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“Where’s Anthony? Is he not back yet!” hollered king Howard across the huge stone dining table. Everyone else at the table stiffened. This was the third time in a row the young merman missed the family dinner.
“He just doesn’t care about his duties, dad,” supplied Gregory unhelpfully. Everyone else at the table murmured agreeing. Tony has been skipping out of his princely duties. Normally it wouldn’t matter but tonight was different. Tonight a prince from a neighbouring kingdom was visiting.
Tiberius Stone was 20, which was the age most princes chose a mate. He was dead set on picking his childhood friend. Tony however has turned down every attempt of Ty’s courting. Having no options left he asked king Howard for help, who agreed wholeheartedly. He wanted to marry off his youngest son as soon as he could. Better he is another kingdom's problem than his own.
“Jarvis, you must have an idea as to where he is?” Queen Maria questioned Tony’s personal servant. The man had basically raised him. If anyone were to know where Tony was, it was Jarvis.
“Young master sneaked out of his room this morning without so much as a whisper.”
They waited as long as they could before it was blatantly obvious Tony was not going to be showing up. They all ate in silence, careful to not upset the enraged king or the disappointed visiting prince. The dinner ended with prince Ty deciding he will go look for the missing prince.
~~~
“Tony, where are we going?” Peter, a clownfish asked curiously. Swimming as fast as he could to keep up with the young prince. Tony with his red and sparkling gold tail was a very fast swimmer. He was very determined to show his fish friend the thingamabob he found.
“It’s gonna blow your mind Petey, it’s huge, it’s incredible, it’s enormou-”
“Please tell me it’s not your dick,” groaned Peter. Tony was grinning ear to ear so it must be spectacular.
“You know Ty is visiting tonight right?” Peter asked as he followed Tony into a dark cave. The only thing illuminating the cave was the glow squid ink on the walls.
“Screw Ty, I already told him that I don't want him! He should just take the rejection and swim back home with his tail down low,” snickered Tony. The young prince had no intention of marrying Ty. He was already in love. Madly deeply in love with someone he can never have.
Finally, they reached what looked like a large floating tarp. Tony exaggerated how big the surprise was. It was about an adult merperson size.
“It's a bag!” gasped Peter sarcastically.
“You brought me out here to look at garbage,” giggled Peter.
“Haha very funny,” Tony rolled his eyes at Peter. He swam up to pull off the tarp covering the actual surprise. He pulled it off and there it stood, a roughly 8-foot tall statue of a handsome human.
“Woah! This is actually kinda cool,” Peter gushed, swimming rapidly around the entire statue.
“Who is this? What is it made of? How did you get it? Where-” Peter was asking a thousand questions a minute.
“Hey hey hey! Calm down before you bump your head on it,” Tony swam after Peter to catch him.
“It’s the prince or king of the human kingdom north of here. It’s made of marble or granite, not quite sure what materials humans use to make statues nowadays. And I found it in the wreckage of those sunken ships near the coral cove.” Tony huffed out with his arms wrapped around Peter effectively stopping him from swimming around the statue.
“I gotta hand it to you Tony, this is a pretty cool surprise,” Peter beamed, looking up at Tony with a huge grin. Tony let Peter go now that he had calmed down. Tony went up to the statue, mere inches from the statue's face. He brought his webbed hands up to slowly caress the cheek. Tony hummed as he rested his forehead against the statues.
“He’s beautiful isn’t he?” Tony said affectionately. He had never felt such strong emotions for anyone or anything before. It must be love Tony thought. He felt light-headed and warm all over.
“I’m in love Peter,” whispered Tony before putting his lips on the statue. It was cold and firm against his soft lips.
“Tony, you can’t be serious!” screamed Peter. Not only did this statue belong to a human but Tony was currently being courted. Courted by a very powerful and influential young prince no less. But Tony knew this all already. Yet here he was pretending to kiss a big lump of stone.
“I don’t care, I love him,” argued Tony. Before Peter could rebuttal another voice chimed in.
“Love you say?” sneered Ty. He swam menacingly towards Tony, using Tony’s surprise to pull him away from the statue. He grabbed Tony’s wrist and put his arm around his waist.
“Ugh Ty, how did you even find me?” Tony was annoyed that Ty was here in his secret heaven. Ty rather than answering chose to press his mouth to Tony’s neck. He kissed his gills. Swiping his tongue on the edge of the slits there. Tony suppressed an involuntary moan at the unwanted affection. Honestly, Ty had no self-control whatsoever! Tony put his hands on Ty’s chest to push him off. His tries proved futile when Ty just snickered at his attempts. He brought his large tail and started grinding against Tony’s.
