Mermay #1 - tiger shark merman (Fáinn) x reader (nsfw) (Patreon)

Howdy folks! Welcome to the Merry Month of May, or as we say in these waters, Mermay! While most of us aren't able to go to the beach or get outside much, I hope these stories will be at least a little help! 

This is the first of five, and is available for all patrons. The next one will be for Pixies and Goblins only though, but there'll be one more available for $1 so I hope you won't go anywhere just yet! 

This time we meet Fáinn properly, after my sneak peek yesterday. Thanks for your positive feedback on that, and I might post more doodles again (additionally to already-planned written content) if you're up for it? I think I had more likes on that post than on most of the previous stories!! XD

Content: a holiday romance that turns serious quickly, some angstiness, a near drowning, and a happy fluffy reunion with a dose of nsfw too at the end.Wordcount: a whopping 8658! (I do not intend for every Friday's story to be that long, so enjoy this one!!). 

It was, without doubt, the hottest summer on record. 

The quaint little town Starfall Springs lay baking under a fierce sun, and honestly only the nagas and the lizardfolk seemed to relish it. The only reprieve was the near-constant sea breeze which swept in off the coast of Starfall Bay and wove its cool fingers through the twisting streets of the town, brushing against the sandstone buildings and rattling the scorched leaves along the gutters of the cobbled streets. 

Between jobs, and with the whole summer stretching deliciously before you, you wandered down to the beach again to paddle your calves in the ocean and perhaps sit on the far jetty by the research station. From there you could watch the little team and their RIB shuttling in and out of the station, sometimes with an octomer in tow too, which was always in interesting addition. You’d never met any merfolk, but they’d always fascinated you. 

You strolled down the wooden boards of the dock, listening to the steady slap of the water against the pilings of the jetty and the sussurating wash of waves on the shore, and although your skin was prickling in the sun’s heat, you sat down at the far end and leaned back on your hands, dangling your legs in the water. Peace and bliss swept up over you and you closed your eyes, raising your face to the sun. 

A soft and different kind of splash from the regular exhaling of the ocean on the sand made you look up a little while later, and you nearly screeched in shock as the distinctively triangular dorsal fin of a shark cut through the water. As you jerked your legs up onto the wood, however, your brain registered the torso, arms, and long flowing hair of one of the merfolk, and you went slack with relief and more than a little embarrassment. They didn’t break the surface, however, and headed over to the research station. Your eyes tracked the hypnotic, easy, side to side sweep of their immensely powerful tail, the tip of the caudal fin sometimes peeking momentarily above the water, and a moment later, they came to a circling halt beneath the research station’s private jetty. 

They still didn’t surface, but they didn’t have to wait long for someone to come out, and when the tall, gruff looking human stepped out and knelt down at the edge of the jetty, they finally breached the surface and you felt your jaw slacken at the sight of them. While most of the merfolk you’d seen on glossy fashion magazines in the city had colourful, glimmering scales and skin tones in the same variety as humans, apparently shark merfolk did not. 

The rough, grey-brown skin of the shark’s body continued up the merman’s bare back and down his arms, though his hands were the same pale colour as his shark-half’s belly and his human chest. He was covered in a network of pale scars and slashes, though his long, blue-black hair hid much of them as it stuck to his skin while he bobbed in the water. You couldn’t hear their voices from that distance, but you could see that in one ear he had what looked like a bone earring, curved in a short crescent, the tips of which pointed downwards. 

Whatever he had come to report to the head of the research station was clearly not lengthy, and the human nodded, smiled and thanked the merman before standing and turning to head back into the station. The merman, message apparently relayed, paused for just a moment and then pushed back off the jetty where he’d been holding himself up out of the water with extremely powerful arms. You were still staring at the impressive bulge of his biceps and the lean ripple of muscle over his shoulders when he caught you looking. 

You swallowed and grinned. “Hi,” you offered. 

He nodded once, looking wary, and looked set to dive again. Disappointment blossomed in your chest as you realised your opportunity to speak to one of the merfolk was about to pass you by, but you couldn’t think of anything to say that didn’t sound horrendously awkward. In the end you blurted, “Bet it’s cooler in the water today!” and instantly cringed.

The merman blinked slowly, large, jet black eyes glistening and staring at you as if you’d announced that the sea tasted like strawberries. 

You nearly cursed aloud, but instead, you laughed and leaned back on your hands again, swishing your feet through the water. “Don’t mind me,” you said. “I’ve never met one of your kind, that’s all. I didn’t mean to hold you up.”

He didn’t respond, but neither did he swim away. 

The merman seemed to be teetering on the point between speaking and fleeing, so you shot him a sidelong look and asked, “You work as a researcher here then?”

He shook his head and swallowed visibly. 

“Oh. I just assumed… sorry.” He clearly didn’t want to talk, and you were beginning to regret starting this, but just as the thought had crossed your mind, he spoke after all. 

“C-Coastguard.” 

The merman’s voice wasn’t particularly deep, but it was rough and husky, and he seemed to have a slight stammer. That, or he was nervous of talking to a human, which seemed preposterous to you, given that he could probably have dragged you under and drowned you before you could even think about screaming for help. He didn't look dangerous though - well, no… he certainly did look like he could be dangerous if he wanted to, but he didn’t seem so inclined. 

