Archive of Our Own

Jisung closes his eyes and listens. It’s the most beautiful song he’s ever heard in his entire life.

His heart beats faster as the notes unfold, crystalline like a summer dawn. He recognises none of the words carried by the wind, all of them sounding ancient, written in a long-forgotten language, but that matters little. The emotion they carry is nearly palpable, the sorrow, the longing, the echo of something long gone. His lips part, breathless, as he leans forward, attempting to grow closer to the melody. He has never felt like this before. His body is on fire, he tastes salt on his tongue, his head is a fog of distorted thoughts. This is not enough, he needs to come closer, to drink the words straight from the lips of whoever is singing them. He doesn’t understand them, but it’s as if they’re calling his name. 

His hands had been gripping the ship’s wale like claws as he tried to remain grounded, but now he raises one of them, desperate to grasp the one calling for him. He needs to see them, to hear their whispers in his ears, to hold them in his arms–

“Your Highness! Leave the deck at once!”

Jisung pays no mind. They’re sailing in the opposite direction to the song. Why is that? Has everyone lost their hearing? Can’t they understand?

“Your Highness.”

A strong hand grabs his forearm, the one reaching out. He’s almost annoyed when he turns to its owner and finds the captain of his personal guard staring at him, wide eyed in disbelief.

“I must insist, your Highness,” she says, panting. “Go to your cabin now, it’s not safe out here.”

Her hat is gone. Rivers roll down her face, and her hair and clothes are heavy and darker. Not holding onto anything besides Jisung’s wrist, she can hardly stand upright when the ship tilts. 

Around them, waves taller than mountains whip the ship, once grandiose, now resembling a tiny nutshell. All that water, and the clouds still believe it’s far from enough, so they drench the deck and the sails, as if they wish to create a new ocean inside the wooden walls of the ship. Sailors push and pull onto ropes, grabbing the shrouds for balance, but the deck slants to an almost impossible angle once the ship tries to overcome yet another wave. People fall, the slippery floor betraying them. Orders are shouted, but the roar of thunder swallows every sound.

Except for that song. Jisung can still hear it. 

“I can’t,” he says, voice breaking. The rain hits the wooden deck with the intensity of fired cannons, and it’s impossible to know whether the captain even understood him. “Can’t you hear it? I need… I need to listen.”

If she could turn any paler, she would have. “Your Highness, it’s a siren!” She tightens her hold on his arm and tries to pull, but it’s like the soles of the prince’s soaked boots have grown roots. “You know how dangerous they are, please, they seek to end you!”

A siren. Nonsense. Jisung has never met a siren, none of them know him. How could it be a complete stranger, when whoever’s singing holds the other half of Jisung’s soul?

If he closes his eyes, there’s no lightning, no downpour, no mayhem around him. There’s nothing but a warm summer day, smelling of oranges and mint.

The captain shouts something, but he’s no longer listening to her. He must chase the sound, or he will lose it forever. Even soaked to the bone, this is the thought that makes him shiver. It can’t happen that way. He must hurry. He must… 

A wave, stronger than all the others, crashes into the hull, making the captain tumble. Her grip disappears from Jisung’s arm, and he’s free. He’s finally free. He’s smiling when he falls, and not even the brutal impact of his body against the waves is enough to change that, because the water amplifies the song, making it sound like it comes from everywhere at once, wrapping him in a warm embrace, never to let go.

It’s only when his lungs start to strain that he realises something is wrong. He instinctively opens his mouth to scream, but salt water enters in buckets, suffocating him. Something is wrong, very wrong. His limbs flail helplessly, but they find nothing to hold onto. He can swim, just like almost everyone from a nation with so much nautical history and tradition as his own, but it’s as if he’s regressed to those first few times at the lagoon, swimming tutors sighing at his youthful panic as soon as his tiny feet touched the water. That panic, dimmed over the years until it became insignificant, resurges now, and feels colder on his skin than this abyssal ocean. 

He can’t breathe, he can’t see anything but the deep black, he can’t hear anything that’s not the song. And it feels like it’s getting closer.

Then, just as it feels like his head is about to explode, two silver eyes open right in front of him. There’s joy in them, but no warmth in the pair of delicate hands that hold his cheeks.

The song ends just as everything goes dark.

⊹ ﹏𓊝﹏𓂁﹏⊹ ˖

Fish. Salt. Seagrass.

Wind. Waves. Gulls.

Rock. Wetness. Viscosity. 

One by one, Jisung’s senses return. He thinks he can feel sunlight hitting his soaked skin and clothes, but the confirmation only comes when he turns his head with a pained grunt and feels the warmth through his closed eyelids, blurring the world in red. His head throbs, and for a second, he has no clue where he is.

It dawns on him when the pungent smell of fish spears into his nostrils. 

His eyes shoot open as his body instinctively tries to put some distance between his face and the dead fish suspended right in front of him. His heart panics as his sore hands dig into the rocky ground under his palms. 

The fish isn’t suspended in thin air, after all. It’s being held by a siren.

Even freezing in fear would have been preferable to the high-pitched screech he lets out. It’s not just his hands that hurt: his entire body aches and twitches with the leftovers of his exhaustion, but he can’t bring himself to get up and run. Besides, as he looks around, desperate for a way out, he finds there is nowhere to run. He’s stuck on a small rocky outcrop, a lone sprout of stone in the middle of the ocean, surrounded by nothing but calm waves, illuminated by the golden sunrise on the horizon. 

The siren laughs. 

He’s sitting right in front of Jisung, tip of his silver tail playing with tiny waves that lap at the rocks. His shiny scales reflect the sunlight and the gill slits on each side of his neck are closed now that he’s above water, but Jisung is too terrified to notice anything that’s not the fish he waves right in front of his face, as if he tried to use its strong scent to rouse him awake. Seeing the job done, the siren lowers the dead animal. Then, he approaches Jisung, moving almost too fast for his numb brain to even register, smiling from ear to ear as his eyes shine with madness. Jisung’s stomach drops a whole mile. Instead of the fish, the siren now holds a knife, peach-coloured and curved like it has been carved out of a conch. A knife that rapidly approaches his throat.

A tiny noise escapes his hoarse throat, burnt from the saltwater, but his back has hit a wall behind him. There’s no more distance he can put between them.

“Well, well, look at the beautiful fish I reeled in,” the siren says, voice high and melodious. Jisung’s stomach churns. He’s staring at the singer he heard on the boat, just these few words were enough for him to be certain. The captain was right. “The crown prince.” The siren’s silver eyes glow like pearls, and his chest heaves with matching excitement. “Even more than I bargained for.”

Jisung’s mouth is so dry he can’t bring himself to speak. Pearls. All of him glows like one: from the moonlight shimmer of his tail and eyes, to the simple strings of beads that adorn his wrists, to the water droplets that hang onto the waves of his dark hair. His chest is bare from clothing or necklaces – in fact, the two bracelets are all he seems to be wearing, but Jisung is busier trying not to imagine his sharp nails bypassing the knife altogether and instead sinking into his eyeballs. A chill creeps up his spine when he notices the translucent webs between the siren’s fingers. Jisung swallows, and decides that if he is destined to command his kingdom one day, then he should be able to command his tongue to work.

Should. It doesn’t exactly go as planned.

“You had many chances to kill me,” he says, too blinded by fear for any humiliation to rise to his cheeks when his voice breaks.

The siren huffs out a laugh. “How cunning of you.” 

