Current mood:	flirty
Entry tags:	fic, katrina

"Home to the Sea" by Pearl Jones - Part 2 - Mature Audiences Only!


II

The car trip was frightening, but soon done. “I was lucky to find a place so close.”

Marsh laughed as he opened the door. “I don’t suppose there’s any point to the usual conventions, is there? I mean, the ‘sorry the place is a mess’ line won’t mean much to a selkie. Fairy. Whatever you are. Uh, enter freely and of your own will so long as you mean no harm to me and mine.”

“I thought humankind had given over all their history.” In accordance with ritual, or as close as she could come in landform, she bit the heel of her hand to let the salt blood flow, and shook three times. “One for me and one for thee and one for the gods.” It stung worse than usual; she pressed her tongue to the wound to seal it. And spat, when she was through. “Ugh. I hate that part.”

Marsh wavered on his feet.

She knew the feeling. “You said something about rest?”

He groaned and led her inside. His brief tour meant nothing at all to her, and he soon realized that, breaking off to apologize. “It’s just, I don’t know what to do with you. Can I ask you some questions?”

“I do not promise to answer.”

“All right.” He nodded toward her hand. “You have a coagulant in your saliva, don’t you?”

“Of course. Do you not?”

“No. Are you really allergic to silver?”

“Silver? The metal? No. We see little of it, fragile as it is, but my father has a few pieces. I have never had any trouble with it. Nor have any of us, that I know.”

“And, uh, would you? Know? I mean, is it a tight community, do you all know each other?” His eyes were very, very wide now, and she smelled nothing of desire in him, only wild, discordant energy. “If I met a selkie in the Old Country, and mentioned your name -- if I knew your name -- would he know it?”

“Everyone knows me.” There was no pride in her voice, only certainty; she did not know if he could hear truth, with no water to carry confirmation, no echoes of past or future, only the thin, harsh air. She shivered.

“What’s wrong?”

“I do not like it here.”

His face twitched, and the blue of his eyes warmed. “No, I can’t imagine you would. Well, you’re not a coffee drinker, I know. Tea? Beer? Water, with salt or without?”

“I...”

“Right. If you can sleep, that’ll probably help.”

If only to speed the time by. She let him escort her to his bedroom, tuck her in, pat her shoulders. So this is how humans live. How odd. She closed her eyes, and let dreams carry her away.

When she woke, the scent of him lay like a blanket all around, heavy and warm on her. She could hear his heartbeat, almost the same meter as hers, but faster far, as though he were exerting himself, though he sat motionless by the side of the bed.

“What are you doing there?”

“Watching you sleep.”

“Why?”

“Well, I just...” His cheeks reddened. “You should be careful not to let a doctor near you. Or anyone who knows something about anatomy, really. Or biology. That apnea’s pretty specific to sea mammals, you know. Or maybe you don’t, but it is. God, I’m babbling, I’m sorry, it’s just... You look human enough, all those curves and that blond hair and everything, but only on the surface, and even then...your skin isn’t quite right, and when you’re excited, it kind of glows.”

She took a breath to answer, and took the scent of him within, and was lost. It smelled so much like home, but different; deliciously unique. “Come here then, if you would see. And touch, and feel. And learn.”

He did not hesitate.

He lay down next to her, not touching, and simply stared. His heart pounded loud in her ears, and she wondered, distantly, if he could hear it, or it he had learned not to -- but there were far more important things to think about than pulses.

“Your heart,” he breathed. “It’s so slow. What is that, twenty beats a minute? Shark-slow!”

“If you would make it speed, you must do more than simply lie there.” She twisted, and bit off a curse as her hair caught beneath her shoulder. He helped her free it, eyes dilating at whatever it was he saw or felt or smelled, and she looked up and fell into the sea of night-deep blue.

The hair only a moment ago free was tangled again, his hands hot against her scalp, tugging. He tilted her face up, lowered his head, his breath mingling with hers, some scent she did not know mixing with his own. His tongue, warm and moist, touched her lip. He traced the shape of her lips, and swallowed the moan she made at the odd caress.

“Let me kiss you.”

“K -- ?”

The instant her mouth opened, his tongue plunged inside.

Her heart raced, nearly a match for his. So soft! The sweet taste of him, combined with his warmth, made her moan again and arch her body. Beneath the thin fabric of her top, her body phosphoresced, signals he was not equipped to read -- but he responded anyway, thrusting past her teeth to tangle her own tongue in his, tugging and tickling and teasing until her whole body moved to his rhythm.