“Oh cool,” you said, brightening and sitting up again. “The coastguard must be busy at this time of year,” you added, looking along the wide, curving, sandy beach where tourists and locals alike gathered to bake in the sun or cool off in the sea. The swells weren’t particularly impressive that day, so there weren’t many surfers, but there was a decent number of paddle-boarders. 

“Mm,” he agreed. “I don’t… st-stay in the shallows much though.”

“Why not?”

“Sharks,” he said, as if it was obvious.

“Sharks?”

“Mn. My job is to k-keep them away from… the surfers.”

“Ohh,” you grinned. “I see.” And then you scowled. “Sounds dangerous…”

He shrugged. “Mostly they leave w-without much fuss…”

You still gave a shudder. “Rather you than me! Still, I bet you must get people throwing themselves into the sea all the time, just in the hopes of being rescued by a handsome mer…” you giggled, not really realising that you’d spoken your thoughts aloud until it was too late. “At least, being a city person, I’d imagine so… but what do I know?”

At first you’d taken his silence for hostility, but as your turned to look at him, you saw a series of expressions flit across his startlingly handsome face, from confusion to slight bashfulness, and then to curiosity. He never said a word, but as you watched him floating in the water, you sensed he was interested in the city, so you just started talking. You spoke of buildings higher than the sandstone cliffs of the Starfall coastline, made of steel and glinting glass, of the ceaseless traffic like tireless crabs shuttling back and forth from bolt-hole to bolt-hole, of constant sirens and occasional street parades, of the leafy parks full of barking dogs and sunbathing city dwellers, of restaurants, clubs, pubs, bars, theatres, cinemas, and museums. 

He never said a word all the while you spoke, but he swam slowly closer and closer until he was only a few metres away, his powerful shark’s body keeping his head easily above the water while he listened to your every word with silent, glimmering eyes. 

You finally stopped when you started to go hoarse, and you swallowed thickly. “Man, listen to me blathering on like that. I need an ice cream or something!” you snorted. “And you must be bored stiff! You’re too polite, I’m sorry.”

He shook his head. “Interested,” he grunted. “Not b-bored.” His stammer was like a bubble popping, a quiet, quick repetition of the syllable, and he blinked a bit harder as he did it. 

“Well, you probably deserve an ice cream for sitting there and listening to me anyway. Do you want one?”

“Ice c-cream?”

“You’ve never had an ice cream?”

He shook his head. “What…?”

“Oh my god. Sit tight,” you said, scrambling to your feet and laughing, making him startle a little bit. “I’ll be right back!” And with that, you were off like a greyhound, leaving your flip flops behind on the jetty as you scurried off to the little pop-up stall on the seafront above the sand. 

Maybe halfway up the beach, dodging around an iridescent red lizardfolk who was clearly loving the scorching weather, you realised that actually he may not want or like ice cream at all, and that you were being extremely pushy. Glancing back over your shoulder, you saw his dorsal fin slicing through the water again, and your feet stalled. 

He was leaving. 

He’d waited politely all that time while you talked his attractively pointed ear off, and had then taken the first opportunity to bolt. 

Naturally. 

But…

The fin circled round again, heading back towards the shore, then towards the jetty, then under it, and then back around in a broad circle. A circle! He was waiting for you!

Trying not to cackle like a gleeful goblin at a gem sale, you scampered up the stairs from the sandy beach and up onto the higher harbour wall which was level with the rest of the harbour-front part of the town. From there, it was a shortish wait at the ice cream stand, and when it was finally your turn, you asked, “What would you pick for someone who’s never had ice cream before?”

The cervitaur who was selling them blinked and then grinned, pointing at a pale pink one. “Strawberry.”

“Done. One of those, and…” you deliberated, finally - and predictably - landing on your favourite flavour. Cones paid for, you thanked the slightly baffled looking cervitaur and hurried - more carefully this time - back down the sand towards the wooden jetty at the furthest reaches of the bay. 

As you sat down again rather awkwardly, balancing the ice creams in your hand, he surfaced and you held one out to him. “I don’t know your name,” you added as you introduced yourself. 

He repeated your name carefully, as if checking diligently to make sure he’d got it right, and then said, “Fáinn.” It was an unfamiliar, two-syllable name that sounded like ‘f-eye-inn’

“Nice to meet you, Fáinn. Well, yours is strawberry, and if you don’t like it, I’ll happily finish it for you. No obligations!”

“Thank you,” he said, eyeing the ice cream cone as if it were a moray eel about to lunge for his face. 

“You lick it,” you grinned. “Like this…” In as non-sexual a way as possible, you showed him how to eat an ice cream, and to his credit, the shark mer did his best. Some of it rolled over his knuckles, melting when he took too long about it, but for the most part, he seemed to enjoy it. “So?” you asked when he was down to the wafer cone and looking at you to see if it was edible or not. “What do you think?”

“Sweet,” he murmured. 

“Nice sweet or too sweet?” you asked. “You can eat the cone too if you like,” you added, in case he wasn’t sure. 

He nodded and nibbled at it, revealing a double set of canines which was suddenly immensely attractive to you. You forced yourself to look away from his full lips and his dangerous mouth just as he said, “N-N-Neither…” His eyes closed as his tongue and teeth got tangled on the initial consonant, and he looked away with half a growl of frustration. 

