What would you trade for the chance to walk on another world?
The simple stuff is easy to imagine.
A sum of money.
An opportunity to travel elsewhere.
A treasured item.
Then there are more complicated choices.
Holding onto Princess Iris' arm, seated on the forest floor, Barry stays with her for a small eternity.
Readjusting his grip, he feels his claws dig into her skin. He doesn't release her, but he does relieve the pressure. A heaviness settles in his chest, warning and sharp. He holds onto his breath, longing to tell her the simplest of truths: I would never hurt you. I would sooner die. Instead, he tries to instill it in his touch, to mean it enough that one human being might fully understand him one last time. I would never hurt you. I would sooner die.
She tangles a hand in his hair at the base of his skull and he dares to believe that this thing between them is something worthwhile. Something worth fighting for. Another day, he thinks fiercely. It is that thought alone that finally gives him the strength to let go.
Back to the water the wolf in sheep's clothing staggers, stripped of his royal purples and shoes, wearing only the decency-preserving lower furskins. He feels a fury overtake him at the cloying, choking feeling in his chest, because he was promised another day, and how could it have been—? But the days, he reflects bitterly, are short this time of year. The sun swings low, kissing the horizon.
Sitting on the large stones of the shoreline, Princess Iris rests her chin in a palm and wraps herself more tightly in her furs, watching him. He sinks into the surf, disappearing under the waves and letting water flood his mouth and lungs. Relief courses through him at the familiarity of it. In a dreamlike complacency, he strips off the remaining furskin, struggling to get the end of his paddle free as it emerges seconds later.
And then, freed again, he does a single loop, marveling at how easy it is to move in the water. Smiling, he looks for the half-woman, half-octopus, but finds no sign of her. Tucking his furskin under an arm, he drifts out to sea, tempted to call out but resisting the urge. Darkness makes it more difficult to see, even for a Siren, but he keeps at it, stowing his furskin in his empty den and carrying on in near blindness.
He bobs to the surface and realizes how far he has drifted only when he sees how tiny the figure on shore is. Princess Iris, he thinks, and in something approaching a panic he ducks under the waves and cuts for the shoreline. In shallow water, he reappears at the surface, relaxing when he sees her. "That's remarkable," Cisco comments, approaching with a small cage of fire and chomping down on a roasted leg of – Barry sniffs deeply, but he's forgotten the name of the animal. Smells divine. He never realized just how mouth-watering human food was until he had it again. "I half-thought I was hallucinating that day," Cisco admits, taking a seat and holding out a second leg to Princess Iris. "Turkey?"
Princess Iris shakes her head, rising from her seat and approaching Barry. "You seem so … ordinary," she muses. He huffs, casually baring his teeth, canines sharpened to a killing point.
"Saw those," Cisco says, mouth full. "That was the real reason I gave you my knife," he adds idly, but Barry has eyes only for the Princess as she kneels at the edge of the surf, "you all but put your name on it, biting into it the way you did." Slowly, carefully, Barry drifts closer, aching to touch her, but the water – it's freezing, and while it does not bother him, it should surely chill her. Wisely, she remains just out of its reach. And his. "He has a tail," Cisco points out, and Princess Iris glances over her shoulder and must make an expression that finally calls him to silence. "Sorry, I'll stop ruining the fun," he says, saluting with the second turkey leg. The small boxed fire flickers beside him, illuminating the space in golden yellow light.
Barry waits until Princess Iris looks at him again, something like childlike curiosity glowing in her eyes. He smiles again, close-mouthed but still pleased just to be near her. He sinks low in the surf, suddenly self-conscious of the tail just below the waves. "Can I see it?" she asks. He hesitates, sinking lower.
On the one hand, he welcomes the curiosity, the shy but earnest interest, but – well. Up to this point, she's only seen him with a man's legs. What will she think, if she sees him in such an animal state? Blinking up at her, hoping she'll forget her own question and inquire something else, he finds no luck. "You don't have to show me," she adds sincerely.
"Yes, he does," Cisco says from behind them.
Barry growls; Princess Iris warns, "Cisco."
A loud crunch is all they hear as Cisco splits turkey between his teeth once again. Sinking beneath the surface, Barry turns onto his back and looks down at his tail. It's rather splendid, extending fully twice the length of his torso before fanning out to a smooth, curved paddle, grayish-blue in appearance, a tool first and accoutrement second. But it is unlike the sinuous, gorgeous tapers of the Merfolk tails or even the regal coherency of a Selkie's seal form. Not for the first time, he finds himself embarrassed at the lack of ornamental Merfolk color or architectural magnificence of a seal tail.