Her arms came up from the bed to wrap around him, her pelvis rubbed restlessly against his. She moaned again.

“Wait.” He untangled himself from her in stages. “This...we’re not...oh, God. I’m sorry.” Completely apart from her, he backed away until he hit a chair and sat down hard. His eyes were too wide, fixed. A dead-fish stare.

“You do not taste like you smell.” It was all she could think of to say, until he flinched. Then she smiled like the cruelest of her cousins, her teeth as eager to rend as ever theirs were, and added, “A shame.”

He didn’t say a word, just got up and walked away.

She could hear him moving around, though the sounds meant nothing to her. Crash. Clank. Squeak. A small splashing, quickly ended. More clattering. Some grumbling. He came back after a while, a tray in his hands, steam and new scents rising from it.

“Tea. If you don’t like it, you can just let it sit here. Toast. Oranges. Sorry I don’t have any finnan haddie, I didn’t know I was going to be entaining a selkie, or whatever you want to call yourself.”

“Mer. I told you that already.”

“Yes, you did. I’m sorry. For that, for...for earlier. For everything. I’m just not really sure what to do here. Hell, for all I know you’re a kid. Horrible thought. So, I’m sorry.”

“Do all humans babble so?”

“Faced with you? Oh, yeah. Each and every one. Try your tea.”

She held the mug beneath her nose and giggled as a warm fog kissed her. “Too hot. I will just hold it.”

“Right. Sensible. Uh, toast?” He picked up a piece from the plate and bit into it.

She shrugged and set her mug aside to follow suit. Crunch and softness and warmth and a flavor delicate as the freshest of scallops burst against her tongue; she swallowed and took another bite.

“Well, that legend’s true. Bread for the fairies. Gram would be so proud.” Marsh shook his head and watched as she devoured four pieces of toast. “Enough for now? Can we talk?”

“If you tell me why you stopped dancing with me.”

“Dancing? Oh. That. Kissing.”

“Kissing. Dancing with tongues.” She quivered as his heat signature changed; it was far easier to sense now that she had eaten. Foolish mer! She’d never have been so reckless at home as to let her body go without food. Still, no point to crying over fish not caught; she was fed now, and his face was hot. And red. That had happened before.

“It’s a blush,” he explained. “Means I’m embarrassed.”

“Why?”

He groaned; his face turned a brighter red, like a lobster dropped in a heat vent. His hands came up, covering his face, and he was still. She could see a pulse at his temple, above his fingertips. Such effort, and for what? When he did not move for a few minutes, she lost interest in watching the flex and ease of his skin and turned her attention to the tray. The tea wasn’t bad, cool, less bitter than coffee. The orange was far less exciting than the bread, but the scent of it cleansed the air.

Perhaps it had some effect on him, or perhaps his blush had simply run its course. He rose from his seat, took a breath and heaved it out, and finally looked at her. “How old are you? And please don’t give me any poetic nonsense about seasons or spans or anything. Are you an adult, according to your ways?”

“Old enough, and not too old. Old enough to bear, but with years before me for doing so.”

“Old enough to make decisions for yourself? To, well, I guess you don’t vote -- do you? -- are you old enough that there’s no older, uh, person, you have to answer to?”

“Only the king.” Who must be frothing mad. And scared. I swear to you, Father-Sire, I am trying!

“No one else?”

“No.”

He huffed, blowing crumbs off the plate.

She frowned at them, imagining the crunch beneath still-tender feet. “A shame you have no sweeping currents or sculleries. Do you?”

“What?”

“Have someone, or something, to clean up after you?”

“Uh, there’s a vacuum...a machine...I have tools to help me. I don’t use them as much as I should. God, you are a grown woman, you must be; kids don’t care. Good. I’d hate to think I was a pedophile on top of all the rest.”

“I do not understand.” Half true; she did not comprehend the words, but the smell of him was strong in the air once more, and heat flowed toward his midline, and his tongue darted out, flickering at the corners of his mouth as she had felt it at hers. She understood what his body said, if not the speech.

“Doesn’t matter. Look, we have a few hours -- which probably means nothing to you. Um, there’s about as much time left to wait as the time we’ve been here. Before my shift, that is, before we can go back to your friend. Is there anything you want do do while you’re here? On land, I mean?”

“Yes.” Crumbs or no crumbs, she stood and went to him.

