Chapter 31
THIRTY-ONE
M o wasn’t sure how much time had passed since Kent walked off, but either way, he still felt exhausted from the long swim that got them here. He moved a little so the water brushed up against his tail, but stayed mostly dry, laying on his stomach, the blanket of pebbles below himself. While his body felt tired, his mind kept him awake, anxious to hear if Kent would come back.
His eyes were low to the ground, unable to see up the hill, but his ears were sharp. It wasn’t much longer until he heard the soft rustle of footsteps in the distance. He doubted there was anyone else around that would come to this lonesome rocky beach, no, that could only be one person?—
“Mo! Oh thank the Lord, you’re still here.”
Quickly, he pushed up on his arms and sat up. There, walking toward him?—
Was Kent.
“Kent! You came back!”
His heart fluttered as relief soaked through him. Pressure in his throat burst as he let out a sob, but it wasn’t out of sadness. He was happy —his beloved finally returned to him. He couldn’t help the little smile that escaped his lips.
Kent smiled back at him, stepping closer and closer as he trekked down the hill. “You really did wait for me.”
“You know I’ll always wait for you, Kent. No matter how long it takes.”
Mo scooched so his tail was out of the water, and Kent made himself comfortable, sitting down next to Mo on the pebbly ground. Even when they were both sitting up straight, Mo loved how Kent was a tad shorter than him.
“I’m… sorry I left you how I did,” said Kent. “But I just needed some space.”
“All is forgiven. You did nothing wrong. I’m the one who should be apologizing. To which, I am sorry. I’m sorry for lying to you, sorry for hiding what I am and what I’ve done. I’m so, so sorry Kent…”
Mo reached for Kent’s hand, but instead of like before where the human pushed him away, he let him take it. Mo gently caressed Kent’s fingers with his own, and it made his heart warm.
Kent looked down at their entwined hands, resting on the ground between them. He didn’t say he accepted his apology yet, but offered something else, “I want to learn more about how you say you’ve learnt to control your Song. I ran off before you could fully explain, and… I want to hear the rest of your story.”
“You really do?”
“Yes, of course. Now that I know the truth, I… I want to understand.”
“All right.” Mo nodded, and squeezed Kent’s hand gently. He would tell Kent everything he wanted to know, no more hiding.
“So,” Mo continued, “as you know from when we talked about it before, when we looked at your book, the Siren’s Song is a gift that’s bestowed to only the rarest of merfolk. While it’s something they know they have from birth, a siren is unable to use the power of the Song until they reach adulthood. So, I’m twenty-five years old now, and I’ve only been able to use the Song for about the last six.”
“I see…” Kent looked up at him.
“What I’ve thought, what I was led to believe all my life, was that when you feel the Song’s call, you need to act on it. The magic flows through your body, clutching you and holding your throat… I suppose it might feel similar to this connection magic we feel, except the Song has its own signature. It’s harsh, it’s strong, it’s demanding. I was anticipating when I’d first feel the call when I was an adolescent, yet it clashed with my interest in humans themselves. To that I spoke the truth—I’ve always had a special interest in humanity. So, I believe it was when I was seventeen years, I gathered the courage to breach the surface and talk with human sailors.”
“I hadn’t realized you started talking to them so young,” said Kent, his eyes widening.
Mo hummed, nodding his head. “Yes. It was those first kind sailors who told me what pirates were. They said the pirates flew black flags, which was how I could identify them, and showed how they themselves flew ones with a red cross. They were happy to tell me these outrageous stories of how horrible pirates were. Since then, I’d spoken to a small handful of other English ships as well, and they told me similar tales. While I never revealed to any of them that I was a siren myself—I feared they would strike me with a harpoon if I said so—the sailors joked with me, asking me if there were any way merfolk could aid in ridding the seas of pirates who were nothing but a menace. They jested because they thought I didn’t have the power to do anything, but it gave me an idea, something that mutually benefited us both. That whenever I felt the power of the Siren’s Song, I could destroy the friendly humans’ enemies.”
“I… I understand that. Yes, that makes perfect sense.” Kent nodded, and rubbed his thumb on the back of Mo’s hand. “But… not everyone aboard a pirate ship would be evil. Some are just there because of circumstances. Look at Seth, look at Allen, look at… me.”