Everyone born within the borders of Jisung’s home nation knows that sirens lure in their prey using their hypnotising songs, but what most aren’t aware, and Jisung had been included in that group until this moment, is just how jaw-droppingly beautiful they can be. The prince recalls all the horrendous images and paintings he’s been seeing all in his life, in books or inside wooden frames, and finds no similarities whatsoever. If it weren’t for those fangs and claws… The sun keeps rising and warming up, but he can imagine the cold under his palms were he to place them on the creature’s tail.

“Maybe my kind still holds onto some shreds of honour, and don’t kill defenceless people in their sleep,” the siren continues, crawling closer to Jisung like a cat on the hunt. Jisung’s blood freezes when a flat side of the conch knife, fresh to the touch, presses against his throat. “Unlike you humans.”

Spit out like an insult. Jisung shudders, but he can’t bring himself to rebate it. 

After all, the siren has every right to want to use the knife.

“Will you?” he asks, voice tiny.

The siren’s grin widens. His canines are sharp like a cat’s. “Not yet,” he says. “I need you alive for now.”

‘Not yet’ isn’t exactly ‘no’, but Jisung sucks in a breath. This is good, this opens some room for negotiation. Assuming the siren is telling the truth, that is, but then again, why wouldn’t he be? Honour or not, it would have been child's play to end Jisung before he even pulled him out of those raging waves.

Jisung squares his shoulders and tries to remember all the lessons he sat through and all the council meetings he silently watched, listening and learning from his parents. It’s hard to take anything useful from the muddled mist his brain retributes with, but he still tries. “If it’s money you want, then–”

The siren interrupts him with a scoff. “I was expecting a prince to be smarter. Money?” he mocks. “What could a siren ever need your gold for? The sea gives us everything we need.”

Jisung blinks, surprised. “Then…?”

The siren grins and lowers the sharp conch. His yawn isn’t too graceful, but the arch described by his spine when he stretches under the morning sun has a bundle of conflicting thoughts swirling inside Jisung’s stomach.

“You’ll see.” 

With that, the siren turns around and starts gathering scattered pieces of cloth, carelessly piling them up in a crevice of the rocky outcrop. Jisung chews on his lower lip as he watches him. In turn, the dead fish lying on the ground watches Jisung. He tries not to grimace as he pushes the animal away with his fingertip, and decides this round of negotiations still has some life in it.

“They'll search for me,” he points out. He’s starting to sound like himself again, thankfully. Like a future ruler, despite what his younger brother always says. “My family. They won't just let their crown prince be lost to the waves.”

His newfound bravery fizzles into white seafoam when the siren only shrugs, not even turning away as he folds a piece that, confusingly for Jisung, resembles a tunic. “I know. That's precisely what I mean for them to do.” The siren peeks over his shoulder, pearl eyes reflecting the sunshine. “In fact, I'm gonna call them here, and we're all gonna have a very pleasant chat.”

Jisung’s jaw drops. “Will I just… stay here in the meantime?” he asks, baffled. “It could take days for a ship to arrive.”

The siren abandons the light tunic and once again stares at Jisung from the corner of his eye, but this time, his gaze lingers for long enough to make Jisung’s heart race. He doesn’t like the sharp smile that has risen to the siren’s lips, he doesn’t like a single bit. His fists are clenched so tightly they shake when the creature turns around and, with the help of his hands, crawls closer to Jisung. The wet pebbles rustle under his silver tail, murmurs that break the silence between them as the siren grabs Jisung’s chin and forces their eyes to meet. Jisung feels his blood draining from him, as if those sharp nails, so close to his skin, have cut the surface and make red rivers roll down his neck. 

Such a cold touch. Cold like the depths of the sea.

“Will you beg for food?” The siren murmurs. “For mercy?” His smile stretches, pink lips moulding words Jisung knows he won’t forget for the rest of his life, regardless of how long or short it is. As he sits here in the creature’s hands, powerless to move, short seems the more likely option. “I need you alive, but that doesn't mean I need you intact.”

Be the crown prince. Be the future ruler, the future king.

Jisung shakes his head.

“I will only beg for your name.”

For the first time, the siren’s icy grin falters. He blinks, caught off guard. “My… name?”

His jaw trembles, teeth wanting to chatter with fear, but Jisung forces the muscles to clench. “I deserve to at least know the name of my captor.”

A moment of silence passes them by, as seagulls fly above their heads. Only their wails and the waves crashing against the rocks break it, until the siren’s crystalline laugh joins them. 

“How bold, little prince.” His cold hand pats Jisung’s cheek twice. “My name is Chenle.”

Chenle. What an unusual name, Jisung thinks as he silently watches the siren pick the tunic back up and slide it down his shoulders. He’s suddenly too aware of the weight of his drenched clothes, even heavier now that they’re dense and itchy with salt, so, without ever taking his eyes off the siren and making sure he’s as far from him as the small patch of flat rock allows him, he slowly takes off his boots and the light summer jacket he’d been wearing since the ship. 

The ship. He wonders what happened to it. He’d been invited to a nearby island nation for a friend’s birthday party, and was just returning home with his retinue when the storm struck. He glances at Chenle’s carefree movements as he continues tending to the pile of cloth near him. Did everyone survive? Are they all back home, safe and sound apart from the bone-deep cold that has likely seeped into them? And if not, did Chenle have anything to do with their demise, or was Jisung his one and only goal from the beginning? 

He shivers. Who knows how long the siren has been planning this, waiting in the shadows for the perfect time to match Jisung leaving his home nation and a storm suddenly hatching, giving him all the cover he needed to snatch him right from under his guards’ watch. 

His throat is too dry, but he still involuntarily swallows. Dense shame sinks deeper and deeper inside his body. It would be so easy to blame Chenle’s actions on the sirens’ cruel, vengeful nature, but he can’t bring himself to, not when he knows what he knows. 

Just what does he need me alive for…?

Jisung only notices he’d been staring when Chenle suddenly looks over his shoulder and cold pearl eyes meet a pair of dark ones, wide with fear. Jisung immediately tears his gaze away, but it’s far too late. He stares at a seagull that has landed nearby, peacefully grooming its white and grey feathers, muscles so tense they start to ache.

“Eat up,” he hears. When he finds the courage to turn to Chenle again, he’s pointing at the dead fish with a claw-like nail. “Wouldn't want you to starve to death before you're of use to me.”

A wave of nausea rises to Jisung’s throat before he can even consider obeying, and God knows that is his first instinct – anything to keep the conch knife away from his throat. And yet, the thought of sinking his teeth into those slimy scales has him feeling sick.

“I can't eat this,” he murmurs. “It's raw.”

The contempt he finds in Chenle’s eyes and twisted nose makes him want to throw up as much as the stench of the fish. “Are you human royals all this picky?” he spits out. 

“T-This has nothing to do with being royalty,” Jisung replies, voice down to a thread, “any human being would cook their food. It… it makes us sick if we don’t.”

The siren rolls his eyes after a second of hesitation. One of the longest seconds in Jisung’s life, that’s for sure. “Fine,” he says. “I can start a fire; I think I still have some driftwood left. I do miss the taste of grilled fish.”

Then, he stands up.

On two pale, elegant legs. 

Jisung’s jaw drops. Shimmery scales, twins to the ones which used to cover the lower half of Chenle’s body, still shine in patches here and there, but most of what exists under the hem of the tunic is smooth skin, identical to Jisung’s, identical to anyone he’s even seen. Jisung’s eyes grow so dry they almost wither, but he can’t even bring himself to blink as Chenle, indifferent to the storm unfolding inside Jisung’s head, moves a stone alongside the face of the main outcrop and reveals a tiny cave full of driftwood, shielded from the elements to remain dry.