His mouth opened, and she used the trick she had learned from him, rushing the barrier of his teeth to find the soft, moist heat within. He tasted of bread and tea and the sweetness she had found before, and all his textures enticed her, from the polished bone of his teeth with their blunt edges to the satin of his cheeks to the nubbly surface of the tongue that dueled so wonderfully with hers. She sank into his lap, sideways.

He ended their kiss with a parting nibble and wrapped one arm around her waist. “My not-so-little mermaid. How far do you want to take this?”

When he moved, the scent was stronger. She licked his jaw, liking the shock of stubble she found there, and the taste, salt and male. Heat, and the tiny leaps of blood pulsing beneath the skin. Tempting. She wanted to devour him. Not -- necessarily -- as food. His free hand traced her ear, stroked her hair, down her back. “How far is far?”

“Damn. It’s official: never was a woman born who couldn’t tease. All right then, magic woman, let’s just see.” He stood, and only his grip kept her from falling.

He carried her back to the bed and laid her down, groaning as her hair spilled across the pillows. “Gold and pearls.”

“What?”

“Your hair. Your skin. You’re beautiful.”

“Thank you. So are you.”

He started to say something, stopped, shook his head, and leaned down to kiss her again. She rose to meet him, let him push her down into the soft mattress with the force of his mouth. Too soon, he pulled away.

“Can we lose the top? Please?”

Silla blinked. Marsh read her expression, and reached for the bottom of the shirt, rucking it up and pulling. She lay passive beneath his ministrations, enjoying the feel of his hands, the backs of them softer than the palms and slightly cooler, with tiny hairs she could barely tell were there. He tugged the material up, and she arched slightly to let it clear her waist, her back, her shoulders, then lay back again as he pulled it over her neck and down her arms.

When it reached her wrists, he paused to stare at the impromptu binding. “But isn’t that leprechauns? No, sorry, never mind. Babbling again.” And he pulled the shirt free.
Only when it was gone did he seem to notice the flesh he had bared. His lips parted, a gleam of white teeth and warm red tongue between red lips, and his breathing briefly ceased. “You are so perfect.” One finger gently grazed the tip of a nipple. “So impossibly perfect.”

“Words,” she growled, and would have grabbed him if he hadn’t moved away. “Why?”

“I want to...to go slowly. You’ll take your--” she watched his throat work as he swallowed “--friend and go home, and I’ll probably never see you again, and I know I’ll remember this forever, and I don’t want to remember being a brute, okay?”

“You are not at all what I thought humans were like.” When I thought of them at all. “Have your kind changed so much from the stories, then?”

“I doubt it. But some of us know when we see something rare, something worth appreciating. And you’re a dream come true for me, you know -- I’ve always wanted to see mysteries, and here one is in my bed.”

“Am I a mystery, then?” She wriggled. “I like that.”

“You are, indeed. And I would very much like to explore you, if you don’t mind.”

There was a human phrase her father used that seemed appropriate: “Excelsior.”

Marsh shook his head. “You dress up to the minute, but the language is more than a little odd.”

“Teach me.”

“Oh, yes.” His hands were hotter than ever as he unbuttoned her jeans, and his smile was hotter still. “A woman after my own heart, you are.”

She made no reply. He peeled the denim down her sides, and she moved only the little necessary to let him yank the material over her curves. He pushed the pants down to her knees, and stopped.

“Dear Lord. It’s...you’re...” He sighed. “You’ve ruined me. I’ll never be able to look at another woman.” A slow, deep breath, strong enough she felt the tug of air rushing toward his lungs. “Thank you.”

“You are welcome, I am sure,” she growled, half laughing, and swung her legs at him, knocking him off balance so he fell partly beside and partly on top of her.

“Hey!”

“Much better.”

He pushed himself up, then groaned and lowered his face to her chest. Her nipples rose, ruby-dark and eager, toward his breath. “Too perfect,” he whispered, and the vibration of his voice made her shiver. “I have to...” Warm breath gave way to hot moist flesh as he suckled her.

She screamed. In all her dalliances, there had never been a sensation to equal this.
Thought splintered. For long moments, that intoxicating, oddly familiar scent of him was her only anchor, but then he would move, or change the pressure or the angle of his slick caress, and she would become aware of everything all at once, the fine prickles of his hair, the gentle warmth where his weight lay upon her, the musty smell beneath chemical fragrance that rose from the covered floor...dry air moistening with his exertions, and her own...that opening at the join of her thighs so different from her true form’s cloaca, swelling and parting for his touch, and a feeling that was and was not pain, eased by his tongue’s sweet caress...