Mo gulped, and he bit his lip. “I… I know that now. But back then, such a sentiment never occurred to me. I simply just felt like I was doing good to the English sailors, and satisfying my own urges at the same time.”
“And… even though Harris wasn’t a pirate, you…”
“It was the same thing. I felt like I was doing good for you, and for the rest of the crew of The Sterling Mer . I… I was blinded by the excitement of being closer to you, Kent. Harris didn’t deserve to die. There were likely many people aboard pirates ships of the past who hadn’t deserved to die either. But before I met you, like I said, I hadn’t known I could control the Song. And, over the last few moons, have I truly learnt how .”
“I wish to know more about that,” said Kent. “How you learnt you can control it.”
“All right.” Mo cleared his throat, still feeling clogged with lingering anxiety. “After I met you, I tried resisting the call of the Song for the first time. It hurt, as in, it physically hurt me to do so, to not use the Song when it wanted me to, but I managed to tough it out. The pain and nausea went away, and all went back to normal. I resisted a few more times since, and each time the pain lessened and lessened. I believe now, if the magic took hold unexpectedly again, I could resist it without any pain at all. I don’t have to use the Song.”
“I see…” Kent gave Mo’s hand a gentle squeeze. “That reassures me, Mo,” he said genuinely, with a soft voice. “Though, I’m curious about one instance that—it was Allen who brought it to my attention. The last night we were on The Sterling Mer , had you used the Song?”
Alas, he suspected that Allen had realized the true nature of what happened that night. It came as no surprise, but he had to reassure Kent. “Yes, I did use the Song for a moment, but I promise you that it was merely an accident. I’d never drank that stuff you gave me—rum—before, and it made me lose control in some way. So when I sang, and the power flowed through me, it just… came out.”
“I suppose one reason humans drink is because they wish to lose control. But even they can end up doing things they wouldn’t truly wish to do while sober,” Kent offered. “So that makes sense.”
“I suppose if I don’t wish to lose control of the Song, I probably shouldn’t drink any more of that stuff.”
“Or, you could drink it, just never sing when you do.” Kent gave him an adorable smile, easing away his nerves that were threatening to come forth. Mo relaxed his shoulders.
“That could work too,” he said with a smile of his own.
“But, back to about that night… that meant Allen was correct of his suspicions. He’d told me how he thought you might be a siren. I tried to say otherwise at the time, because I didn’t know the truth, but… you know what he did tell me then, one thing that I know is true, and will always be true?”
Mo’s heart pounded, and peculiarly, he felt the magic that connected him to Kent grow, pulsing with his heartbeat. “What did he say?”
“He said…” Kent’s grin grew wider, and drops of water clouded around his eyes. “He said he saw the way you looked at me. That that was the look of someone in love. Even if he did suspect you were a siren, he still trusted you, because he knew you were honest in your promise to protect me.”
The magic pulsed even harder, banging against his chest, filling himself with a warm, pleasant surge. Pressure pushed behind his eyes, urging him to cry, and his own drops of water spilled down his cheeks. “Oh, my dear Kent, of course. I will always protect you. Know my love for you is true, no matter what.” He reached up with his free hand to caress Kent’s face, feeling his new short facial hair under his fingers. “I love you more than anything else in the world.”
Kent nuzzled his cheek into Mo’s hand. “Mo.” He sniffed. “My darling merman. I…”
He sighed.
He closed his eyes.
Then opened them again, wet from his crying. He smiled. So sweet, so genuine. The most beautiful smile Mo had ever seen.
“I forgive you. I love you too, Mo.”
Mo thought his heart was going to burst from his ribs.
“Are you honest, Kent? Do you truly mean it?”
Kent nodded, the water on his face dripping down his chin and onto Mo’s hand. “Yes. Mo, I’d be empty without you. How I met you on the beach, talking with you, falling for you… they’ve been the happiest times I’ve ever experienced. I need you in my life. I love you.”
Mo couldn’t hold back—he closed the gap between them with a kiss.