“Well, next time I can recommend a lemon sorbet or something. It’s still sweet, but it’s sharp too. You might like that better.”

“Nnnnext time?” he repeated, the sound stretching before he forced it on. 

“Mmm,” you hummed brightly. “If you’re up for it.”

He licked his lips and then crunched the remainder of the cone down. “Yes,” he said quietly. 

“Yes you’re up for it?” you asked and he nodded. “Awesome! Wait, I hope you’re not just being polite. I know I can be a bit pushy…”

“No,” he smiled. “I… I’d l-like that.”

Your grin felt as broad as the sea itself, and you laughed. “I’ve not been here long, and you’re the first real friend I’ve made,” you said. 

His eyes widened a little at that. “Me?”

“Yup. I’m here on a long holiday, and I thought the sea would do me some good. I’m really glad I met you.”

He nodded once and then lowered his now-empty hands back under the water. Something in you ached at the loss of them, having enjoyed watching the beautiful two-tone greys in his skin under the strong sun. “Thank you, and… I’ll s-see you again…” he said falteringly, looking down and not meeting your eyes. 

With a nod, you smiled. “Thanks for sharing an ice cream with me. I’ll probably be here most days, I think.”

He bowed his head and then simply swam away. 

You watched him go, his powerful tail threshing the water like a great flail until he was deep in the open water beyond the bay and well out of sight. 

You didn’t see him again for a whole week, and you’d almost given up when, one afternoon as you were lying on your stomach on the beach, lost in the pages of a trashy book, a splashing spray of salt water landed across your face. With a squawk of surprise, you looked up and squinted at the nearby water lapping the sandy shore. Your annoyance evaporated instantly when you saw Fáinn in the shallows, staring shyly at you. 

“Hey!” you laughed, dog-earing the corner of your cheap paperback and abandoning it to the sand as you scrambled to your feet and headed for the water. You were in swimwear, so you just plonked yourself down in the shallows and waited for him to approach. 

It wasn’t long before he snaked effortlessly through the water and came to rest on his elbows in not too dissimilar a pose from how you’d been reading a moment earlier. 

“I thought you weren’t going to come back,” you began, but your words died in your throat when you saw the thick band of seaweed wrapped and tied neatly around his upper bicep in what was clearly a bandage. “What happened? Are you ok?”

He nodded and shot a quick glance down at his wounded left arm. “Humans… with harpoons… I c-came to warn the C-Coastguard.”

Horror plunged deep into your gut and you blinked stupidly for a few seconds before you were even able to croak, “That’s awful, Fáinn…”

He shrugged. “It happens.”

“It happens?” you parroted. “Here? Aren’t there laws protecting against that?”

“Oh, sure…” he said, sarcasm thick in his husky, rasping tenor. 

You didn’t need to hear the rest to follow his meaning. “But since when have humans followed laws when there’s something they want, huh?” you said bitterly. “I’m so sorry.”

“Not your fault,” he said. His beautiful, long, deep blue hair drifted in the currents and you smiled as he let the matter go to drift like weed in the tide. “So…” he added, turning suddenly playful in a way you hadn’t remembered from your first meeting. “Lemon?”

The smile that split your face made your cheeks hurt, and you laughed long and loud. “Yes! Lemon. Hang on, I’ll go get you one.”

“I’ll be here,” he smiled. Gods, he was especially beautiful when he smiled. 

Over the next few weeks, you tried him out with every flavour that Millie, the cervitaur, had to offer. Blackcurrant he didn’t like, orange he loved. Lemon was good, but caramel was too thick and sweet. After a month of living in Starfall Springs, you realised you were down at the beach almost every day, and that Fáinn was there more often than not now. 

One lazy Sunday afternoon, he beached himself for the first time, hauling himself up well out of the water and coming to rest in the thick, white sand. It was then that you saw his whole body properly for the first time. There was something affectionately intimate about the moment, and you licked your lips nervously as he heaved himself to a halt beside you. 

“Wow,” you breathed, and he tilted his head questioningly. “You’re… Beautiful… and… built…” you added with a snort. “Wow. I knew you were strong, but…”

He flushed and looked away, blinking. 

“Sorry,” you laughed nervously, holding out a coffee ice cream this time. “Here. Try this.”

Once the ice creams were finished - coffee he quite enjoyed, apparently - he lay on his back, careful not to crush his dorsal, and sighed expansively, spreading his fingers through the fine sand. 

It was difficult not to stare openly at him. “Don’t suppose you do this very often? Leave the water altogether, I mean…” you ventured, and he shook his head before sighing hugely. 

Fáinn remained almost completely silent after that. It wasn’t that he didn’t engage with you - his manners and gestures were expressive enough - but he seemed especially reluctant to use his voice that day. You weren’t going to push him into chatting if it wasn’t his thing, and besides, spending time with him was more than enough. He radiated calm the way orcs radiate power. 

Feeling brave, you lay on your side in the sand next to him, couching your weight on your elbow, and fixed your eyes on his pale, freckled, scarred chest. The sight of the old injuries made you wonder where they all came from. You knew he had a colossal bite mark on his back that he said was from a bull shark that had refused to move on. 