“I’m going to burn in Hell for this, I just know it.” He climbed up her body, for a moment all angles and bones, but once he was aligned above and atop her body, his grace returned. A single gentle nudge to spread her legs further; a slow, deep kiss; a sleek, hot foray that ended in pressure and stretching that left her breathless.

Landform had odd, never-dreamed nerves inside for him to reach, hot bursts of pleasure with no outlet, until it felt like she had waves, currents, tides answering his strokes like the ocean dancing with the moon. She rocked against him, waves of sensation breaking in salt spray and cries of ecstasy. His own were low and heartfelt, and the scent of him grew stronger, so much like the sea it felt like coming home.

They rested then. Idle strokings and liftings sometimes grew urgent, hot twisting and flexing driving toward some peak, then falling away into slow nibblings and sighs scented with the brine of life, and dreams.

* * * * *

The light was that sea-roe orange that heralds a beautiful, still night. Silla stretched up into the glow, sighing -- and purring as she encountered Marsh’s salt-dappled skin. Her tongue darted out to taste him, and she turned in his arms.

He smiled, then opened his eyes and gasped. “Oh, holy hell! I’m going to be late!” He jumped out of bed and raced from the room, tossing a quick “Get dressed!” over his shoulder at her.

She wriggled, in no mood to do anything but what they had spent the day doing, but then she remembered Dravid. Froth and Foam, I forgot! She covered her face with her hands, much as Marsh had done earlier, though her face would not change color in her shame, she thought. There was no time for her to wonder, or to experiment; she grit her teeth, took a hard grip on her emotions, and pulled her hands away. The skin felt tight almost to bursting, her webs seeming eager to emerge, her scales to rise. Her head swam with the effort of holding landform, and standing felt dangerous -- as though her legs would refuse to hold her, or her feet to lie flat against the floor. Her fingers were naked twigs to her vision, and the pale fall of her hair over her shoulders looked sickly.

Stop that. You didn’t feel wrong in this body a few minutes ago, and it’s the same as it was then. Except for the hollow behind her navel that ached to be filled again, and the too-heavy feel of her guilty heart. I’m coming, Dravid. As soon as I can. I’m taking you home.

The car ride was marginally less frightening this time, though no less uncomfortable. When they neared the aquarium, Marsh told her to slide down into the well beneath the dash, so she would not be seen. As soon as “the coast was clear” -- which phrase meant nothing to her, with only paving and human construction to be seen -- he came back for her.

She ran headlong down the passage toward the place she had last seen Dravid; he was not there. Her shocked cry drew an answer, though, her name a roar in Dravid’s voice. She followed it to one of the glass-walled enclosures but could find no way in.

“Marsh, help.”

“Uh, is he safe? I mean...”

“He will harm no friend of mine. Let him out!”

Muttering words she did not recognize in a tone she did, Marsh vaulted a stair. She imagined his body performing that same leap into her arms, and quivered. His fingers danced over a rattling console; she could almost feel them dancing over her soles, her thighs, that secret jewel. He blew his hair out of his eyes; she inhaled sharply, recalling the taste of his breath. But reminiscence faded as he frowned. Chewed his lip. Muttered. Then, at long last, smiled, and made the console rattle again.

“Tell him to go through the feed slot. That door that’s opening now.”

She passed on the command, watched as Dravid made his lurching way across the cell. The door seemed almost too small for him to fit, though she knew how agile he could be.
Normally. His ear looked better, but he moved like he was in pain. The mark of her name on his lower curve flared gold against the dark fur as he shoved his upper body through the opening, and she winced. He was a handsome specimen in any case, but the tattoo made him too identifiable. Too much a target. I didn’t know!

I should have. Father was right; they have changed, and we must know their new ways.

Marsh leapt the stairs again, draping his arm over her shoulders with a familiarity that should, she thought, have bothered her. “Hey, figment. Buck up, we’ve got him. Down that corridor, out the loading dock, and we’re home free. Time to celebrate.”

His scent didn’t match his words; she turned to look at him, really look. His eyes were dark, and there were white lines at the sides of his pinched mouth. His chin was raised. His throat worked, cords visible for a moment, then gone.

“Let’s do this before I regain my sanity, okay?” He led the way to his car, opened all the doors, and let Silla and Dravid figure out how he could best fit. She soothed her guilt with the knowledge that no other would have fit in the small vehicle; still, thought of those others left trapped pricked at her.