“Enough! Let go,” Tony snapped. He upped his efforts to get away from him. Wiggling and moving his tail wildly. This only seemed to excite the other prince. He smiled mischievously, tightening his grip around the younger prince. He snaked his other hand down, fingers right on top of where Tony’s genitalia was hidden. He pushed his finger inside to pull out Tony’s slimy appendage.
Tony was close to hyperventilating. Tears were streaming down his face. He was openly sobbing and begging Ty to let go. Ty was not listening to reason at all. His eyes were completely lost in lust. He was kept coming in close to try and kiss Tony. Tony was moving his face, kisses are much more personal to him than the current assault. He only wanted to kiss the man he was infatuated with. The man he loved.
“Unhand the young prince, immediately,” came a loud thunderous voice. The command had Ty letting go of Tony instantly. Ty looked around widely for merperson the voice belonged to. There he was, Jarvis. Standing tall, tense, his tail and shoulders pulled tautly. He looked calm but his eyes hid a strong silent murderous intent. Behind him came a fast-swimming little clownfish.
“Tony, I’m sorry I took so long!” Cried, Peter. Poor fish looked scared half to death. Even though just a second ago Tony himself was a crying mess he pulled himself together. He didn’t want Peter to cry more than he already had. He tucked his slimy penis back inside his tail, wiped his face and took Peter into his arms.
“It’s okay, Peter it’s okay,” Tony soothed, trying to calm down the young fish.
“No you’re not,” wailed the baby fish. He nuzzled deeper into Tony’s embrace.
“I’m okay Peter, you saved me,” Tony praised. Soon guards from the palace were escorting Tony back home. He had no idea where Ty or Jarvis was and he didn’t care. He was happy that he was safe at home, laying in his shell bed.
~~~
The next morning was tense, to say the least. All the servants were behaving oddly near him. Tony broke and asked Jarvis why everyone was treating him like glass.
“It appears everyone has caught wind of what prince Ty did,” Jarvis offered.
“What!? Did you tell them?” Tony accused.
“I didn’t, but it seems rumours spread from the guards that escorted you home yesterday, and from the fact that the king sent prince Ty home early this morning.”
“They just let him leave without any consequences?” Tony asked bewildered. Before Jarvis could answer Tony started swimming as fast he could to his dad’s throne room. He was probably in a meeting with higher-ups but Tony didn’t care. He wanted answers. He threw open the large doors. All the heads inside at once turned to look at the young prince. Tony, never one to shy away from attention, stood tall with his entire tail straightened.
Everyone was surprised at Tony’s interruption except King Howard. He looked as if he was expecting something like this. Without breaking eye contact with Tony he demanded everyone leave the room at once. One by one each merman and mermaid swam out, not daring to look at the prince or the king. Gregory the last one to leave, ‘of course he was invited to the meeting’ Tony thought bitterly, gave Tony a scaling glare and left.
Tony slowly swam to his dad, refusing to sit in the chair the king pulled out for him. He waited for the king to speak, refusing to be the one to break the silence first. Howard sighed, already feeling a headache coming. He didn’t want to deal with this right now.
“Tony you’re upset, you have every right t-,” Howard didn’t get to finish his sentence before Tony cut him off.
“Upset?! I am furious! How could you just let him leave without any repercussions? He should be in jail!” Tony fumed.
“We can’t put a prince of a neighbouring kingdom in jail,” Howard said gently, trying not to anger the prince more than he already was.
“He can’t get away with this!” Tony seethed. For fucks sake god knows what Ty would’ve done if Jarvis wasn’t there to stop him.
“He won't, his parents will deal with him.”
“Oh that’s a load of shit, they won’t say anything to him,” hissed Tony. Tony has met Ty’s parents many times as a child. Those two are a bunch of airheads that let Ty get away with everything. Howards knows this very well too.
“Don’t worry, from now on we won’t let Ty around you alone again.” Howard looked proud at this. Like this was the thing that Tony was worried about. Like this was gonna fix everything.
“Again? Don’t tell me we are still going forward with the courtship.” Tony was baffled, Howard couldn’t be serious. Tony never wanted to see Ty again. He wanted Ty to rot in a cell far far away from him. But his own father wanted him to marry Ty. Mate with the goddamn rapist.