He says nothing as he picks out a few logs, and silent he remains as he brings them to the centre of the flat area. Jisung is aware he could be committing the mistake that will bring the conch knife back in the vicinity of his throat, but he can’t take it anymore.

“You… you have legs now,” he murmurs.

Chenle stops halfway into building a cone with the wood and narrows his eyes at Jisung. “How observant of you,” he says, venomous.

“I had no idea sirens even could–”

“Maybe your people would know a thing or two about sirens,” Chenle interrupts, voice sharper than his nails, “if you didn't harpoon them on sight.”

Jisung’s nails dig into his palms, but it’s all he can do to keep them from shaking. He knows he should close his mouth, but one last attempt still manages to slip through his lips. “I don't–”

Once again, the siren doesn’t let him finish. Gone is the almost playful glint in his eyes when he asked whether Jisung was going to beg. There’s only pure, condensed hatred now.

“Yeah, you don't. You have people who can get their hands dirty for you.”

He’s still staring right into Jisung’s eyes as he grabs the fish in one hand and a sharp stick from the driftwood pile with the other, and spears the animal from open mouth to tail in one clean move. Jisung’s sight blurs with rising tears, but he blinks them away.

He said he wouldn’t kill me. He said he still needs me for something. It’s still safe for now. There’s still hope. 

He repeats these words in his mind until he believes them. The mackerel is thoroughly grilled by the time he gets there, and his stomach growls at the fragrance. By now, the sunlight is strong and warm, and the clothes he refused to take off start to dry. Chenle rips the fish in half and carelessly throws Jisung the back portion, but he’s already staring at the waves when Jisung manages to catch it and give him a tiny nod of acknowledgement. 

He’s used to fine herbs over perfect smooth textures and a chilly glass of white wine on the side, but the mackerel tastes like heaven after so many hours sitting on an empty belly. He chews on one of the last chunks of white flesh as he stares at Chenle’s profile. The sun illuminates the side of his face he hides from Jisung, emphasizing the slope of his nose, the outline of his pink lips, the frown etched onto his eyebrows as he silently eats his half of the fish. There’s a sizable chance he’s musing over the best ways to get rid of Jisung’s corpse after he’s done being useful to him, but there’s also the chance Jisung will avoid that fate if he plays his cards right. Right now, his deck seems to contain nothing but twos and threes, but the only thing bigger than his fear right now, is his desire to keep living. 

“I was wondering…” he starts. Chenle turns to him, frown deepening. There goes Jisung’s courage. “Nevermind.”

The siren’s humourless smirk bends his lips into a chill-inducing shape. “What, you're worried I'll call you ignorant?” he mocks. “I already think you are, it makes no difference. Spit it out.”

Jisung puts the insult in his mouth and swallows it without complaining. Instead, he nods at the bonfire that separates them. The flames are tiny now, mostly reduced to pulsing embers.

“I thought sirens would hate fire,” he carefully says. “That they'd even fear it.”

Chenle shrugs. “Why would we fear fire?” he asks. “We're made of water, and there are no flames big enough that the ocean can’t put out.”

Made of water. And yet, there’s as much flesh and bone in them as in any human being. Jisung never saw the blood, sheltered in his palace, but he knows what some people do with the fins, and that was enough to shape his thoughts into what they are today. He stares at Chenle, his captor, the one who kidnapped him and threatened him with a dagger, and finds his heart aching. 

He wants to say something, to explain what can’t be believed and make Chenle understand, but he finds no suitable words in time, as the waves bubbles near their rock, and a pair of heads break the water surface. Jisung’s heart races as the two sirens approach them, barely noticing his own instinct to crawl backwards and away from them. Their eyes are silver pearls like Chenle’s, but one of them wears his hair down to his shoulders, heavy with saltwater but already curling at the tips, and the other’s tan skin glows under the warm sunlight. Their expressions vary as they hold onto the rocks and stare right at Jisung, but Jisung is instead staring at the blurry moonlight glow of their silver tails underwater, waving softly to keep them floating. 

“So,” the first siren slowly comments, but even though his eyes are still on Jisung’s frozen still figure, the prince knows he’s not the one meant to answer. “You actually caught one.”

Chenle nods from where he’s sitting, still chewing on the fishbones. “Fell right into my net,” he casually says. “Humans are easy, Renjun, you know that.”

The siren – Renjun – narrows his eyes. “Is that the Crown Prince?”

“Yes. Cute little Jisung, in the flesh.”

When the second newcomer speaks for the first time, grin opening wide, it reminds Jisung of the curve of the conch knife. The words he says don’t help either. “You should kill him. To send a message.”

Chenle won’t, Jisung thinks, dizzy with concern he very much wished he had gotten rid of by now. He said he wouldn’t. He said he needs me for something.

“That will only anger the royals and make things worse, Donghyeok,” Chenle states. Jisung breathes a discreet sigh of relief. “Trust my plan, I know it’s gonna work. But I do need your help.”

Donghyeok rolls his round eyes, resting his head on the rocks he holds onto, smooth from the endless caresses of the waves. “Can’t believe you’re gonna make us run errands for you.”

“Help tie the hook and half of the catch is yours.” Chenle discards the fishbone and smiles. “This will benefit all of us. It’s not like spreading the news will be difficult for you.”

“Besides,” Renjun says. His smirk is smaller but scarier than Donghyeok’s, if that was even possible, “in case this doesn’t work–”

“Which it will,” Chenle says.

“–we can always kill him later.”

Jisung suddenly notices just how dry his throat is. The three sirens exchange a few more casual words, but he barely listens. Hearing it out loud makes it so real it’s almost palpable. By the time he no longer feels the urge to throw up, the two sirens are already bidding their goodbyes and disappearing under the waves, possibly to fulfil the task Chenle asked of them. 

“How will the news reach my family unless they talk to humans?” He asks as soon as the bubbles they leave behind melt into the waves and the foam. It’s not at all part of the questions that are making him nauseous, but he feels the need to clear his head.

Chenle sighs and drops his shoulders. “Seas of blue, you really are naive.”

Jisung perks up. “They’ll talk to humans?” he asks, dumbfounded. “That’s… They’ll get themselves killed.”

“They’re not stupid, they know which humans are safe to engage with,” Chenle replies, every word sharp and acidic. “Your beloved family will be here in a minute, and a new era will begin… whether you like that or not.”

Whether you like that or not. Does he want to make a deal? Jisung can easily imagine a very different story unfolding on this rocky outcrop if Chenle had managed to reel in his brother instead. He swallows and decides to change the topic.

“Were you here first?”

Chenle raises an eyebrow and reclines on the slope behind him. “Is that your way of asking why we don’t leave to shores where we’re not hunted for sport?”

“You’re not hunted for sport, Chenle,” Jisung murmurs, “you’re hunted because you’ve made countless ships crash against countless rocks, causing countless deaths.”

He is half expecting Chenle to grow angry and frustrated, but his cold eyes barely change.

“Sirens sing in the same way humans laugh or cry,” he says. “We were here first, do you expect us to change our ways because you idiot humans can’t tell reality from mirage? You would never do the same for us, and I really, really can’t stand injustices.” 

Chenle stretches his legs in front of him, crossed at the ankles, and that’s when something dawns on Jisung.

He put on the light blue tunic, so loose it almost fully exposes his left shoulder and barely long enough to cover his thighs, and shifted from his tail to his legged form. That can only mean he’s not wearing anything underneath. 