Oh , was the kiss everything he needed. It mended his wounded heart, and more than that, Kent’s love filled him up tenfold. Their shared magic pulsed and prodded inside him, harder, stronger than ever before, overwhelming him with intensity. Yet it only urged Mo to kiss Kent more, and as he opened his mouth, Kent did the same. He tasted salty water drops, dripping onto their lips, assuring him what he needed to know. It was the taste of love. And nothing was more true than that.
But as they continued to kiss, something felt strange.
The magic wasn’t just in his chest—no, it was flowing through his whole body, and he could feel it radiate off of Kent as well. It shocked him. His muscles tensed suddenly, and he had to let go of Kent’s face in fear his claws would accidentally extract. But they never did. Instead, his skin burned, his heart throbbed, he pulled his lips away as something absolutely otherworldly took over his body?—
“Mo, are—are you all right?”
And then?—
He glowed .
The most intense pain he’d ever felt struck him like a bolt of lightning, starting at the tip of his tail and dragging upward. He couldn’t even see what was happening as his body was glowing white like a sea crystal, blinding, bright and beautiful. But the pain was all-consuming. He couldn’t even sit up straight anymore from the agony, and he collapsed; his head fell into Kent’s lap.
“Oh my God, Mo, what is happening?!” cried Kent. He felt his hand delicately on his shoulder.
“I…” Mo could barely speak, moaning from the pain. He squinted his eyes shut. “I… don’t know…”
It was as if a sword was tearing through his tail, slicing it in two. It wasn’t just his tail that hurt, no, his forearms tensed. The tips of his fingers simmered. His ribs quaked. His neck muscles clenched. A thorny lump formed in his throat. Even his teeth ached.
Panic surged through him as he groaned through the pressure, and he wondered what went wrong for the magic to think he deserved this. It felt like he was dying, when every bit of him stung and throbbed. Was he, or—what else could this be?
No, he wasn’t dying. The magic pulsed again, glowing brighter, and it reassured him with a warm, sweet wave.
He was changing .
The pain lessened. It never went away completely, but the striking, tearing intensity had stopped, falling into a dull ache. The throbbing throughout his body diminished, his heart rate slowed, and the pulsing magic dissolved into a soft, background presence. Just as suddenly as it had appeared, it left him.
He sucked in deep breaths, in and out, in and out, keeping his eyes closed. He was alive. Thank the seas he was alive. But his mind was spinning like a whirlpool, hectic and dizzy. What even was that? Why did it happen?
His tail in particular felt so bizarre.
He could feel Kent’s hand quivering on his shoulder. Even Kent’s lap was shaking underneath his head.
“Mo, ho—holy mother of God! Mo, please! Open your eyes!”
He opened them, looking straight up at Kent’s frantic face above him. The sunlight shining in the sky, glowing around Kent’s head, looked so beautiful. “I… I’m here.”
“Look down! Mo, you—you have legs!”
“I have what ?!”
Mo sat up slightly on his elbows, Kent helping support him by holding his shoulders, and there?—
Instead of his familiar blue scales, instead of his fanning gold and brown fins?—
—was pale skin, matching the color of his torso.
He tried flexing his muscles, wincing at the pain that was still there, and he curled his toes.
Mo had legs.
“Kent, I… I…” He sniffed, and he couldn’t help crying from happiness. “I can’t believe it!”
“Look at you, Mo!” Kent squeezed his shoulders in a frantic, excited hug. “You’re human!”
“I’m human…”
He really was, wasn’t he? It wasn’t just the fact that he had legs now. No, everything about him felt different. He tried to sit up straight again, but as he did so, pain shot up from his new feet to his hips. It was as if his body was telling him: separate your legs. You can move them independently from each other. And so, he did, bending his left knee first as he pushed on the heels of his hands to sit up straight, Kent keeping a hold on his back. Oh , did that ever feel so foreign. As he bent his legs, he couldn’t ignore how utterly strange his privates felt, brushing gently against the skin of his thighs.
Once fully seated upright, he adjusted his legs underneath him, still keeping his knees touching each other for the most part but separating his calves to get more comfortable. That was strange—alleviating the pain by moving the two limbs of his lower body away from each other. It’s not just one tail anymore. It’s two legs.
Kent kept a hand flat and steady resting on Mo’s back, helping him balance. “How do you feel? Oh God, I can’t even imagine what it must be like to have your body change so drastically like that.”