“Tony please I know this is going to be hard for you, but we all have responsibilities, and I expect you to fulfil yours,” Howard said calmly. Tony was speechless, utterly speechless. He would be forced to marry Ty despite what Ty did to him.
He couldn’t bear to be in the same room as his dad any longer. He held his head high while he swam away like a coward. Howard was going to say something else but Tony just slammed the door and left.
He swam as fast he could to his special place. The one with the beautiful statue of his soulmate. He noticed that the water around him was unusually aggressive. He assumed there was a storm happening, the heavy rain tended to send currents even down here. Tony got excited thinking of the storm. Storms usually meant shipwrecks and shipwrecks meant new human toys to play with! He started swimming up to the surface. He circled around the place where ships have sunk in the past.
“Bingo!” Tony said out loud to himself when he noticed wood floating around. A ship must’ve sunk here very recently. He noticed in the distance that there were people alive just floating about. Well, that sucks. How is Tony supposed to rummage through the wreckage if there are still people around? He decided rather than accidentally getting spotted by the humans who are still alive, he would swim just below all the wrecked ship parts.
He happily started looking through all the cool knick-knacks among the bodies of the poor humans who couldn’t float. He picked up a cool shiny pointy thing and a round dull thing. He didn’t know the names of any of these things. He kept looking for things when he noticed a familiar face.
“Where have I seen him before?” Tony wondered and then it hit him. That was the statue man! He was here and he was drowning. He was moving his arms around wildly. He was trying to go to the surface but his legs were caught in a net. ‘Oh, how the tables have turned’ Tony thought as he rushed to the human.
He grabbed the big man to hold him still which was really hard. The man was really fighting him when Tony grabbed his legs. Tony bent down and used his sharp teeth to cut the net. Finally, the net fell away from the man. The human stopped moving though. Tony realized quickly that he needed oxygen. Humans can’t be down in the water very long without it.
He wrapped his arms around the man and hauled him up to the surface. He swam to the nearest land he knew about. He tried his best to push the man on the land. It was very hard since the waves kept trying to wash them away. He used his tail to push them up. The human was safely on the land but he still wasn’t moving.
“Come on! You can’t die on me! I just met you,” Tony hissed. He was furious, how dare he die on him. He began to shake the man violently. Hoping that this would wake the man up. Nothing, he wasn’t moving one bit. He wanted to keep trying to wake him up but he heard shouting coming from the distance. People were running towards them. He didn’t want to leave but he didn’t stay and get seen or worse caught. He quickly knelt down and placed a kiss on his lips before leaving. He flopped back towards the ocean, letting the waves wash him away.
He watched quietly from a distance as the people found his mate. Did they start pushing his chest? Oh god were they trying to kill him? They were probably trying to finish him off! Then that disgusting human put his mouth on his mate. Tony wanted to kill that man but then his soulmate pushed the human off himself. He turned over and spat up a bunch of water. He was alive! He was so happy his mate didn’t die. He cheerfully swam back home, completely forgetting the awful mood he was in before he left.
~~~
Ok, so Tony knows he shouldn’t be doing this. This was a terrible idea. Peter wouldn’t shut up about how bad of an idea this was. He just wanted to show Peter that he had found his statue man. Peter didn’t believe him when he talked about how he saved his soulmate from dying. So he just had to prove to him that ‘no he wasn’t lying’ and ‘yes statue man was real’.
“How much further do we have to go?” Peter whined.
“We are almost there okay? Just hold on, it’ll be totally worth it.” Tony has been coming to the same shore where he dropped that man off every night. He did this in hope of seeing him again. Then last night he saw him. Statue man was walking the shore with a bright glowing thing. Tony saw him and he’s very sure statue man saw him too but rather than stay and find out, he swam back home. He was nervous and a little scared, so he brought Peter along for some courage. He wouldn’t wuss out again in front of Peter.
They made it near the shore and waited. Tony wasn’t sure if statue man was gonna come here again. They waited very long and just when they were about to give up, they saw something bright.
“Tony, what is that?” Peter asked curiously.
“It’s how he sees in the dark, it’s like his own little sun,” Tony gushed. The man started coming closer and closer. He still hasn’t spotted Tony and Peter.
“Oh woah, you were right! That so totally is the statue man.”
“See I wasn’t lying, I saved him and now I’ll woo him.”
