her arm around my waist and walking with me.
Puff starts getting excited about the cliffs, wagging his tail as he walks by Annie. They truly are a sight to take in. I grew up in an area near this. Another town full of fishermen. It was surrounded by cliffs like these ones. Those ones had been my favorite places in the world. I would often go to read poetry or play with my brother. At least before I was recruited and taken to Capitol City. So, in a strange way, it feels like this place knows me. Or as if I’ve always meant to find it.
“One of my friends lives there,” Annie explains, nodding towards the lighthouse. “Piper. Remember her?”
I don’t think I’ve ever met Piper. I’ve only ever met one of Annie’s old childhood friends from town, and it was because fate turned him into my trusted navigator for my trips and mysteries revolving specific locations in the sea. Ray. He’s actually a very good friend of mine. He lives here, too, and I’m looking forward to spending more time with him.
But I do remember some of the stories Annie has told me.
“... the one who tried to make messenger seagulls a thing?” I try.
She nods excitedly.
“She’s great! I can’t wait to see her more, now that we’ll be living here. Last time we actually saw each other, she was eighteen and I was seventeen… A lot has changed.”
Nacre babbles against my chest, reaching out for the lighthouse with outstretched arms.
“He agrees,” I say, turning to him. “Nacre, honey, do you think Piper will love mum just as much?”
He blinks and tilts his head towards Annie immediately, beaming at her.
“Mummy!”
“That’s a yes,” I translate.
“That’s a maybe at best!” Annie argues.
We meet each other’s eyes and laugh. We would’ve continued arguing if it weren’t for the door to the lighthouse bursting open. A girl with warm brown skin and coily copper hair comes out of it giggling, covered in yellow stains. She’s wearing a striped, fitted vest and some white pants rolled up to her ankles. And my eyes land on her left side, where her left arm is missing. She notices us after a moment of chuckling, looking at us with bright, enormous blue eyes.
“Oh, hey! Welcome! You must be– oh, my gosh, Annie! And the whole Annie army!” She calls out, her lips outstretched in a bright grin. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a person with such a radiant smile. It looks like she truly is feeling nothing but joy. “Come here!”
Annie lets out a laugh, but rushes to wrap her arms around her.
“Careful! I’ll stain you a little,” the girl warns, trying to shift in the hug, probably to avoid staining Annie with that yellow pigment over her. Probably getting the opposite effect. Still, Annie doesn’t mind. She moves back, grinning as the girl reaches for her cheek with her hand. “My little witch… you’re so beautiful! And so grown-up!”
“I could say the same,” Annie retorts. The girl squints at her.
“Oh, you had to come and ruin it…”
Annie giggles.
“Come, I’ll introduce you.” She grabs the girl’s hand and guides her closer to us. “These are my husband, Finnick, our child, Nacre, and…”
“Oh my gosh! This little guy!” The girl turns to Puff, with an expression of pure adoration. “Well, huge little hug!”
“That’s Puff. He’s my service dog,” Annie explains. “Everyone, this is Piper Ronan.”
Piper waves at us.
“Also known as the Lighthouse Ghost.”
I feel my brows furrowing a little and focus a little further on her. A ghost, huh?
“I– it’s my artistic name,” she explains, a little flustered, waving her hand towards the lighthouse. “I perform magic shows there, every Monday.”
“Magic?” I question.
She smirks.
“The kind you need to see to believe.”
“That so?”
Annie nods.
“Piper has been doing magic for ages! I didn’t know you still did it!”
Piper’s lips stretch into another small, fond grin.
“Every Monday at seven o’clock. We call it Ghost…”
“Ghost Hour!” Annie finishes for her. The girls laugh. I don’t think I’ve ever seen Annie this relaxed and excited. She has other friends. Like her old friend Kaitlyn, from this town as well, who is dating Ray and thus has met up with us a few times. Or her friend Maeve. Or the friends she has from work. Annie is very good at making friends. But this friendship seems to be one that makes her glow. Perhaps it’s the weight of all their years apart. “Can we come next Monday?”
“Of course! Everyone’s welcome! Including this little fella,” Piper playfully gives the dog a salute. Then, she turns to Nacre, making a playful face at him. “And you! Yes, you!”
Nacre babbles something, reaching for her face. He tries to grab her nose, which makes her chuckle.
“Hey, I need that!” She mirrors him, playfully grabbing his nose. He stares at her in confusion for some seconds before he laughs. “If you don’t let go, I don’t let go!”
A voice calls from the lighthouse.
“Mum! I found my goggles!”
It sounds like a little kid. Annie freezes into place, but Piper simply pulls back from Nacre, playfully waving a finger in front of his face.
“You win this time!” she claims, before turning around to answer. “Okay, Dyl! Honey, come over here! The new neighbors are here!”
The kid is on his way, until he sees us. He was mid-run from the door when he caught sight of us and abruptly stopped. A little kid with tanned skin and a couple of silver scars across his nose and jaw and dark curly hair. He can’t be older than six. The boy stays exactly where he is, hiding a little behind the door.
Piper’s expression softens.
“Sorry, he’s a little shy with strangers…”
“Wait, Pipes, you have– since when do you have a kid?” Annie blurts out.
Piper shrugs.
“What, you’re the only one allowed to be a mum?” she teases, sticking her tongue out. “Don’t be jealous, your kid is adorable!”
Nacre finds Piper sticking her tongue out hilarious. He claps a couple of times and I can’t help but snort.