If Jisung’s mouth felt dry before, now he feels like he’s swallowed a ball of cotton. He tries to blame the heat that rises to his face on the sunlight hitting it straight on, but the way his eyes stubbornly seek the sight of Chenle’s legs has him feeling dizzy. This is not good. Far from good. He can only hope Chenle doesn’t decide to start singing again, because only that could possibly make everything worse. 

He doesn’t know if the siren has noticed his torment, but he doesn’t think he wants to know either, so he pretends he’s staring at the waves and tries to recall the conversation they were having. 

“I wanna help you,” he says, barely recognising his own voice.

Chenle snorts. “I sure hope so.” When Jisung finally turns to him again, the bottom half of his body is once again a long stretch of silver scales, with the tip of his rayed fin already kissing the waves below them. “Considering that’s your only way to stay alive.”

With that, he gets rid of the tunic and dives into the ocean. 

Jisung remains still for a few breathless moments, then springs into action. He approaches the edge of the rocks, careful so he doesn’t slip on the slimy seaweed that covers them, and squints at the calm waves. Nothing. It’s impossible to tell which way Chenle went, or why he left or when he’ll come back or whether he’s as bloodthirsty as he sometimes seems, or–

Jisung sighs and lies down on the pebbles. The sun is too strong for him to keep his eyes open without burning his retinas to a crisp, so he blindly rolls his sleeves up, thankful for the fresh breeze that occasionally blows. 

What in the world is he supposed to do now? 

Swimming away is not an option. No matter how hard he stares at the misty horizon, he can’t find traces of the continent, only a few islets here and there, little more than boulders peeking at the sky. Besides, he has no way of knowing how long Chenle will take to come back, and no matter how naive the siren thinks he is, Jisung sure doesn’t think he can outswim him if they meet among the waves. 

He takes a deep breath and wipes the sweat droplets forming on his forehead with the back of his wrist. At least it’s summer and he won’t freeze to death out here on his own. 

He’s starting to overheat under the scorching sun, so he stands up before the salt and spray rust his joints. He considers rummaging through Chenle’s scarce belongings to search for anything interesting or useful, but he quickly discards that idea. To his tired mind, every slight difference in the whisper of the waves is a sign the siren is returning, pearl irises burning with hatred at his nerve. The thought of hiding the conch knife and using it against Chenle barely even crosses his mind. It’s pointless to create more attrition between them. Jisung wants the deal, if that’s even the goal, to go smoothly almost as much as Chenle and the rest of the sirens do, so he leaves the dagger where he found it. 

There’s not much to see here, Chenle clearly spends most of his time underwater. After around fifteen minutes of climbing rocks, slipping on algae, and a close encounter with an octopus resting on a puddle near the edge of the outcrop that had his heart jumping, Jisung finds himself back where he started. At least there’s a rocky overhang wide enough to provide some shade, so, with nothing to do or lose, he curls up and lets his eyelids fall. 

It’s impossible to tell how much time has passed when the sudden sound of something falling mere centimetres from his face startles him awake. Jisung blinks, driving away the frayed edges of the strange dreams that haunted every second of his sleep, and slowly sits up. Under the light of the still high yet less flaming sun, the clear contents of a glass bottle stare right back at him. Surprised, he looks up at Chenle. He’s ruffling his dark hair, splashing water drops all around him. Some fall on his shoulders, on his arms, on his chest, and Jisung finds himself tracing their paths as gravity pulls them down his lean torso, glistening and shining like they’re tiny diamonds, until they reach his waist and their glow blends with the iridescent scales of Chenle’s tail.

He only looks away when he notices Chenle spying on him through the corner of his eye.

“Drink up.” The siren lets out a huff. “You’re lucky Renjun even remembered you useless humans can’t drink from the ocean.”

No one with sharp nails and an even sharper conch at their disposal resorts to poisoning, so Jisung grabs the bottle and pulls out the cork. The water is chilly and already covering the outer glass in a thin layer of condensation, perhaps from having been transported across the cold sea, and Jisung feels his body temperature drop by a delightful few degrees as he drinks. We really take the smallest things for granted. Thank you, Renjun.

“We weren’t born from the ocean like you, but from the land” he says, stopping himself from downing the entire bottle – after all, he has no idea how long it will have to last him. He wonders where Chenle got it. Maybe from one of those ‘safe’ humans the sirens know? “We drink from its rivers and ponds.”

Chenle twists his nose, and Jisung is left convinced he stayed under the sun for far too long, because he finds that gesture rather cute. “That can’t possibly taste good.”

“It does.” Jisung finds a small smile on his lips. “It’s sweeter.”

This time, Chenle goes beyond twisting his nose and just fully sticks his tongue out. “I hate sweets.”

“Then you’d like the codfish pastries we make.”

Chenle opens his mouth, ready to argue, but then he pauses. His lips close, while his head tilts to the side and his eyes narrow, like he’s considering the suggestion. Jisung tries to limit the width of his smile as he continues. 

“We also make these delicious–”

His words fail him as soon as he spots a moving dot in the horizon, over Chenle’s shoulder. His heart beats like a drum as his eyes widen.

“What is that?”

Chenle turns around, matching his line of sight. He lets out a short yet dry laugh and reaches for his dagger. “That, little prince, is your ride back home.” His silver eyes glow when he peeks at Jisung. “If you behave.”

Five minutes later, Jisung’s gaze is trained on the approaching ship as he tries to breathe as shallowly as possible. His family were faster than he’d been expecting. He’s sitting on the edge of the rocks, with Chenle right behind him, so close Jisung can distinguish his personal salty scent from the sharper and bolder one of the ocean around them. Chenle’s shimmery tail drapes over the rocks on Jisung’s left, and the siren absentmindedly brushes the tip of his translucent fin on the clumps of foam that caress his overwater house. A brittle melody rises from the conch knife as Chenle grazes the blade on the pebbles beneath them, and Jisung tries to focus on the ship and nothing else. Not on the fact that his proximity to the siren is about to increase, not on the prospects of having the dagger close to his neck, not on the real possibility of leaving this place in one piece, despite all the odds stacked against him from the very first moment. 

The winds and currents are favourable: the ship seems to fly above the waves. It doesn’t take long until Jisung recognises his family’s coat of arms adorning the sails, but he doesn’t let his excitement get to him, not yet. His fate depends on the course of the incoming negotiations, and there’s no guarantee they’ll go his way. 

Lost in these musings, he shudders when Chenle approaches. It matters not that he could foresee his next moves, because he still finds himself sucking in a breath when the siren grips one of his arms with one hand of webbed fingers, while the other brings the conch to the frail skin of his neck. The round beads of his bracelets are cold against his skin. Jisung hardens his muscles and begs himself to remain as still as a statue, but that’s not easy when he can feel Chenle’s breath fan the thin hair behind his ear. Fuck. It’s all it takes for his arms to end up covered in goosebumps. 

The sun, always generous, lends its warm reds and oranges to the sky and clouds around it as it approaches the surface of the sea. Diamonds glow on the waves, ready to welcome it in a precious bed, but Jisung is blind to the beauty. The ship grows every second, but remains a miniature in the distance for long enough for him to doubt his eyes, recalling old stories about far away deserts, where heedless adventurers have fallen victim to the mirages it conjures, water and shelter painted in heat and sand. He closes his eyes and takes his first deep breath in many minutes. He can almost feel the smooth curve of the conch breaching his skin open – it would only take a second of distraction from Chenle’s side. 

Or a second of frustration, if he doesn’t get what he wants. 

Chenle remains quiet as a fish.