“I feel extremely sore,” said Mo honestly. He felt like he was pronouncing words a bit strange, but he couldn’t place why. “It was so much pain all at once, and I’m still feeling quite a bit now. I’m surprised I don’t see any blood.” He held out one of his arms horizontally in front of him. “I don’t have my forearm fins anymore. Where they used to be… it looks like one of my other scars.”
Kent leant in a little closer. “You’re right! Your gills too, they look different. They look somewhat like scars as well.”
Mo took his hand and traced where the gills on his neck were, and Kent was right. They were closed, feeling about the same as any other scar.
“Your hair is different, too! There are no more blond patches; now it’s brown all over.”
Mo grabbed a lock by his cheek—a part that had always been blond his entire life—only to find it brown. “Wow…”
He licked the side of his mouth as he was examining, and there— that was why he was talking so strangely. Touching the tips of his teeth with his tongue, he only found them dull and flatter. “Even my fangs have changed.”
But even with all these changes, the one that struck him the most, the one that always would, was his new pair of legs. No longer could he dive under the sea and swim like he used to. Now he had legs. His own legs. He petted one of his thighs just to know what it felt like, and he felt short, thin hairs graced all over his skin. The hair was a bit thicker on his calves, but barely any was on his feet. If he so wished, he could walk on these new feet. Mo reached down further, slipping his fingers between his toes.
Yet touching too much made him groan in pain. He pulled his hand away, bringing it to his chest, clutching onto the necklaces he was still wearing.
“Are you all right?” asked Kent, concern in his tone as he rubbed comforting circles on Mo’s back.
“I…” Mo swallowed. “I’ll be fine. I believe these pains are just because I’m not used to my new body. Once I move around some more, once I’ve been like this for a while, I should be all right.”
“I certainly hope so! I wouldn’t want for you to be constantly in pain.”
“I’ll be fine, really!” Mo gave Kent a large grin. “Wenta told me stories of how her grandmother was able to shift into human form over the course of her life, and she never mentioned anything about pain. So, I’m assuming that means the pain is simply something you feel initially.”
“I hadn’t known! Well, I suppose we’ve barely had a chance to talk about how you met Wenta, have we?”
“Now that I’m human, we’ll have all the time in the world to talk to each other about whatever we’d like.” That was what soothed his pain the most, which made his chest warm with delight: now that he had legs, he could join Kent on land.
Oh seas, I can be with Kent on land!
“May I… may I touch your legs, Mo?” asked Kent.
“Of course. But be gentle, it still hurts a bit.”
“All right.”
And so, Kent reached with his free hand, keeping his other steady on Mo’s back, and petted down Mo’s thigh. His touch was so soft, his fingers so careful as he brushed against his skin, and it felt wonderful. The new sensation of something so unique quelled the pain even more. But what was also so peculiar was how this situation had happened before, in some way.
“This reminds me of when we first met, and you’d touched my tail,” said Mo.
“I suppose so.” Kent chuckled, moving his hand over one of Mo’s knees. “Sitting together on a beach, too. Just like before.”
“Just like before,” he repeated. “Because even with my new body, I’m still me.”
“You are. Yes, you are, Mo.”
As Kent pulled his hand away, Mo adjusted his posture, spreading his thighs slightly apart—and the awkward feeling between them snatched all his attention.
“Oh fuck, I cannot even begin to describe how bizarre my cock feels.” He couldn’t help himself; he cupped his hand over it, wincing slightly from the lingering pain.
And Kent laughed, because of course he did. “I was trying not to stare. It’s not hidden in your tail anymore.”
“Stare at me all you like.” Mo smirked. “This feels so funny. I have balls . How do you even walk like this, with them just hanging there?”
“Mo, please!” Kent’s cheeks flushed crimson red. “I don’t know, it’s just how I’ve learnt to walk for my entire life?” He grinned. “You’ll get used to it. Though, you’ll need some clothes, and that will probably help with the strangeness.”
“Are you sure? I’ve lived my entire life without clothes.”
“I mean it’ll help you not feel so exposed!” Kent laughed again. “To which, oh, how will we even get you any clothes? Where shall we go from here?”