Catching you staring, his black eyes darted briefly to his huge shoulder, and you took it for the invitation it was and laid your head there on his right shoulder. Beneath you, the sand was cool and damp, and beside you, Fáinn’s body seemed to absorb the warmth from your own skin, leaving you pleasantly cool. 

Tentatively a few minutes later, he brought his right hand up to your waist and tucked you closer against his side. The skin of his lower body was rough as sandpaper, but the palm of his hand was smooth and hard as leather, and it made your insides writhe. “Thank you,” you smiled and he twitched the corner of his lips once before closing his eyes again. 

How long you lay like that, you couldn't be entirely sure. Both of you drifted and strayed into the soft currents of sleep, his hands tracing idle patterns on your waist and hip as you found a little more courage and rested your arm across his solid stomach. Eventually he heaved another huge sigh and you tilted your face up to his. “Penny for your thoughts?”

His thick, blue black brows pinched in confusion. 

“It’s a saying,” you shrugged. “You don’t actually get a penny if you tell me what’s on your mind, but still… You ok?”

“Mmn,” he grunted. 

His chest was completely dry by now, and as you trailed your fingertips over the freckles that littered the milk-pale skin of his belly, he sucked in a sudden breath and rocked his head back in the sand, eyes rolling closed. “You like that?”

“Mn.”

“You want me to stop?”

“…Mn.”

“Fair enough,” you chuckled. It was a public beach in high summer after all. Not long after that, he started to shuffle, and then propped himself up on one arm, looking towards the sea that was thinking about creeping back up the beach again as the tide turned. “You want to get back in the water?” you asked. 

Fáinn nodded. 

“Is this goodbye for today?”

Again, the mer nodded, but something warred in his expression. You would have given anything to know what went on in his busy head all the time. He’d given the impression to you that people seemed to think he was simple or stupid, or even rude. He’d been surprised that you’d seen past it almost straight away. It was clear as daylight to you that if they just took the time to get to know him, people would have seen how deep his thoughts ran and how much he considered his words before speaking - if he uttered a syllable at all. It wasn’t connected to his speech disfluency either; it was just the way Fáinn was. 

This time, before he left, he let his fingertips play around your ankles as you stood in the softly washing surf. With a dolorous look up at you, he smiled and then said, “Tomorrow?”

“I’ll be here,” you promised. “Wait,” you breathed just as he was on the point of swimming away. 

Fáinn halted and cocked his head curiously. With a smile, you knelt down in the shallow water and let it lap over your waist, revelling the cool touch of the tide around you. Shortly after that, his hands closed around your waist and he drew himself closer to you as if you were an anchor and all he had to do was reel himself in. Inches from your face, he paused and you saw your own nervous expression reflected in his glassy eyes. “Can I kiss you?” you asked. 

He sank his teeth into his lower lip but then nodded once. 

In fact it was Fáinn who closed the distance between you completely, rolling in like a breaker and crushing you together. His lips were cool and tasted of the salt of the ocean, but as he kissed you, you felt yourself beginning to melt and drift. It had never felt so right in your whole life. Your fingers raked through his thick, blue-black hair, and he broke the kiss with a soft gasp, eyes closed, chest heaving, forehead pressed against yours, resting nose to nose. The gills in his neck flared open for a moment and he appeared to be struggling to breathe. 

Planting one large hand flat on your chest, he pushed himself away, turning from you with an unreadable expression, and with a few flicks of his powerful tail, he was gone. 

“Fáinn?” you called, but he come back. 

Reeling, you knelt there in the surf for a while before standing and making your way unsteadily back to your holiday rental. You couldn’t help feeling like you’d left something behind on the beach that day. 

Two days later, Fáinn was back at the little wooden jetty where you’d first met, and something was wrong. He was always quiet, sure, but today he was silent. He also wouldn’t stop touching you. The heat of the day was at its zenith, the sun blasting down and baking everything to a husk, so you’d slipped into the water to wait for him. When he saw you, he speared through the water to you and wrapped his muscular arms around you, holding himself upright by you alone as you clung to the wood of the jetty. 

“Fáinn?” you murmured, using one hand to stroke his scarred back. “Fáinn what’s wrong?”

In answer, he buried his face at your neck and breathed in the scent of you over and over until finally he seemed to calm enough to draw back and blink slowly at you. 

“Fáinn?”

The look in his eyes sent cold horror plunging through you. You’d seen that look before, though never so sincere, and you swallowed thickly. 

“Fáinn? What’s wrong? Talk to me…?”

“I…” he began, the sound choking in his throat before he swallowed and tried again. “I was wrong… I shouldn’t have… This…” 

Your fingers started to go slack on the slippery wood of the jetty beside you. You couldn’t reach the bottom from here, and that connection was all that was keeping your head above water. “Fáinn, talk to me… what’s brought this on?”

“There’s… There’s always something between us,” he rasped. “Getting in the way. Air… Water… We… We c-could never be… anything more than th-this…” he said, snarling softly and jutting his chin at your hand as if to prove that without that support, you’d have been floundering hopelessly in the water. 

Trying to prove him wrong, you let go and trod water for a bit, but you tired more quickly than you’d thought you would, and the seawater was soon lapping against your jaw and lips. He grabbed you and hauled you up again before bringing his lips to your neck and kissing you. His strange, sharp teeth raked over your skin and you shivered, going limp in his grasp. Your head lolled with pleasure as he continued to mouth at you, biting painlessly before sucking a bruise hard enough to leave a mark on your collarbones. 