At long last, when the ship is already close enough for Jisung to see individual people on the deck walking back and forth, the anchor is dropped and the vessel stops. He raises an eyebrow. It’s still pretty far from Chenle’s rock. Perhaps the ocean floor is less deep than its dark blue suggests, preventing the ship from coming even closer? Intrigued, he watches the sailors lower a rowboat to the waves, containing no more than five people. Jisung licks his dry lips, eyes straining to catch every detail. Could one of them be his father? As the king, he’s a busy man, but Jisung knows for a fact he loves all his children: Jisung, his younger brother, his even younger sister. 

Carried by both the currents and the oars, the smaller boat crosses the sea with ease. A small noise escapes Jisung’s mouth. Four oarsmen, and someone else, sitting between them, that much becomes clear, but that someone doesn’t look like his father. Rather… his brother?

Strange. Why would they send him of all people? It’s not like we get along…

Jisung bites his lip, but there’s no more time for silent concerns. The boat is only a few metres away, and the rowers abandon their oars in favour of loaded harpoons, which they point straight at the two of them on the rock. Jisung tries to tell himself they’d never shoot, not when his body is serving as Chenle’s shield… to moderate success. The warm sunrays make the sharp hooks of the harpoons shine like gilded swords.

Chenle seems to pay them no mind as he straightens his back behind Jisung, hands firm and stable where they restrain his movements.

“Don’t come any closer!” he shouts, making Jisung flinch. It’s no surprise a siren would have a powerful voice, but this close to his ear… “I promise I can slit his throat open before those harpoons can shoot.”

The waves rock the boat like a cradle, gently enough for Jisung’s brother to stand up. Jisung tries to capture his gaze and send him a weak yet reassuring smile, but it seems that the prince, two years younger than Jisung, only has eyes for the siren.

“I have no desire to get anywhere near the likes of you,” he says, a frown deeply etched into his youthful face. “What do you want?”

Jisung hears Chenle suck in a breath. He's nervous too… For sirens, a lot depends on him right now, I’m sure.

“In the name of my family and all the sirens,” Chenle says, voice robust despite everything, “I wish to make a deal.”

Jisung’s brother twists his lips into an arrogant smile. “Your family…” he muses. “You don’t happen to be Prince Chenle, do you? Son of the Azure King?”

Jisung blinks. Huh? He’s royalty too? So many sirens in these waters, and it fell on a prince to kidnap a human?

This time, Chenle's breath is deeper and shakier, like his patience is wearing thin, but his words are as determined as always. “My name doesn’t matter.”

All the way from the safety of his boat, surrounded by armed men, the younger prince crosses his arms and smirks. “I can only imagine how disappointed your useless parents will be when they find out what you’ve done.”

Jisung’s stomach sinks. He’s starting to feel the need to say something, to remind everyone he’s still here, but his brother hasn’t looked directly at him a single time, like he’s a disposable part of this conversation despite being the one held at knifepoint. Jisung doesn’t like this. Something heavy and cold coils like a snake inside him. 

“It’s precisely because they’re useless that I’m doing it,” Chenle throws. “Things need to change.” His nails dig into Jisung’s upper arm. If he weren’t wearing a shirt, there would already be blood flowing down to his wrist. “Your brother’s life and health, in exchange for an end to the siren killings. Take it or leave it.”

Knew it, Jisung thinks through the heavy breaths he can no longer contain. Come on, little bro. I know you don’t like me, but… Come on. 

And yet, the younger prince closes his eyes and shakes his head, like he’s watching a child get into some trouble he has no intention of fixing nor preventing. 

“I’m starting to think, Prince Chenle, that you’re as useless as your parents,” he says. “Only a third-rate negotiator would use a dead man as a bargaining chip.”

Jisung’s world stops spinning. A sudden nausea pierces his chest like it has been shot by one of the harpoons.

No… This can’t be…

Behind him, Chenle’s grip on the conch falters as he’s stunned into silence. 

The younger prince raises his palms like it’s all so obvious even a blind man could see it. “My brother is already dead, what is he worth now?” he asks. “At least once Father dies, this kingdom will now finally fall into capable hands. I’m afraid I can’t accept your deal, your Highness.” For the first time, he turns to Jisung. There’s only disdain in his icy eyes. “And you, Jisung… You should be happy. All this time, always defending sirens in court, always claiming the killings were nonsensical. I wish you a good harvest, after all you’ve sowed.” He pats the shoulder of the closest rower. “Let’s go home, boys.”

And so, he sits back down as the men pick up their oars again and row away, all the way to the larger ship. The anchor rises, the ship describes a wide turn, and returns the way it came from. 

Chenle lowers his arms, and the knife falls to the ground with a series of small clinks, but Jisung doesn’t see any of that. He just stares at the horizon, at the ship becoming no more than a dark dot once again, and waits for the moment it will turn around and pick him back up so he can go home.

But it never does. 

The oranges and reds are but a smidge of paint on the clouds when the ship disappears, replaced by darkening shades of blue. Tears roll down Jisung’s cheeks, as salty as the ocean around him. His chest hurts like a boulder has been placed on his sternum, and his head hurts, so bad, so bad, so bad. 

This can’t be real. It can’t. 

His brother never had much care for him, Jisung isn’t naive enough to think otherwise, but to this point? To the point of turning his back on Jisung when he needed him the most? Leaving him in the arms of whom he has all the reason to believe is a murderous siren? And his words… This kingdom will now finally fall into capable hands.

All for the throne. The throne he must have always coveted.

Jisung’s heart seems to collapse into itself, folding itself over and over again until it's all crumpled, the size of an olive. He tries to breathe but it’s getting harder and harder each second, like his throat has tightened to the width of the eye of a needle. Even the weak light of the waves mirroring the sunlight makes black spots dance in his sight, and they’re growing in size with each painful gulp of air he swallows. He slaps a hand over his mouth when the first sob makes his shoulders shake. 

He looks around, but the images sway like Chenle has taken him underwater. Jisung refuses to look into the siren’s beautiful silver eyes when he finally finds the conch knife – he simply places it on Chenle’s limp hand and forces his webbed fingers to close around it. 

“Just…” he croaks out. “Just make it quick. Please.”

In the end, he’s not even scared. It all just hurts like he’s on fire, like he did end up with one of those harpoons slicing his aching heart in half. He stares at his own hands, shaky where they’re clenched on the ground, and waits for the end.

Instead of laughter, he hears the knife once again clinking on the rocks where it's carelessly discarded. Instead of pain, he feels a pair of arms wrapping around him. Instead of blood, he smells the ocean on Chenle’s skin when he pulls him close.

Jisung sobs against Chenle’s shoulder until he falls asleep, hours later, and Chenle doesn’t let go of him for a single second. 

⊹ ﹏𓊝﹏𓂁﹏⊹ ˖

Sirens will never have to worry about the ocean going dry, not with all the tears Jisung has offered. They still silently stream down his cheeks when he notices he’s awake, but he doesn’t move. He lets himself lie on Chenle’s chest, half draped over his tail. A hand caresses his back and the hair on his nape, slowly, gently. 

It’s still almost too dark to tell rocks from sky, but a beacon of incipient light starts to illuminate the far side of the distant waves. The seagulls rise from their sleep too, sharing last night’s dreams and today’s goals with each other in fast caws, already scouring the waves for something to break their fast. 

It still doesn’t feel real. Nothing does. It’s hard for Jisung to believe the hole he feels in his chest isn’t physically there. 