Mama, a merchild with a brilliant azure tail once observed, his tail is sick.
Rubbing the side of it idly, like he can transform it from a functional curiosity to an actual wonder, Barry resurfaces. Turning onto his back again, he looks at Princess Iris, still seated among the rocks. At last, he arches the end of the flat paddle out of the water. Conveniently, it hides his face; at her gasp, he blushes furiously and ducks back under the waves.
It's ugly, she hates it, could you not even pretend to be a shorelander properly? he berates himself, sinking low to the rocky shallows. After a few moments, he feels water being displaced nearby. He doesn't immediately understand it until – oh. Oh.
Lunging upright, he comes face-to-face with the Princess.
Correction: he would have come face-to-face with the Princess, had she not startled back in surprise and promptly landed in the water.
Anxious and apologetic, he surges forward, hands on her waist, reflexively steadying and righting her. The waves push against him but do not move him at all, unable to best a powerful animal in his element. Teeth chattering, Princess Iris holds onto his bare arms and observes softly, "I thought you'd l-left." Shaking his head slowly, Barry holds her sides, keeping the pressure on his claws to an absolute minimum. Scarcely days ago, he held her like this, and she didn't know he existed then. God, if he's the death of her— "It's very c-cold," she remarks, pulling him back from memory, chopping waves and a terribly fearful premonition that the ship was in danger.
Nodding in acquiescence, he propels her gently but assuredly towards the shore. She lets him, stepping out of the water and pulling her second furskin around her torso again, exhaling a cloud. "How do you stand it?" she asks, more amused than shocked.
Barry cocks his head to one side. Then he lifts his tail behind him in a shrug, making her laugh. And, oh, it's a beautiful sound – he positively beams, his own jaw dropping reflexively in a toothy smile. No self-respecting Merperson would ever pose in such a way – he's seen Selkies occasionally do so in their seal forms, exultantly arching their heads and tails – but he doesn't care, because Princess Iris isn't a self-respecting Merperson, and neither is he.
Lowering his tail, he ducks back under the water, flushed with amusement that – he made her laugh. He did that. And he can do it again, he thinks brightly, scrambling for – some amusement, some curiosity, something— He finds a blue stone and surfaces, holding it up triumphantly and flicking it towards her, aiming to the left to ensure he doesn't hurt her. The stone lands precisely where he wants it to – there are few sports for lone Sirens to engage in, after all – and she arches her eyebrows as she leans over and picks it up. "You spoil me," she teases.
Then, knowingly, she looks off to his right, winds her arm back, and pitches the stone out to sea. Barry is halfway to it before it hits the waves, grinning in triumph as he catches it barely below them. Tucking it between his teeth, sharp and familiarly precise, he glides back over and pops back out of the water scarce seconds later, flicking it back onto the shore in front of her.
"You're fast," she muses, and it's a challenge as she sweeps the stone up and stands. He glides back a few paces, straightening in the water. Challengingly, she steps further back on the shore; he takes her cue and retreats to deeper water. And then, inspired, he waits until her arm twitches back, a powerful animal in her element, before diving for the floor.
About-facing, he surges upright and breaks through the ceiling of his world, daring to be seen, daring to exist. Then he disappears again, stone in hand, and grins triumphantly as he tucks it between his teeth.
Then there's a shock at the back of his neck so severe it nearly paralyzes him. He drops the stone in surprise, struggling to adjust to the sudden pain. He turns sharply to confront his attacker but – it's already gone, searing the sole of his left foot, grazing the skin beneath his right eye. In the dark water and caught off-guard, he can't seem to pin down either eel. Swimming away only leaves his tail vulnerable, and he snarls in pain as one of them latches onto old Merfolk inflicted scars, aggravating the injury by shaking its head violently.
The second eel gets a hold of the back of his right shoulder and he arches, clawing at it, thrashing in a futile attempt to dislodge them both. They don't relent, and he sees red flood the water as, all at once, the tiny, sharp teeth retract. Twin currents of eels vanish.
Thoroughly stunned, he spends a moment sinking in open water. If he can just – he sees more red clouds and realizes he's bleeding, somewhere, everywhere.