Your legs wrapped instinctively around his torso and you clung to him, gasping. “Are you breaking up with me or taking this further?” you asked. 

“This…” he hissed in your ear. “This has to be… it. I can’t… I c-can’t…”

“Fáinn, no… come on. You’re giving me whiplash with all these signals…” you begged, but his strong grip was prying your legs off his body and he was holding you at arm’s length in a heartbeat. Before you could register what was happening, he had hoisted you bodily out of the water and set you down on the dock, turning away from you with a swirl of his tiger-striped tail. “Fáinn!” you yelled, voice cracking in desperation. “Wait! Let’s talk about this! Stop!”

But he was not to be persuaded. Pausing at the end of the jetty, he said, “We are not… the same. Forget it.”

“I can’t,” you whimpered, but it was too late. 

Fáinn had dived deep and with a splash of his caudal fin, he had vanished. 

You didn’t notice your legs moving, but you ran to the end of the jetty and plunged into the water after him. You weren’t a poor swimmer, but the currents were strong out here. Doggedly fighting on, you swam way out into the channel, following the line of his retreating shadow underwater. He didn’t stop, and in minutes, he had completely disappeared from view. 

Treading water out here in the deep, cold water sapped you of strength, and you began to bob and struggle like a cork in a storm drain. “Fáinn…” you whimpered, but he was long gone. 

After another few minutes, the whine of a jet ski engine rose above the waves, and you turned to see the research station’s little craft leaping over the breakers, slowing as it neared you. The man who sat astride it was the one you’d seen Fáinn talking to on a number of occasions - Garrett, you thought his name was. “Here,” he said kindly. “Come on. Let’s get you back ashore.”

Numb, inside and out, you didn’t argue. 

Back at the station, he wrapped you in a blanket and looked at you warily. “What happened?”

“I thought… Fáinn… I thought he cared, but…”

The man sighed. “Ahh, he’s a strange one. Let it go, I would…”

“I can’t…” you repeated. Everything hurt now; muscles, skin, eyes, throat, lips, heart… 

For the next two weeks, you continued to visit the jetty, but there was no sign of the shark mer at all. It really must have been just a holiday fling, but it had felt like there was the potential for so much more. 

On one muggy, humid afternoon you tramped up the jetty to the research station with a corked glass bottle in your hands and a request for Garrett on your lips. 

“Borrow the RIB?” he asked, his eyes darting to the inflatable craft bobbing in the waves. “Whatever for?”

“I… I just want to say goodbye. I know he won’t be there, but… please…?”

With an affectionately patient roll of his eyes, the old romantic nodded. “Fine. I shouldn’t let you do this, you know? You’re not a researcher or anything.”

“I won’t be long, and I’ll be careful,” you said by way of a thank you, stepping into the boat and yanking the knots free. The outboard roared to life and you steered it steadily out of the harbour and out into the main channel beyond. Cutting the engine, you let the craft drift for a moment, not intending to stay out there for long, just as you’d promised. 

Taking the bottle with the little curl of paper inside, you jogged it in your hand, feeling the weight of it for a moment. You didn’t believe for a moment that he would ever read the words written in waterproof ink on the note inside -  the chances of him and it crossing currents in the ocean was astronomical after all - but still, you gritted your teeth, grabbed the neck of the wine bottle, and hurled it as far as you could into the sea. After writing the date at the top of the paper, you’d scribbled: ‘I will go to the sunken causeway of the old Starfall Castle every quarter moon for the next month. I hope you’ll be there, but I can’t believe you’ll ever find this.’ 

The bottle bobbed for a while and then began to drift off, caught in a current beyond the reach of the boat. You stared at it until it was out of sight, heart thudding a painful rhythm in your chest, and then gunned the RIB back to the research station.

You tried your best to enjoy Starfall after that, visiting the museum and going for walks through the pine forest near the silver mines, but all the while you felt the call of the beach and the ache in your chest. It stung and galled you to know that he’d ended it before it could really begin, just because he’d not had the courage to try. Taking a deep breath, you forced the frustration back down and made your preparations for your first trip to Starfall Castle. 

The first three visits to the old castle causeway, about a mile along the coast from the town, brought nothing at all, save for the empty whistling of the wind around the crumbling keep. 

It was a fantastic old building, abandoned when the cliff had partly collapsed five hundred years earlier. It was said locally that the Silkfoot family had once owned it before moving to the Grange at the other end of town, far from the sea. Now all that was left was a sunken causeway that was only properly traversable at low tide, and even then it was still mired under a wash of saltwater, and beyond that was a small island of crumbling sandstone adorned with the rotting crown of the former stronghold. You’d been there a few times on your trip, and it seemed like a suitable macabre place to lurk and sulk out the rest of your holiday before returning to the city and trying to forget all about what had been the most amazing few weeks of your life; before it had all gone arse over teakettle, straight into the ocean. 