No one came back for him. His brother must have turned his oh-so witty joke into a heartbreaking story to tell at court. ‘There was nothing I could do, Mother. That vile siren had already claimed his life by the time I got there. There, there, don’t you cry. I’ll handle everything from now on.’

Jisung wants to feel angry, but right now, there’s only emptiness. 

“You didn’t tell me you defended sirens at court,” he suddenly hears. Chenle must have noticed he’s now awake, but his whisper had been so soft it wouldn’t have disturbed Jisung’s sleep.

“Right,” Jisung says, barely able to dig up the required irony. Even his voice sounds dead. “Because you would’ve totally believed I wasn’t just saying that to try and save myself.”

Chenle hums. From their current position, it’s impossible for Jisung to see the look on his face, but he hasn’t stopped slowly raking his nails across his scalp for a single second.

“No,” he finally murmurs. “I wouldn’t.”

“You didn’t tell me you were a prince too,” Jisung says. At least it doesn’t hurt as bad when he’s focusing on Chenle’s half of the equation. 

“It didn’t matter.”

There’s nothing between them but silence until Chenle shifts in place, perhaps seeking a more comfortable angle, and it’s only then that it dawns on Jisung the position they’ve been in. He shudders as he sits up despite his muscles’ protests, rusty and aching. Did Chenle really… hold him all night as he cried? That feels too surreal to even be true. 

With shaky hands, he wipes his tears away, and no others follow them, like his well has run dry. His head throbs like someone is nailing paintings to his cranium, and the lingering weight on the back of his throat makes him want to throw up. 

None of this feels real. It’s so cold.

There is no sun to warm up the world yet, but something inside him doubts that’s the only reason why he’s still shaking.

“Jisung…” he hears. Chenle’s voice is calm and collected, but Jisung just shakes his head, unable to face the siren.

“You don’t have to say anything.”

“No, I… I have siblings too.” Hearing this, Jisung raises his head, surprised. He’s expecting to find Chenle gazing at the waves, but he’s staring directly at Jisung. An unexplainable hurt shines in his eyes, but his eyebrows are furred and his pink lips are tense. “I can’t imagine what I’d be feeling if I were the one who…” He sighs, shaking his head as he finally looks away.

Jisung sits with his back against a rock, finding a dry, pained laugh emerging from some unknown place inside him. “Maybe you were right to hate humans,” he says. “Maybe there really isn’t any hope for us.”

He refuses to recall the moment he put the dagger in Chenle’s hand. It will only make everything even more unbearable. 

Is he happy Chenle refused? Or would his suffering be over?

Chenle raises an eyebrow. “There wouldn’t be a prince defending us sirens at his court if that were the case.”

“I didn’t get anywhere,” Jisung murmurs, voice half-muffled by his hands as he rubs them on his face. “I could never do anything useful, anything that would truly help.” A shiver. He forces himself to meet Chenle’s eyes. He owes him that, at the very least. “I'm sorry I couldn't help you. I should've… I should've been able to do something.”

None of the anger he had been imagining for the scenario where Chenle’s negotiations went nowhere has materialised in the siren’s silver eyes, but Jisung finds no pity either. In a way, that’s a relief. If he were able to remember any articulate, cohesive words at all, he’d say the siren looks repulsed, but not at Jisung. 

“They were pointing their blades right at us, Jisung,” Chenle says. “Even though they could never hit me without hitting you first.”

‘Us’. It could be the first time in history there’s an ‘us’ between a human and a siren. 

Jisung shrugs. A thin slice of the sun already peeks over the rugged waves, changing Chenle’s scales from silver to gold. “Still, I should've…” He abandons his sentence when he spots something strange on Chenle’s neck. “What's wrong with your gills?”

From parallel slits sitting perfectly on both sides of Chenle’s throat, they now look parched, wrinkled like withering plants. Chenle takes his hand to them and grimaces.

“Ugh, I stayed above water for too long,” he grumbles. “Being in my more human form would've helped but you were basically lying on top of me, so–”

Jisung’s heart seems to spring into motion for the first time in years. “You could've woken me up!”

It’s Chenle’s turn to shrug. “You were crying like a baby, how could I…” he murmurs. He looks away as he stretches his neck, refusing to meet Jisung’s baffled eyes. “I'm gonna go for a swim and grab us something to eat.”

There’s no time for Jisung to protest – Chenle is diving before he can even open his mouth. 

Jisung stares at the waves for a long, long time, frozen still as the sun wakes up the world. He barely notices the warm rays caressing his skin, all he can think about now is how, for the first time in his life, he’s truly lost. He had always feared a moment like this would come, but he had been expecting it to happen the moment the crown was placed on his head. Nowhere to go, no way to contact his family, no one to turn to. Except maybe…

He swallows. That’s too much to ask for. Just the fact that Chenle didn’t kill him is already reason enough to feel forever indebted to him. 

A small part of Jisung wants to dive beneath the waves and never surface, but the largest one knows that would only prove his brother right.

The sun no longer touches the crests of the far away waves when Chenle comes back. This time, he drops two fish on the rocks, so fresh their eyes still shine like onyx. 

“Well, the news has spread,” he dryly comments. He doesn’t look at Jisung as he points at the rock that hides his driftwood. “We probably had an audience during our conversation with the human.” Chenle rolls his eyes and thanks Jisung with a nod when he passes him some sticks. “My ‘useless parents’ should know everything by now.”

Jisung’s teeth worry into his lower lip. He tries not to nonsensically shiver when their fingers brush against each other as they prepare the fire. “Do you not get along?”

“Your brother was right about some things,” Chenle says, voice down to a resigned mutter. “They are cowards. Weak. They watch as sirens get killed and cross their arms, idle like a tripod fish. I couldn't just stand by and do nothing.”

Jisung’s hands shake when he tries to use one of Chenle’s sharp sticks to pierce the fish. It’s hard to explain how the siren did it so smoothly that one time… Yesterday. It all feels like it happened a century ago.

“You were really brave.”

Chenle drops the fish he was handling. He raises his head, eyes wide, lips partially open. His gills are looking much better, Jisung notices, to avoid noticing just how pretty he looks under the morning light.

“They did point harpoons at... at us,” Jisung continues in a murmur. The fish in his hands stares dumbly at him like it wonders why it had to get involved in all of this.

“Just…” Chenle starts, but then he shakes his head and rubs two pieces of wood together until there is a tiny column of smoke rising between them.

No more words are shared until the fish are toasty and fragrant. Chenle grabs one of the sharp sticks and hands it to Jisung.

“Come on,” he says. “Eat.”

Jisung shakes his head. “I'm not hungry.”

He’s usually starving in the morning, but the prospect of never having breakfast with his parents and his little sister ever again makes his empty stomach turn.

Chenle frowns, and pushes the fish closer to Jisung’s face until it almost touches him. “You need to eat,” he protests. Jisung leans away, baffled, but Chenle doesn’t back down. “And drink some of that sweet water while you're at it, you look like a dried squid.”

There’s nothing Jisung can do but sigh and grab the stick from Chenle’s hand. The sip of ‘sweet water’ he takes does make him feel a bit better, he’ll give Chenle that.

“What are you gonna do now?” Jisung asks as he plugs the cork back in.

Chenle pouts through a mouthful of fish. “I don't know yet.” He quickly glances at Jisung. “I obviously can’t keep you here forever, you’d go insane.”

Jisung finds a small smile on his lips. “I appreciate that.”

“I’ll be the laughingstock of all sirens if I just let you go, but it’s not like anyone else had the guts to do what I did, anyway.” He casts his eyes to the ground, chewing more slowly now. “There is something I want to do, but…”

“But…?”