He paddles towards shore, bleary and desperate for safety, nearly impaling himself on a sharply obtruding rock as he scrambles up the beach. Heavy and awkward above the waves, his tail struggles to find any purchase whatsoever. He finds himself aching for legs – so much lighter and easier to carry! – and turns onto his back, exhaling deeply.
He reaches up to feel the stinging bite marks underneath his right eye, scarcely aware of Princess Iris running towards him. Cisco and his bobbing orange light aren't far behind him, but Barry shuts his eyes for a moment, trying to sort out the various aches. Blood in the water. He can feel it on his fingertips; if he's lucky, his face is the only place that's bleeding.
Startled by the ferocity and swiftness of the attack, he's even more surprised when he feels a hand holding something soft to his cheek. "You're bleeding," Iris remarks, alarmed, pressing the cloth to his face.
He blinks deliriously up at her. He can barely make out her features, but God, she is radiant. He reaches up in astonished surprise to graze his fingers across her unmarred cheek. And then, achingly disappointed, he realizes he dropped the stone. Empty hands grapple at the stone around him, trying to push himself upright, but the simple gesture makes him grimace. Ow. Ow, ow, ow.
Making a soft approximation of the sound, he reaches up, holds her hand to his cheek, and lets himself be lost for a moment in time.
"What happened?" Cisco asks breathlessly, halting nearby.
Iris holds Henry's head in both her hands, red-stained cloth still held against his cheek, and shakes her own head. "I don't know," she says, guilt and fear rising in her as she looks at the damage. There are bitemarks across his body: ribcage, wrist, the tiny sliver of back she can see, a deep laceration ripped down the side of his paddle. His paddle, she thinks, and tries not to feel, at the very least, slightly hysterical about it.
But despite the absurdity of their positions, Iris feels calm sweep over her instead. Henry smiles lazily up at her, the tips of those pointy teeth visible against his lower lip. He sweeps his thumb against the hand holding the cloth to his cheek and looks more pleased than he has any right to be, bleeding as much as he is. He looks up at her in wonder despite the deep, purple bruising already forming around his eye, and she wants to gently shake him. What happened to you because of me?
He sits up shakily. She sees even more angry red marks across his back – it's shredded, whole hanks of flesh worried between a small but menacing set of teeth. And his tail… He leans forward to examine it, the good humor vanishing from his eyes. She keeps a steadying hand on his left shoulder, the one portion not raw and angry. The muscles bulge under her fingers, stronger than she expects, and she understands at once how he is able to launch sailors from sea to tiny ship without apparent effort. He makes a low, disappointed noise, and takes the abandoned white – decidedly redder – cloth and curling it around the deep cut.
Exhaling noisily, he seems so – alive, and inhuman, and extraordinary all at once. She has to step back, overcome. Looking up at her, he frowns apologetically, opening his mouth like he wants to speak before closing it. Making another, even less readable sound, he tightens his grip on the cloth and closes his eyes, twisting his head like it hurts him. She shoves her feelings aside, confused as they are, and crouches beside him again. She dares to take hold of the cloth for him, letting no part of her hand touch his tail.
Not only does it seem – improper, but it promises to make its realness undeniable. His realness.
She crouches there, numb with cold and anxious for him. Slowly, she lets her fingers splay. He watches her hand, and then her face, and finally reaches forward with trembling fingers, brushing it off the cloth and onto the skin itself.
She doesn't know what she expected, but the sheer firmness catches her off-guard. It is rock solid, heavy. When she brushes her thumb against it, it has the consistency of an incredibly dense coat of fur, almost soft in its finite divisions. Fascinated, she runs her hand down the length of it, more out of reflex than conscious action. He twitches it slightly, perhaps also reflexively, and she snaps back to herself, blushing fiercely. "Wow," is all she can say.
He lets out a huff, one sharp-pointed hand reaching for hers and clasping it. There's blood on his fingers. It draws her attention back to the wounds – dozens of them, and she aches to ask what happened and knows he can't tell her – and breaks the moment of distraction. He rubs his eyes – even they're bloodshot – before he blinks at her, like he's trying to comprehend her realness.
It seems fitting, and it makes her smile.