Once they were on their way, and Silla passed on Marsh’s reassurance that they were safe, more or less, Dravid ceased to be so biddable. He roared demands: for explanation, for revenge, for her to scratch beneath his flipper. She laughed and did that much for him, leaning over the seat in a manner that made Marsh quite audibly nervous.

Figures they’d both start dithering at once. She ignored the man, for the most part; he was less likely to do something foolish than her hot-tempered, hot-blooded lion lover. Still, Marsh did know more about the human world than she, so she slid down in the seat as he asked even as she spoke to Dravid, explaining the situation to him.

He thanked her for the rescue, though he grumbled over the time it had taken her to find him, growled over the cramped vehicle, whimpered when a too-emphatic head-shake tugged at his ear, and cursed humans as a species through all their generations. “And that one shall be only the beginning of my revenge.”

Silla asked him, calmly, which one that might be.

“The one you captured, of course.” He pointed with his whiskers at Marsh. “The one we shall kill together, you and I, as soon as his work is done.”

Silla surprised herself with the bite in her voice as she replied. “He is mine!” Mine to kill or keep. I wonder if I could... “He is...a friend.” It was harder to say that to Dravid than to Marsh himself. Why? No matter. “He helped me save you, and I will not let you hurt him now.”

Dravid snuffled. Sneezed. Gaped. And then turned away from her, sticking his nose against the window. He said not another word until they arrived.

“Is this close enough?” Marsh pulled the car off the road and nodded. “There’s a rookery there. I don’t know if it’s the same one, but we were near here last collection day.”

Silla winced before remembering that Dravid didn’t speak much human. English, Marsh was clear about that. English and Gaelic. Whatever. Dravid likely wouldn’t have heard that “confession,” that was all that mattered. She opened the back door to help her -- What? Lover? Subject? Mate? Playmate? -- Dravid out.

He snarled at her. “You keep my chosen prey safe and claim to care for me. Do you expect thanks for this? False friend. Your father would be shamed to see his only child so bloodless.” Dravid fell heavily to the ground, awkward, the sound of his flippers like screams. He shook his head, the ragged edge of his torn ear flapping. “You are no mer at all. Guppy.”

Silla winced at that worst of insults, but bit her tongue to hold back boiling words. There is nothing to say he will hear, nothing he does not already know save that he refuses to see. Silence would not serve, though, so, “He helped us. Brought us here with no payment made. Let him live for that, if nothing else. Or do you have less honor than humankind?”

Dravid growled wordlessly, sneezed again, and humped his way toward the sea.

Silla turned to Marsh, who had stood silent nearby. “Thank you. Oh, that is only words! Thank you.” She grabbed his hands in hers and lifted them to her mouth. “Thank you,” she whispered, and took one of his fingers into her mouth, laving it carefully before releasing it. “Thank you,” she said again, and sucked the next finger, nibbling just a bit. “Thank you.”

“You’re killing me,” he groaned.

“Wh -- ?” He didn’t smell like he was dying. The smell of salt and musk and life was as strong as ever, and that lovely swelling had returned to his genitals. “Should I stop?”

“God, no!”

As she tongued her way from one finger to the next, she noticed again the hard planes of calluses, so different from the soft skin of his protected areas. Her own seldom-worn landform had no thick bits like this, nearly as tough as webbing, gentle on her own tender landform parts. She lifted his hands to her breasts, rubbed her nipples against the lines of his palms, blinked back tears at the strength of his response.

How did humans manage, with their bodies so quick to respond, so easy to read? Her own was as ready as quickly, as eager for him. Their coupling was as bittersweet as the tears that flavored their last kiss. “I’d better go,” he said at last. “Hope no one stole the building while I was gone.”

She pressed her lips together, determined not to ask any more of him. He has risked so much already. The thought of those other sea-denizens tore at her, but what could she do? Even were he willing...no. “I shall never forget you.”

“Yeah? Well, that’s something.” He kept his fingers twined with hers as they walked to his car, as he opened the door. “I’m one up on the stories, anyway. Mostly, the hero just gets a kiss. That was a joke.”

She nodded, freed her hand from his, waited for him to slide into his seat. Leaned in and kissed him one last time. “You are, you know. A hero. Slán agus beannacht leat, a fear. Farewell.”

Her eyes swam as she watched him drive away.

- T B C -