On your fourth and final visit to the castle, you struggled down the cliff path from where you’d parked your rental car, wind lashing your face as storm clouds built on the horizon. It seemed as though the weather was finally going to break. The clouds had swept in as you’d made the short journey out of Starfall Springs to the heritage site by car this time, and now as you slithered down the shingle-riddled path to the causeway on the beach, the wind picked up to a steady howling and the sea crashed against the rocks as if to warn you back to the safety of your car. 

But this was your last visit here, and you were damned if you were going to be turned back by a spot of inclement drizzle. In fact, it turned out to be a bit more than that, but as you sloshed along the causeway, pacing back and forth like a caged beast, you caught sight of a darker flash of movement in the water and froze. 

A fin sliced through the choppy seas; dark and stocky, it was the fin of a shark for sure. 

You held your breath. 

Arms moved in the water, and the figure circled a few times before swimming away slowly towards the castle on the island. Entranced, you struggled through the shallow water, yelling, “Fáinn? Wait!” 

The sea churned around you, the currents buffeting you as the water washed in and over the stones, threatening to take your feet out from underneath you with the merest push. Heedless you forged ahead, scrambling up the grassy paths of the little island, ducking through the ruins, heart fluttering, until you emerged on the other side near the former castle docks. 

Here the water was a deep and endless green, the rocks having been long ago cut away below to allow for the enormous, deep-drafted warships of the previous generations to dock alongside the castle itself. You ventured out onto the stone quayside, even as waves washed over the masonry and threatened to sweep you away like autumn debris into a gutter. 

The shadowy figure was circling in the water below and it made you think of all those times you’d met up with Fáinn when he’d needed to take some time to himself beforehand. With your heart thudding in your throat, you waited. 

In the blink of an eye, everything changed. The mood shifted from nervous expectancy to blank terror in a second as the shark mer turned and lanced through the water straight for you. They didn’t slow, and as they breached the surface like a great white in full attack, you stepped back and slipped. The figure who launched themselves out of the water and straight at you was not Fáinn at all. 

It was a female tiger shark mer, with muscles as powerful as Fáinn’s and hair the same shade of blue black, who leapt over the stone dock and crashed into you. The impact knocked you into the empty water behind you, the mer dragging you down a few metres with the impact before releasing you with a muffled laugh. 

Freezing water rushed in on all sides, frothing and foaming, and you floundered amid a cloud of bubbles, struggling blindly for the surface as the waves tipped you and tugged at you until you felt like a toy in a washing machine. Panic clawed at you, but you broke the surface and sucked in a mouthful of salty air, coughing and kicking. Your heel connected with something but a moment later you were yanked back down, hands grabbing at nothing but water as you were tugged below. Your eyes were open but the cold salt water half blinded you and it hurt so badly you wanted to scream. 

You were going to die like this. The thought hit you a second before the shark mer did. 

Her long, thick, hard tail lashed through the water and connected with your ribs, knocking a stream of bubbles from your mouth and stunning you instantly. You dangled lifeless in the water, unable to make your muscles move. Then, out of the murky shadows of the dock, another figure darted, quick and deadly, with the side-to-side movement of a shark in full attack, and for a wild moment you half hoped it was an actual shark. Surely it would go for her before you? She offered the bigger target after all. 

To your delight, just as your lungs reached their limit and began to spasm, the second creature barrelled at her with an unholy screech and she let go of you. Before you made for the surface, you caught a glimpse of arms wrapped around the other mer in a deadly wrestling tackle and saw the vague flash of a weapon before you turned your head towards the surface and swam for all you were worth.

You kicked wildly for the surface. 

You didn’t stop to look back. 

Blood wafted in the water from the struggle behind you and one of the merfolk screamed. 

Terror overwhelmed you. 

The rough stones of the quayside scuffed your palms raw as you scrabbled desperately, but the lashing waves kept knocking you free of the wall like a spider in a sink. Sobbing and desperate with terror, you floundered hopelessly until you felt hands on your waist and you flailed wildly in the water. 

The hands somehow did not let go but guided you up out of the reach of the waves and up onto the dock, releasing you the instant you were safe. Desperately scrabbling back away from the water, you found yourself on dry land again, coughing and wheezing, blinking furiously and with your lungs and chest burning. 

Retching and heaving, you stayed on all fours before your mind started to return to you and you looked to your right and into the eyes of the mer who had rescued you. A crescent of bone glimmered in his left ear. 

It was Fáinn. 

Tears rolled down your cheeks and all the strength left your limbs. You wept his name and crawled on all fours to the edge of the dock as he pulled himself close to you, murmuring your name quietly. “She’s gone,” he said, reaching for your hand and clutching at you. Fear filled his dark eyes as he gazed at you, willing you to be alright. 

“I…” you began but your throat was raw from the salt and from screaming underwater, and you broke off to cough again. 

“She… She taunted me with something about a message in a bottle?” he said once you’d stopped heaving and had fallen still again, save for the shivering in your limbs as the storm wind lashed your wet clothes. 

You shook your head. “I didn’t think… you’d ever read it… It… It was more for me. Gods, I’ve missed you…”

He lowered his head in agreement. “I missed you too. It… it hurt…”

“Why? Why did you suddenly just…”

“Landfolk and merfolk don’t… shouldn’t…”

“Says who?” you fired angrily. “We could make it work!” 

“You need to go home,” he said quietly. “You’re cold.”

“I’m not leaving you again,” you growled. “Not without talking properly at least.”