Then something crackles in the water and Iris startles back a step. An eel breaches the surface, and without waiting an instant he lunges forward, ignoring her shout of warning. They disappear in a flurry of foam, and she aches to join him but cannot move, paralyzed. "Don't," Cisco warns, putting a hand on her shoulder, and she realizes she's taken a step forward, is about to take another into the water, when –
Sputtering, he breaks the surface, an eel in either clawed hand, face a rictus of pain. Muscles convulsing, he can barely hold onto the crackling animals, and Iris can only imagine the agony of trying as his grip involuntarily loosens. Before it abandons him entirely, he flings both eels far out into the water, sinking low in the surf. Rushing forward at last, Iris hooks both hands under his arms and drags him back to the safety of the shore.
Groaning, looking decidedly worse for wear, he glances up at her and pats her arm with a bloodied hand, it's okay plain in his eyes.
A sharp jerk nearly pulls her into the water as he slides back. She plants her feet and Cisco joins her, but the creature on the other end is strong – powerfully, inexorably strong, and Iris feels herself being drawn out to sea even as Henry looks up at her and shakes his head. "Princess," Cisco says softly, and lets go. Iris only doubles down, and Henry grunts as the force near his tail end tugs him harder.
Reaching up, he pleads without words, pawing weakly at her hand. She feels tears burn in her eyes, fearful, furious tears, and says sharply, "No. No."
And then he's just – gone, slipped through her fingers. She crashes to the shallows. Righting herself as quickly as she can, she frantically searches, but – there's no sign of him.
He may never have been there, but for the blood on the rocks.
Resting a gentle hand on her shoulder, Cisco says quietly, "I think it's okay."
Iris appreciates the hesitation, kneeling in the surf, devastated and cold and hungry for him.
I had him, she thinks, as a tear slips down her cheek. I lost him.
"Poor, unfortunate soul," the half-woman, half-octopus croons, dragging Barry effortlessly by the paddle. He can't seem to move any limb, but – aching head to tail, he isn't sure he'd want to. Without a word, she releases him, and he sinks. Panic rises in his chest. Try though he might, he can't move. Then, not of his own volition, he halts in the water, held at attention, tail still bleeding freely.
Smiling, the half-woman, half-octopus clicks her fingers. Heat pours across him, searing the cuts to extinction. He would scream if he could, but frozen, he can only allow the noise to rise in his chest, faltering in his throat and dying off before it reaches his lips. The restraining pressure vanishes; he sags, sinks, groaning softly.
An elevating pressure rises like a current under him, buoying him, and he settles into it like a chair. "Take a rest," she croons, drifting towards him. "After all – you've been on your feet for days." She glides a tentacle over his arm, musing, "How much longer do you think it can last?"
He forces himself to meet her gaze. Forever, he thinks, and sees it reflected in the gold in her eyes.
"I am generous," the sea-woman continues, "yet … I feel you take that generosity for granted." The buoying pressure vanishes, and he sinks again, righting himself after a beat. He feels heavy, slow. Exhausted. "Come, now, Siren – you would heal so much faster if only you would let that song out of your heart."
He doesn't know if it's true, but he doesn't dare entertain the idea. Pain is manageable. Disagreeable, yes, but nothing he hasn't dealt with before. He won't let it compromise his morals. Besides, he thinks bitterly, looking right at her, does she not know what will happen to her if he does? She smiles, like she knows exactly what danger she's tempting, gliding closer still until he can only see the gold in her eyes. "Oh, my child," she croons. "You do not deserve the gift."
He wants to lash out, but the thought barely passes his mind before he's frozen again. He can only stare in silent frustration as she cradles his face with a tentacle, wagging it back and forth in a mockery of dissent. "They die, you know," she tells him, holding his head still and staring into his eyes. Her own are fathomless; the edges dissolve, leaving only deep pools of gold behind, and he cannot look away.
"No matter how many sailors you save," she croons, and he sees an after-image of a silhouette sweep beneath a sinking human, "no matter how many humans you think you spare, they still die." This time, a small silhouette trails after two larger ones, until, all at once, the larger silhouettes disappear. "They die horrible, horrible deaths," she adds, and he sees those silhouettes in various contortions of agony and disrepair. "Mangled by disease, dismembered by each other.
"But you." Here, a black-silhouetted Siren drifts across his field of view, and he can almost hear that Siren's song as she narrates, "You can give them peace." A bird alights on the Siren's arm; a dolphin leaps alongside it; every manner of creature the Siren encounters appears better for it, livelier, happier, and full of that song that brings tears to his eyes. "You can give them what they want." A staggering, silhouetted human struggles towards the sea, and the Siren calls to them, and embraces them, and the human relaxes into its arms as they both dissolve from the golden scene.