The siren shakes his head. “Nevermind,” he says. “I’ll have to wait for nightfall, anyway.”

Chenle leaves soon after that, and Jisung is alone again. He didn’t manage to get Chenle to explain what his cryptic words meant, and insisting struck him as a bad idea. Seeing the hours pass and no mop of black hair emerging from the waves, and not standing the option to sit in silence with his own thoughts, Jisung makes himself busy. 

He starts by doing some simple exercises: some push ups, some stretching, just to get his blood flowing, as the rocks here aren’t exactly wide enough for a jog. Then, his cheeks heat up as he takes his clothes off. There are no signs of sirens around, let alone humans, but he’s far from used to being bare outside his chambers, that’s not befitting of a crown prince. The waves around him are too inviting for him to resist, though, and his skin aches for the feeling of water on them after so many hours under the sun, so he hides his shame in a corner and dives.

He swims until his limbs hurt, then he turns around and floats, letting the waves be his cradle. As he stares at an impossibly blue sky, he wonders if his funeral preparations have begun, if his parents have cried or secretly agreed with his brother all this time, if his sister has already been told her big bro isn’t coming back to play with her ever again. Jisung fills his lungs with air and expels it as slowly as he can, occasionally eyeing the rocky outcrop to make sure he isn’t drifting too far away. 

He wants to be Chenle’s friend. Not just to increase his chances to go back home, but also because he saw the hurt in his eyes and heard the despair in his voice as he begged for an agreement. 

Sirens sing in the same way humans laugh or cry, he had said. 

How Jisung wishes he’ll hear him sing again, at least once before he dies.

Once he goes back to the rock, his skin quickly dries under the sun, but he twists his nose at his clothes, dirty and stiff with salt. He hesitates for only a second before he grabs one of Chenle’s tunics. The fabric is softer than anything he had ever felt before, even smoother than all the fine garments he had access to in the palace. He stares at the weaving, marvelled, and wonders how much the two species could learn from each other if they would simply lower the harpoons and talk.

Even if today he got to start the day with an entire sizable fish in his stomach – after the first displeased bite, the floodgates of his hunger had opened, and he had quickly devoured it – it is certainly not enough to last a young man his size an entire day, but as the sun falls down, his chest tightens for a different reason.

Chenle has never been away for so long.

What if something happened? What if some fishermen caught him, and his fins are being cut from his tail right now? Jisung chews on his inner lip, unable to even imagine it any further. 

Hours pass. He starts pacing around the flat portion of his open cage, hugging his own body over the soft fabric even though the later afternoon breeze is balmy. 

What if he doesn’t come back?

There’s barely any daylight left when Jisung lies down and decides to force himself to get some sleep. With all he exercised today, he should feel tired enough to pass out as soon as he rested his head, but his heart is beating too fast. He lies down regardless, praying for the best. 

He must have managed to fall asleep, because a choir of loud, distressed voices startles him. Once he opens his heavy eyelids, the only lights he sees come from the pale moon, and a strange lamp placed on a nearby stone, filled not with fire but with water and what seems to be thousands of tiny floating bioluminescent particles. Together, they illuminate the two other sirens Jisung had met, Donghyeok and Renjun, dragging a bleeding Chenle onto the rocks.

Jisung’s heart drops. He only hesitates for a split second before he runs to them, tears already gathering in the corners of his eyes.

“What happened?” he asks, voice breaking. 

“We don’t know,” Renjun answers, face tense with concern. He pulls down Chenle’s chin and places something similar to a leaf on his tongue. “We found him like this near the shore.”

Near the shore…? Why would he approach the shore in a situation like this, after such a bitter confrontation with humans? Jisung’s heart seems to beat inside his mouth as he helps the sirens scoop Chenle up by grabbing him below his armpits. His naturally pale face is even paler than the moon now, and his breathing is shallow and fast. His gills pulse too, ignoring that they’re useless now that he’s above water, as if his body is desperate to get him all possible oxygen. 

“I think it’s just his arm,” Donghyeok says, pointing. Jisung’s vision blurs at the sight of all the blood that flows down to his beaded bracelets, diluted and pink-ish from being mixed with the water that drips from his skin and hair, but he grits his teeth and kneels next to Chenle, ready for anything. “We should be able to stop the bleeding.”

“It’s not a pretty wound…” Renjun comments quietly as he inspects it. “Definitely a barbed blade.”

A cold chill climbs up Jisung’s spine. They’re not commonly used as the damage they inflict can easily ruin the sirens’ precious fins, so it’s only reasonable to assume whoever used it wasn’t looking to hunt. They were looking to hurt.

“Don’t just stand there, pretty prince.” Donghyeok’s stern words snap Jisung back to reality, but the look in his eyes is different from before. For a split second, Jisung wonders if these two were part of the silent ‘audience’ Chenle had mentioned they had. “Get me some fabric.”

Jisung nods and immediately obeys. Not knowing what Donghyeok will need, he brings him all of Chenle’s stuff, and watches him rip a few strips of his garments to turn into bandages. Large blood flowers immediately soak them, but Donghyeok works quickly to close the wound. Renjun helps by ripping more bandages as they’re needed, and Jisung forgets how much he usually can’t stand the sight of blood without feeling the urge to throw up, because he is the one who scoops up handfuls of saltwater to wash Chenle’s tail from the splattered blood, the one who places one hand on his forehead to check his temperature, the one who spends some of his precious sweet water to cool it down. 

The whole process simultaneously seems to last a few seconds and the whole night, but at last, Donghyeok sighs and straightens his back. His hands are covered in blood, but the last bandages he placed remain white.

Somewhere along the line, Jisung had placed Chenle’s head on his lap. As he caresses his wavy hair, all he can think about is that sirens, made of water as they are, bleed as red as any human. 

⊹ ﹏𓊝﹏𓂁﹏⊹ ˖

Renjun and Donghyeok remain until it’s clear that Chenle is no longer in danger, but they’re much quieter now, their gazes lingering on Jisung for long, silent moments. They leave the fluorescent lamp behind, and Jisung reaches out to bring it closer to Chenle’s face on his lap, to better keep an eye on him. 

Either because of the medicinal seaweed Renjun placed in his mouth or because the wound is healing well, the wrinkles of pain on Chenle’s face are gone now. His gills no longer pulse, just like his chest falls into a more stable rhythm. Jisung allows himself a deep breath. What in the world did Chenle get himself into for something like this to happen? He can only hope no one’s chasing after him to finish the job. 

He dozes off, barely noticing how uncomfortable it feels to lean his head on a nearby boulder, but his concern wakes him up regularly. On one of those times, he looks down and sees Chenle frowning and opening his eyes.

“Chenle!” Jisung calls, heart racing. “Are you alright? What happened? How do you feel?”

“Calm down…” Chenle groans. He tries to raise his arm to check the wound and immediately hisses in pain, so Jisung gently grabs it by the wrist and lays it on the ground again. “I’m fine.” Chenle sticks his tongue out and uses his good arm to grab the piece of seaweed Renjun had put on his tongue and toss it into the sea. “Ugh, this thing is fucking bitter.”

“What have you done?” Jisung insists. 

To his surprise, the siren chuckles. “What have I done indeed…”

“Chenle…?”

“Maybe I was right about humans, maybe humans were right about me,” Chenle continues. He seems to be looking at the lamp next to him, but his eyes are glassy and unfocused. “Maybe we’re all just some bloodthirsty monsters.”