He swam a little way back from the dock, almost as if you might launch yourself at him if he stayed too close. “I’ll be here when you come back.”

The idea of warm, dry clothes was starting to sound more appealing by the second. “You promise?” you demanded through chattering teeth, and Fáinn nodded. 

You staggered dazedly to your feet and stared at him for a long time. He didn’t dip below the water, but stayed there watching you, his grey body blending almost perfectly with the stormy water around him. “Come back t-tomorrow,” he said. “When the weather is better. I’ll be here.”

“Promise?” you hissed again and he nodded once more. 

With one last look, you staggered back through the ruins and over the causeway, weak-kneed and half expecting the female shark mer to come back and knock you into the foaming sea again. 

You grabbed the bag you’d abandoned on the beach in your haste to chase after the shape in the water and slipped and slid up the path to your car again. 

You didn’t sleep that night, but you did go home and shower, warm up, grab some food, and then, as soon as dawn painted the sky a delicate lavender and gold behind the fading clouds of the night before, you scrambled back into your car - ignoring the sandy, salty, damp upholstery beneath you - and drove back to the castle. 

In the calmer light of morning, you could hardly believe that it was the same place. Waves innocently kissed the pebbles, though flotsam and debris was strewn halfway up the beach as you made your way tentatively back down. The causeway was deserted as you waded through it, the water now up to your thighs, soaking the fabric of your shorts, but the weather was warm enough for it not to be an issue now. You still cast your eyes warily but the glass-clear water was empty on either side. 

The castle echoed with the cries of seagulls and the soft whisper of the waves, and as you stepped out onto the stone dock at the back, you saw him circling in the water below. You hung back, but picked up a loose shard of stone from the crumbling castle wall and lobbed it into the water at a safe distance from him. 

The instant the stone struck the surface, he broke his hypnotic pattern and snaked to the surface, his black eyes finding your face immediately. A sequence of unreadable emotions swirled across his face before he exhaled with tangible relief and swam over. “Are you alright?” he asked. “I was so w-worried… I wasn’t sure you’d c-come back…”

“Yeah,” you said, voice still hoarse and a little unsteady. “Shaken, but ok. You? She didn’t hurt you?”

He shook his head. 

“She didn’t come back?”

Fáinn shook his head again, blue-black hair trailing in the water behind him. “No. I told her this was my territory, and she seemed to accept that. Left a notch on her dorsal fin to remind her,” he added. “She was just passing through anyway.”

“She only came here because she found my stupid note,” you huffed, sitting down heavily on the edge of the dock and letting your feet trail in the water. Fáinn’s eyes followed them but he didn't touch you this time. 

He shrugged. “Maybe she’d have found you anyway,” he suggested. 

“She was waiting for me,” you rasped. 

He swam a little closer to you, water swirling around his tail, and snarled, “Forget her. She’s g-gone.”

You hitched a half-smile. “I thought you were gone too…”

“I was,” he said. “Did you c-come here before?”

“Yeah.”

“I’ve been here for a month and I had no idea,” he sighed. “I didn’t forget you. I c-couldn’t.” He paused and then reached for your leg. His touch faltered just before it connected and he curled his strong, knuckly, scarred fingers inwards, withdrawing. “M-May I?”

“Mmm.”

His touch was steady and cool as the stones beneath your body, and you sighed luxuriantly. He ran his hands up and down your leg as if sculpting the memory of their shape into his mind forever. “I’m so sorry,” he whispered. “I hurt you. I was stupid, and I’m sorry.”

“I get it,” you admitted. “We are from different backgrounds to say the least…”

He smiled. “You’re going back to the city?”

You shrugged. “I don’t have to. I could get a job here instead.”

Fáinn’s eyes went wide. “You’d do that? For m-me?”

As your gaze drifted off towards the horizon, you thought it through. You’d hated your job in the city, but you were good at it. Sure, you would miss a few friends, but they could come and visit, and it wasn’t so far away that a day trip was out of the question. “I could, yes,” you said. 

When your eyes met his again, there was a heat burning in them that you’d not seen before, and suddenly he’d hauled himself out of the water completely, using the powerful muscles of his torso and arms to heave his body onto the dock beside you. 

Water ran down his back and dripped from the ebony tips of his hair, glittering in the bright dawn and you stared at his strange lower body. His five lower gills were flared wide and he was staring at you as he breathed shallow, quick breaths. With trembling fingers, he reached his left hand towards your face while his right braced his weight up on the ground. The cool touch of his hand made your eyes flutter shut and you leaned into the touch as he cupped your cheek. “I would never ask that of you,” he whispered. 

“I know,” you replied. Shaking your head a little, you added, “I know it’s quick, but I think I love you though…”

Overwhelmed, he squeezed his eyes shut and then drew you in to a searingly heartfelt kiss. If you’d thought he was intense about it the first time, that was nothing compared to now. He reared against you, drawing you close and moaned behind the gesture. 

You tipped backwards and he followed afterwards, his body weighing you down until you parted your legs around him and gripped his tail tightly, tugging yourself as close to him as you could get. “I’m sorry,” he whispered against your hair as he broke the kiss and buried his nose against your neck like he had on the unsuspecting afternoon when he’d abandoned you. “I’m so sorry…”

“Shh,” you murmured. “I understand.” You did. You really did. He was so different from you in so many ways, but the connection you shared ran deeper than that - you were sure of it by now. Who was to say it would be forever, but it was certainly something worth sticking at for longer than a quick holiday romance; you were sure of that. Bucking your hips up against him, you found your arousal spiking and you moaned as he reciprocated. 