Annie still looks a bit dumbfounded.
“Wait… it wasn’t… Was it Mako?”
Piper raises a brow and smiles.
“You’re awfully interested.”
“Pipes…”
“He’s mine. That’s all there is to it,” she explains easily. Then, she starts walking towards the door. “His name is Dylan. He’s lovely.”
“Mama!” he protests from behind the door. Piper walks inside for a moment to talk. It only takes some minutes before the two are coming out. Dylan is still walking behind Piper’s legs, hiding behind them until his eyes meet Puff’s.
Puff seems to sense that this kid is mortified, because he steps closer and sniffs his foot. Dylan blinks, offering him his hand.
“Dylan, you need to ask. He’s like Goldie, he’s working,” Piper gently reminds him.
Dylan looks up at Annie.
“Can I pet him?”
Annie smiles.
“Sure.”
Dylan raises his hand and Puff immediately answers by pressing his huge head against it. The boy pauses before he starts petting it, smiling a little nervously.
“Mama, he likes me!”
Piper reaches for the kid’s curls, messing them playfully.
“I know! He’s a new friend. Do you want to say hi to the other friends?”
It takes him a moment of consideration before he nods, facing us. His cheeks and nose are dotted with freckles everywhere.
“Hi.”
“Hey, what’s up?”
He pets Puff some more, as if to gather strength through his company. I get it, he’s a huge dog, he’d make me feel safe as well. “I’m going swimming with my mama.”
I get on my knees.
“That’s awesome. Do you like swimming a lot?”
He nods.
“I do, too.”
“Really?” he asks. “I like to go in the water and dive and then we go on a walk and we eat sandwiches and we look for shark teeth.”
I widen my eyes, exaggerating surprise.
“Shark teeth?”
He hums.
“I always try to find the big ones! Mama puts them in her lucky jar.”
“You have an entire jar for them?” I question. “You must be very good!”
He gets a little flustered and hides a little behind Piper’s legs. Then, he studies Nacre, who is still on my hip.
“Does he have any shark teeth?”
Nacre stares at him in pure confusion.
After some moments, Dylan’s face gives in to a lot of solemnity.
“I’ll find you one.”
“Oh, isn’t that nice?” Annie asks Nacre. Nacre simply waves his hands around babbling. Somehow, that manages to make Dylan let out a few giggles.
“Okay, okay! One shark tooth for him! What’s your name?”
“... Ba.”
Dylan laughs.
“That’s not your name!”
“Ba!” Nacre retaliates.
All three adults exchange fond glances. It seems like these two will get along very well.
“It was lovely seeing you,” Annie tells Piper.
“You too.”
Piper begins undoing her vest, which makes me glance away for a moment, only for Annie to shake her head with a grin.
“Swimsuit underneath,” Piper explains.
Dylan turns to her.
“We jump?”
Piper nods.
She kicks her shoes off and pants. Dylan follows her lead, staying in his swim trunks. He wraps his arms and legs around Piper’s torso like a tiny barnacle and Piper waves at us.
“I’ll see you at Ghost Hour?”
“Wouldn’t miss it,” I murmur, watching as she begins running with the kid towards the cliffs. My breath catches in my throat as I watch and Annie rushes behind, only for Puff to trot by her side.
“Piper…!”
Piper jumps off the cliffs, hugging the little kid with her arm. Annie curses and raises her hands, ready to do a spell, when the girl and the kid hit the sea and disappear in it for some seconds.
“Oh, no… this girl…” Annie mumbles.
But just as she begins whispering an enchantment, two heads surface, bursting out laughing so loud that we can hear them from where we are standing. Annie’s shoulders drop and she covers her face with her hands.
“These two…”
Puff starts pawing at her leg. Annie laughs, uncovering her face and kneeling beside him.
“It’s okay, Puff,” she says. “Here. I’m here. She’s just… fearless as when we were kids.”
I grin, walking closer to Annie. Nacre does grabby hands at the air, attempting to reach for Piper and for Dylan, clearly having found the jump hilarious.
“I’m surprised you don’t have any grey hairs yet,” I tell her.
She gives me a playful look.
“You might be the one to have that honor.”
“Me? Nah, I think you’re overestimating me.”
We continue our little walk around the town as the sun begins to fall and paint the sky pink, orange and red. When we glance off at the lighthouse, we find it already lit up and ready for the night. Annie is holding Nacre in her arms now as he sleeps with his tiny head against her chest. I have my arm wrapped around her waist as we make our way home. The waves crash and sing by us as we move on. It truly feels like the beginning of an adventure.
“We need to go to Ghost Hour,” I suddenly remind Annie.
“Yeah, Nacre will love it,” she says in a hushed voice.
“No, no. Just to… to look.”
She gives me a look.
“Finnick…”
“What?!”
“Finnick, it’s not real magic!”
“We just have to make sure! It’s our duty!”
“Are you seriously suspicious of my friend being entangled in… weird magic situations?!”
“I mean, she could’ve made a deal, or could secretly have magic blood… Remember that werewolf you insisted wasn’t a werewolf?”
“I said it wasn’t right to assume based on his body hair.”
“He had a lot,” I insist. “And I was right.”
Annie laughs.
“I can promise you that Piper is not really magic.”
“Then, let’s go for the show. For the human-made magic.”
Her lips stretch into a small, scheming little smile I know far too well. She kisses my shoulder.
“Sure. Let’s do it. For the human-made magic. I think it’ll surprise you.”