Chapter 199: Harbour

Syryn and Salem were playing a complicated game of cards on the bed.

"You cheated," Salem declared with narrowed eyes. "I don't know how but you cheated."

"That's what all the sore losers say," Syryn replied with a smug grin on the face that Salem was tempted to squish between the pages of a thick open book.

"Lucien is very good at this game. If he weren't asleep, I'd call him over to trounce you," Salem said with folded arms.

"Oh, oh, Salem the genius, threatening to hide behind the skills of a little brat? You can do better than that, you know. Learn to cheat!" Syryn tossed the cards to the side of his bed and flopped down dramatically.

"Syryn, you might fall asleep if you get too comfortable," the alchemist warned him. "We don't know what powers this creature holds. It might just have a way to force you into a deep sleep."

The mage reluctantly sat up because Salem was right. He was always right. Syryn didn't want to experience simultaneous drowning and strangulation like that again. He would rather choke to death on Rowan's delicious- right, it wasn't the time to be thinking about that.

"You just had a dirty thought," Salem accused.

Sometimes the half-elf displayed a clarity of insight that baffled the mage. "How did you know?"

"I won't tell you."

"You're really annoying."

"Hearing that from you somehow makes me feel like I've accomplished good for humanity." Salem ducked when Syryn threw a pillow at him.

"Choke on a dick, Salem."

"I'd rather not," the blond dryly replied.

"I would."

"Of course you would. Your epitaph would read - here lies Syryn Nigh'hart. He died the way he lived, choking on Rowan Windwalker's-" Salem was smart enough to know that when someone's eyes went wide as he looked behind you, it meant that the person you were talking about was standing behind you. "Flute."

"I don't have a flute," he heard Rowan say with undisguised mirth. The blond alchemist graciously nodded to the anti mage and walked out of the room before Syryn could say something volatile.

After Salem's hasty departure, the mage rolled over on his back so that his head was half hanging off the edge of the bed. He looked up at his lover and smiled.

"Welcome back Rowan. What news do you come bearing?"

The anti mage kneeled and placed a light kiss on Syryn's lips. It was soft and reverent. Rowan's goddess was Eos but his heart worshipped Syryn.

"The sea hag will no longer bother you. It's a vow," he said to the mage who was curiously waiting to hear what he had to say.

Syryn's brows were raised, or in this case, lowered. "A sea hag? How did I get so unlucky?"

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"That's what I ask myself every day," Rowan replied. "Why is Syryn so unlucky?"

"I guess it evens out since I was lucky to have met you, Ro." Only Rowan could make his say such sappy words and not feel embarrassed about it. Maybe Luci did too.

"I would argue that it was my fortune to have met you, but I'd rather you kept my mouth occupied with something else," a slow smile tugged Rowan's lips into an arc, and it held the promise of heat

Syryn was instantly turned on. He cupped Rowan's cheeks and drew him in for a salty kiss. Rowan had been to the ocean, and the ocean had come with him. The anti mage's kiss was a wave that swept away the apprehensions that Syryn hid within the confines of his heart. Rowan was the ocean and the harbour, and Syryn was content to be carried away wherever the waters took him.

-----

"Tell me, how did the old man create the sea hag?" Luci asked Rowan in the morning while they ate breakfast together.

"How does one go about creating a sea hag-" Rowan bit into his toast as he considered the words to use for an explanation that wasn't gruesome to a child's ears.

"It's okay, you don't have to sanitise it for me, Rowan," Luci told him. "I've heard and seen many things that would probably cause you to make the face you're making right now," the redhead's eyes crinkled with glee.

Rowan felt sorry for Luci. Despite being saved by Syryn, he still wasn't able to have a normal childhood. Setting aside these heavy thoughts, the anti mage put down his toast and faced Luci.

"A sea hag is a creature borne out of desperation."

Luci's eyes were shining with interest as he listened to Rowan speak.

"Sometimes when you care about someone more than you should, you find yourself unable to let go of them," Rowan's heart ached as he said those words. "And when they die, you try everything in your power to keep their memories beside you, even when you know that they would have wanted you to move on."

Rowan found it difficult to speak. Swallowing past the lump in his throat, he plodded on.

"A sea hag is borne when you offer a dead body to a malicious water spirit. They possess the corpse and gain access to the memories of the deceased."

Luci nodded. His eyes were riveted to Rowan's blues.

"If you're lucky, they'll play pretend, and you get back a fake version of the person you lost."

"And if you're unlucky?" Luci asked in a hush.

Rowan's face was grim. "They turn on you."

"But that's not fair!" Luci's voice rose. "It is a deal, and the water spirit should have to respect it!"

"This is why you don't make deals with malicious spirits or any spirits in general. When the living pass away, it's only natural that they be allowed to move on."

Rowan didn't tell Luci about how the sea hag recieved its name. The possessed corpse always ended up morphing into an ugly form that looked the same whether it started out male or female. Long dark hair, a skinny grotesque body that looked like skin stretched over bones, black nails that could pierce through the flesh of its victims - sea hags were ugly on the inside and the outside.

What Rowan failed to understand was why this particular sea hag did not sing.

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