“I’m not sure. As much as we’ve talked about the prospect of me becoming human, we haven’t really prepared for what to do when it would happen.” He moved his hand away from his prick, instead resting it on his hip. He’d experiment with touching himself more there later, when the pain fully receded. With Kent’s help , he thought with a smile.
“I suppose not. Well, the first order of business should be for you to try standing, right?”
Mo nodded. “Yes, and to practice walking.”
“I’ll help you. Here.” Kent adjusted himself from sitting into a kneeling position. He held out both his hands for Mo. “Hold on to me, and I’ll help you rise as I rise.”
“All right.”
Mo placed his left hand on Kent’s shoulder and his right hand into Kent’s left, shuffling his legs underneath him. Oh , did that ever feel so strange, as the pebbles of the rocky beach dug into his new knees. He hissed at the pain, a foreign sensation as the rocks rubbed against vulnerable skin.
Kent placed his free hand on Mo’s waist. “You’re doing great. Can you lift one of your feet and place it flat?” Mo did as he asked, ignoring the pain that shot through his calf to keep going. “Good. Now push up on it. There you go. Up, here…”
Using Kent’s support, he managed to get his other foot flat and rose to a standing position. Pins and needles pricked at the soles of his feet, protesting at the sudden weight that this part of his body had never had to bear before, but he pushed onward. He straightened his back, never letting go of Kent, and his legs wobbled as he adjusted.
“You’ve got it! Yes, Mo, you’ve got it!”
“I… I do, don’t I?”
But he spoke too soon as his knees shuddered, and he fell forward into Kent’s embrace. Kent bared his weight as much as he could, keeping them both standing, and gently pushed Mo back into using his own feet.
“Woah, there! Try spreading your legs a bit more, to even out your weight. There, that’s it.”
And so, Mo did. Now that he was human, he couldn’t keep his legs stuck together as if they were one, as if he still had a tail, no, he needed them separate. Once he was steady, he lifted his chin, standing up straight.
Kent smiled, looking up at him. “I knew you’d be taller than me. I knew it!”
Mo grinned. “I suppose I am.”
“Here, I’m going to take a step back, so you can try standing without support. All right?”
“All right.”
Kent did as he said, Mo mourning the loss of Kent’s touch, and… he didn’t fall. He was standing on the pebbly beach with his own two human feet. A warm breeze caressed his skin, and he viewed the land around him from his new vantage point. He would have to walk up those grassy hills with Kent. The excitement of it made his heart pound, and his chest fluttered with wrasses.
“Mo, that’s wonderful! Do you think you can try to take a step?”
“Perhaps with your assistance.” He held out his hand.
“Absolutely. I’ll help you as much as you need. Wait! Oh, but first, if we are to walk anywhere where there are other people, you will need some sort of clothes at least on your lower half to cover up. Hmm, ah, here.”
Kent pulled his shirt off and suddenly wrapped it around Mo’s waist. He tied the sleeves together on the side of Mo’s hips, making the bulk of the shirt drape over, covering his privates along with his rear. “It’s not the best, especially with the blood stains, but this will have to do until we can get you some proper clothes,” said Kent.
“All right. This doesn’t feel too bad.”
Kent put his arm around Mo’s back, holding him steady and close. “Let’s try one foot in front of the other, now.”
Mo nodded, and lifted his foot to take the first step of his life. When it came back down, it shot more needles up his leg, and he couldn’t hold back a groan, making Kent tighten his hold.
“Careful, now! Are you in pain?”
“A bit, but I’ll be fine. Let’s keep going.”
“All right.”
Mo took another step, and soon after, another, ignoring the pain as he kept moving forward. The action of walking rang so oddly familiar to him, even though he never technically had before. No, he had —just never in real life.
“I’ve walked before in my dreams,” he mused aloud. “I’ve had dreams where I was human.”
“You have? I don’t believe you’ve ever told me.” Kent grinned as he held Mo steady with another step, finally making it to softer, grassy ground and away from the pebbles. “It’s no longer a dream, Mo. This is so amazing… it’s reality.”
“It certainly is.” He grinned back. For the first time, he would explore further than he ever could before as a merman, venturing farther than the beach, away from any body of water, as a human himself. The magic inside him pulsed with a comforting warmth as his excitement was nourished by one particularly assuring fact: Kent would be with him every step of the way, experiencing this new life together with him.