Jisung says nothing, but his heart tightens. One of his hands is still limp around Chenle’s wrist, while the other holds his head on his lap.

“Wanna know how I got this pretty thing on my arm?” The siren asks, but he doesn’t give Jisung time to answer. “It was your brother’s guard.”

Jisung’s breath catches. He closes his eyes. He’s starting to suspect what Chenle is going to say next, but part of him refuses to believe it. It could be because he thought the siren would look happier and Chenle still looks dazed, like the pain is still dulling both his senses and his emotions, but it’s more likely it is because he’s only human, with a heart as frail as any other. 

“Not a very good guard, though. He’s fish food now.”

Jisung’s mouth goes dry. When he lets go of the breath he’s been holding, it comes out shaky and ragged. All he can hear is that voice, over and over again like waves crashing against the shore. My brother is already dead, what is he worth now?

“You… you drowned my brother?”

The pearls that are Chenle’s eyes shine as bright as the moonlight about them when he stares straight at Jisung. There’s a certain frailty in them, matched by equal amounts of determination.

“I did,” he states, but his voice is a whisper. “I sang to him like I sang to you, but instead of picking him up when he fell, I let him sink. For what he did to all us sirens, and for all he did to y–” Chenle’s jaw clenches. “To everyone.”

Jisung’s fingers graze the round pebbles below them as his handles clench into fists. The first tear drops. “You’re… you’re out of your mind.”

With the help of his good arm, Chenle raises his head from Jisung’s lap and sits up. Some of the beads around his delicate wrists are still stained with his blood, likely forever. Chenle comes closer to the human. The fin at the end of his tail brushing against his legs as he waves it slowly in the air.

“I know–” he starts, but Jisung doesn’t let him finish.

“They could have killed you. Your fins could be soup by now.”

Chenle’s eyebrows disappear under his messy hair. His shock mutes him.

“Getting so close to humans after all that happened lately…” Jisung shakes his head. Another tear follows, then another, then another. His bottom lip trembles when he faces Chenle. “How could you take such a risk?”

Chenle’s face softens. Slowly, he lays his forehead on Jisung’s shoulder.

“It wasn’t fair, Jisung,” he murmurs. “And I told you. I really hate injustices.”

The sky is still so dark. Fast clouds leave them in the sole company of the bioluminescent lamp when they cover the moon, bright and huge, almost as huge as the stone that seems to have blocked Jisung’s throat. It’s all grey inside his head, all currents overlapping and crashing and dissolving into foam, until it’s impossible to derive any sense from anything. Only three words surface from that whirlpool.

“You shouldn’t have,” he croaks out, tilting his head until he too is leaning on Chenle. He still smells like the ocean on a winter day.

“Taken the risk?” Chenle asks, more to himself than Jisung. “Or lead your brother to his death?”

Jisung doesn’t answer. He can’t. He doesn’t know how to. 

They’re sitting side by side now, back against the rocks, pressed together because Chenle’s injury faces the world and not Jisung. In the middle of the chaos, Jisung finds himself thinking the siren will have to go for a short swim soon, at the very least, or his gills will once again suffer the consequences. 

“I know,” Chenle says, so quietly the sound of the waves almost drowns his words. “He was still your brother. But I couldn’t let someone like that become king.”

Jisung huffs out a humourless laugh. “I’m not fit either,” he says. “If anyone, it should be my little sister, one day.”

Chenle hums. “Maybe. But I do think you’ll do well.” A pause, then even quieter, “You have a good heart, at the very least. Not many rulers can claim that.”

Jisung stares at the siren’s smaller hands, pale over the silver scales of his lap. He suddenly wants to hold them. 

“I hated him,” he says instead.

“I know.”

“But I still loved him.”

“I know.”

“This is not about me.” He sniffs. “Don’t think I don’t know that.”

In the end, it’s Chenle who links their hands. The translucent tissue that connects the siren’s fingers feels strange and smooth on Jisung’s skin. “It’s about everyone,” Chenle says. “Every siren and every human.”

Without ever letting go of Jisung’s hand, the siren turns around until he is facing him. At first, Jisung tries to avoid meeting his eyes by noticing the small speck of blood that stains his bandages, that will have to be changed soon, but Chenle places his free hand on his jaw and forces him to meet his sharp eyes. Jisung’s already so tired heart skips a beat when he sees the fire in them, brighter than a pearl.

“I think I was wrong,” Chenle says. “I should have tried to make a deal with you.” His tongue darts out to wet his lips. Is he in need of water, or trying to buy time? “I’ll take you back, you tell everyone what your brother did, and you ask your father to speak to us.”

Jisung nods. He knows he’ll feel relief, in time, but right now all he can do is squeeze Chenle’s hand once or twice and gift him the only smile he can: tiny and broken, but sincere, nonetheless. “Of course. I promise I will.”

⊹ ﹏𓊝﹏𓂁﹏⊹ ˖

Jisung is panting when he lets his body heavily roll onto the coarse sand. It’s true that he wasn’t doing the brunt of the work, but keeping his head above water while he held onto Chenle, who crossed the waves faster than a sailfish, sure did take a toll on his body. 

He had insisted they waited until Chenle’s arm was doing better, but the siren had confidently claimed his upper body barely did anything compared to his tail, so here they are.

Dry land. Miles and miles of it.

At least, as dry as a beach can be. Jisung gracelessly sits up, limbs flying around, when a larger wave crashes against him and tries to sneak into his open mouth. The wind cools down his soaked clothes, making him shiver, but his face heats up when he hears Chenle’s laughter. 

He’s lying on his stomach near Jisung, torso supported by his elbow and tail up and proud like a cat’s tail. The earliest sunrays are starting to bloom, forming a halo right behind his head. Jisung forgets to breathe until he hears him speak.

“You look like a soggy otter.”

For the first time in what feels like a whole year, Jisung chuckles.

“I’ll speak to my father as soon as I can.” His legs wobble as he stands up. It only makes Chenle’s grin grow, but Jisung’s not sure he minds. “I swear.”

“I know you will.” A red crab walks up to him, perhaps recognising him as a fellow creature of the ocean, and Chenle playfully pats its hard shell with one of his sharp nails. “Try not to scare them too much when you arrive.”

Jisung smiles, trying and failing to shake all the sand out of his wet hair. “Hah. It’s not every day that your oldest son comes back from the dead.”

The crab waves its tiny pincers in joy, but it’s Jisung Chenle is smiling at. Jisung, even through all the lingering pain, the ache of the betrayal and the uncertainty of the future, doesn’t recall having seen a prettier smile anywhere in his entire life. 

He puts it all aside to fill up his lungs with air.

“Will I ever see you again?” he blurs out.

Chenle tilts his head and grins. “Why not?” he muses. “You know where to find me.” 

⊹ ﹏𓊝﹏𓂁﹏⊹ ˖

“Are you sure about this, your Highness?”

Jisung turns at the captain of his guard as she steers the small boat through the waves, and nods. Arriving at the palace and discovering no lives had been lost that fateful stormy night was an immense relief, but right now, she has one eyebrow raised in suspicion.

“Of course.” Jisung pats the basket full of codfish pastries he’s holding. “I need to bring him some of these.”

Goosebumps rise on his skin when he hears the first notes, but this time, his smile is so wide it barely fits his face.

“Besides,” Jisung continues as the melody floats in the breeze. “I have some good news for him.”

An agreement had been reached. The killings would end, and sirens could still sing freely, just far enough from human settlements to reduce danger.

Jisung closes his eyes and listens. It’s still the most beautiful song he’s ever heard in his entire life.