“Wait woo him? You’re not still seriously considering marrying him?” Peter asked worriedly. The man kept walking closer and then he noticed them!
“Tony he sees us! We need to go,” Peter started to push Tony under the water. He kept trying to get Tony to go home before he made a mistake.
“Hey you, come here,” that statue man asked in an assertive tone. Tony understood human speech better than most merpeople. While he had trouble replying, he had no problem listening. Tony slowly swam closer to shore much to Peter’s dismay. At one point Tony had to stop because he still wanted to keep hidden the fact he was a merman.
“Why did you stop?” Tony didn’t reply.
“Can you not hear me?” The human started to grow restless.
“Fine, I’ll come to you.” That shocked Tony, he didn’t think the human would swim to him. The man took off his shoe clothes, ‘they are called shoes I think’, then swam right up to him.
“What are you?” The human asked after he came within a foot of Tony. ‘So much for hiding the fact I’m a merman’ Tony thought. Instead of replying Tony merely smiled, showing off his sharp teeth. He wanted to test this human, see if he was easily scared off. The human however just tilted his head curiously. He then raised his hand and grabbed Tony’s jaw. ‘He’s bold’, Tony thought. Tony tried to move his head and shake the hand off but the human just gripped him tighter. Tony let out a small whimper.
“Oh so you can speak,” the human chuckled. He brought his other hand to touch Tony’s hair, shoulder, arms, back and even his nipples! Tony let out an outraged moan at that. Who does this stupid human think he is?!
“Come on now, don’t get shy, after all, you’re the one who kissed me.” Tony gave him a shocked look at that. How did this human even know that?
“Some of my servants told me that they saw someone on top of me, the whole kingdoms been looking for that person, the one that saved and stole a kiss from me.” Tony looked away embarrassed. He wouldn’t have kissed the man if he’d known people could see him.
“I should have asked them to search the ocean as well,” the man chuckled.
“Can you tell me your name?” The man asked with his huge baby blue eyes.
“Tnony, TOnny,” human speech was so troublesome.
“Tony?” the human asked. Tony nodded approvingly. He then pocked the human’s chest, wanting to know his.
“My name? It’s Steve Rogers, the next king of Shield.” What a coincidence, the man he saved turned out to be a prince too. Tony started to point to himself wildly then he pointed at the kingdom’s amulet he wore. He wanted to let Steve know he was a prince too.
“What? Is that necklace mean something?”
“Pricn, me prinnce,” Tony stumbled through his words but Steve understood nevertheless.
“You’re a prince too?” Steve asked wondrously to which Tony nodded aggressively.
“Wow we have so much in common,” Steve said with little hearts in his eyes. They both spent the next couple of hours talking to each other as much as they could. It was difficult at first but Tony got the hang of human speech as the conversation went on. Eventually, Steve said he had to go home. He asked if Tony would come back.
“Please tell me I’ll see you again,” the blonde prince asked. Even though he was freezing and was sure he was going to catch a cold, he still didn’t want to leave. He wanted to spend more time with the adorable little sea creature. He hadn’t felt this strongly for someone else in a long time. A little part of him wondered if Tony was a siren who had cast a love spell on him.
“Tomomorrow,” Tony was so happy to find out that his statue man was a prince. A prince who liked Tony back.
“Same time tomorrow okay? I’ll bring a boat so I won’t have to swim,” and with that, the older prince swam back to shore leaving Tony dazed. Tony was so in love with him. Tony happily swam back home. He carefully snuck back into his room without getting caught. Soon as he entered his room he was headbutted by a clownfish.
“Tony what took you so long?!”
“Peter! Why did you leave me? I wanted you to meet Steve too!”
“Steve? Oh please don’t tell me you’re on first name bases with a human,” Peter cried.
“Peter calm down, it’s really not a big deal,” Tony tried to soothe the little fish down. After Peter calmed down, Tony explained everything to him. Explained how the other man was a prince, who maybe had feelings for Tony too.
“Tony, you know your dad’s gonna be mad when he finds out,” Peter pointed out trying to get Tony to see reason.
“If he finds out.”
“He will find out if you plan on visiting him again.”
“No he won’t, and I’ll be very careful okay?”
“Why do you even love him so much?”
“I don’t really know why but I do know that I’d do anything for him.” Tony might not know why he wants to see the other prince again but that doesn’t matter. Tony loved him and was willing to do anything for him.