"Yet you deny them," the sea-woman accuses. He sees the bird drifting listlessly, the dolphin wandering aimlessly, the human seated in a catatonia on the shore, aching with anguish. "Do you not see the harm you cause with your inaction?"
Breathing shallowly, unable to do anything else, Barry cannot answer. I won't enslave them, he thinks, and it helps clear the haze from his eyes. I won't hurt them, he insists, faintly at first and then fiercely. He manages the tiniest snarl. Rather than looking annoyed, the sea-woman laughs and pinches his bruised cheek hard. "You think death is cruel," she muses. "Do you not see your own calling, Siren? You are the Reaper. You are supposed to collect them. Yet you leave the fields fallow, the harvest unpicked. The world is rotting."
An eel crackles nearby. "The sailors grow bold and reckless under your protection," she says, and an image appears across the golden field of his sightline, silhouetted figures crowded on a ship venturing out into deep, dangerous waters. "They'll suffer because they think you'll protect them." The ship breaks in half, and the Siren strains to keep them above water but cannot, not forever, not long enough. To exhaustion, the Siren tries, and tries, and still they drown, all of them, in the deep open water he could not stop them from testing their wits against.
"Other creatures will grow argumentative, too," she adds. Barry sees a Selkie transform from a seal into a human on the shore, approaching a silhouetted human with a knife behind its back. "A little fear is a healthy thing," she says. In the golden light, Barry watches the Siren call out to the Selkie. The knife set to plunge into the human's chest falls; the Selkie retreats to the waves.
"It keeps the sea orderly," she points out. He sees a shark disturbing a small pod of carousing dolphins, eels snatching fish from the shallows, prey of all manner treading more considerately while predator regard their surroundings with great intent. "You are what stands between us and chaos." The image vanishes, and he stares at her eyes, blue now, and blinks slowly. "So tell me, Siren – which world do you want to live in?"
She releases the paralyzing grasp, but he doesn't accost her. He feels vaguely sick, knowing that – she's wrong, she's wrong, he's not –
You are a monster, he thinks, and looks down at his clawed hands, the sharp tips of his teeth digging into his lower lip. You're a monster.
He looks up, shaken. Ruffling his hair with a hand, a mockery of kindness, the woman says, "I'll give you what you want. But unlike you, I am not afraid to embrace the nature of this world. Its callousness. Its cruelty." She glides away. He aches, suddenly, intensely, for the shore, anything but this open water. "I have something I want you to do for me." Again, the flicker of the Selkie in human form, knife upraised. "If you want another day on the shore," she says, turning to face him, "you will bring me the Selkie's skin."
The empty seal skin lies on the shore, carefully concealed beneath the rocks. Barry pales. He cannot – he cannot – do that. "Or you can wallow here," she adds nonchalantly. "I wouldn't recommend it. My companions grow impatient." In response, an eel crackles nearby. Barry jerks away reflexively, but it doesn't touch him. "It's your choice," she finishes. "What say you, Siren?"
He thinks about the Selkie, about the image – a knife upraised, certainty swelling in his chest as he realized that the Selkie was going to kill somebody – and feels resolve burning in his chest. He can do this. It's fine. It's fine. Selkies are fearsome creatures, perhaps a little humbling will even be good for this one. Carefully, he holds out a hand, and she clasps his wrist in the manner of Selkies, making something tighten in his chest because – but he firms his resolve, refusing to show his own cowardice before her or the eels. "I'll give you three days," she says. "If you fail…"
Without warning, the water in his lungs transforms, a benign presence thrust into malignant pain, desperate to be expunged. He flails for the surface, black dots crowding his vision. Breaching it, he coughs harshly, aching and sick to his stomach. Teeth chattering in the cold air, he struggles to paddle towards the shore, the sea-woman's words chasing him along.
Fetch the skin, he thinks, knowing that once it's done – once it's done, he can focus on being human, on being light and free and happy.
Restoring order. That's all it is. I'm helping, he tries to convince himself, but the lie doesn't want to take.
You have to do it, he tells himself, and has to hope that she has no ill intent towards the Selkie. Or you will die.
And finally, selfishly, he realizes he has something to live for, a jubilation like anguish stirring in his soul.
What a great and terrible gift.