His pupils, barely visible against the dark blue-black of his irises under the best of circumstances, were blown wide as he gazed at you in wonder. A few moments later, he had slithered sideways off you and landed on the dock beside you, half on his side and mostly on his back, mindful of his dorsal fin as always. The slit in the centre of his lower abdomen, just behind his pectoral fins, looked puffy and swollen, and he lay there breathing rapidly, half stunned. 

“Fáinn? You alright?”

“Mn,” he grunted, looking a bit stunned. 

With a grin, you ran your fingers down the rough skin of his belly and he lurched, tail flailing under the sudden stimulation. He didn’t tell you to stop, and you watched as he shivered and relaxed even more. “Fáinn, may I…?”

“Anything,” he hissed. “Whatever you want… I’m… I won’t go again. I promise.”

You had to smile at that. “You can still say no if you don’t want it,” you insisted. 

“I want you,” he replied immediately. “Please…”

Trailing your fingers up the swollen rim of the sheath, your fingers came away slick and you smiled again as he moaned a deep, guttural groan of pure pleasure at the touch. Slowly, carefully, you nudged your fingertip inside the line of the sheath this time and he lurched, letting out a broken, choked gasp, tail thrashing again. 

“Good?”

“Y-Yes!” 

You repeated the gesture and got exactly the same reaction as you stroked the silky walls of his sheath, only this time, his cocks began to unfurl from deep within him. Two beautiful, thick cocks, pale blue and slick with arousal, slid free of the sheath in no time beneath your attentions and coiled against his belly, drooling freely and writhing. 

“Gods, you’re beautiful, Fáinn,” you hissed, leaning over him and taking one of them in your mouth and sucking rhythmically while you played with the other, squeezing your fist around it and feeling it pulse and harden even further. He yelled and sobbed again, overcome with stimulation and sensation, and you backed off just a little, letting him adjust to the attention. “Ok?” you asked and he whimpered, nodding. 

“Please… your touch… I… I need… P-Please…” and suddenly both of his cocks coiled around your wrist in a corkscrew as if seeking you out, clenching tightly around you. Working free of their grasp, you slid your fingers around both of them and started to work him gently. 

Fáinn’s lips parted to reveal his bared, double canines, and he let out a sonorous moan each time you stroked him or lapped at his tip with a teasing tongue. 

He seemed to be tipping closer and closer to his release with every stroke, and as you laved your tongue once more over the salty-sweet tip of one in a tight little circle, he choked out another moan, back arching, tail trembling. As the shaking got more severe, you picked up the pace with your hands until his whole body was heaving in steady waves. Pre-come leaked freely over your fingers, easing the passage of your hands over his hard cocks. 

A moment later, he cried out and with a great convulsing wave that was so intense it seemed to take him by surprise, he spilled all over his stomach and over your hands. 

His release rolled down his sides and onto the stones as he shuddered and twitched, eyes screwed shut, lips drawn back in a rictus snarl of pleasure, torso clenching, body jerking, and to your surprise, a final, long, low wail left his lips and he reached blindly for you even as he continued to come. 

“Easy,” you chuckled fondly, working him through it with gentler motions of your hands now, holding him tightly until finally he fell back, boneless, sweating, gills flared wide and gasping. His caudal fin slapped onto the stones and he lay there, occasionally trembling and twitching. 

For a moment you thought he’d passed out, save for the rapid rise and fall of his chest, but eventually he cracked an eye open and reached for you again. “I want… wanted…” he slurred, voice thick and rough. “To make you… uh…”

“There’s plenty of time for that,” you smiled, lying down beside him and letting him pet your hair with distracted, clumsy movements. His cocks didn’t soften much, still twitching and drooling come down his belly, and in no time he seemed to be waking up again. “But if you’re offering…?” you grinned and he nodded. 

“C-Can I taste you?” he asked. 

“Sure…” 

You’d been half expecting him to ask you to sit astride him, but he was apparently more recovered than he looked because he tipped you onto your back and had rolled himself onto his front in a few easy motions. 

“I forgot how strong you are,” you gasped, the words dying in your throat as he lowered his mouth to you. “Oh gods, that’s good,” you hissed. 

His rhythm was punishing, and although he started off gently, his tongue barely-there, by the end he was pressing bruises into your hips with his powerful fingers as he moved his head, rocking his body against your legs, one cock on either side of your leg and both equally stimulated. 

As he finally tipped you over the edge into your own blindingly powerful orgasm, you felt him shuddering too. He kept his mouth on you, throat working as he swallowed, but it was obvious - even lost as you were in the throes of your own release - that he was coming a second time just from getting you off. 

“Fáinn,” you whispered, heart hammering. 

“I love you,” he replied a few minutes later as he raised his head and hauled himself up to lie next to you. He kissed your temple and then lay back, looking winded and spent and a little dazed. 

“I’m staying,” you said, staring up at the scudding summer clouds overhead. “For sure.”

In answer, he just laced his fingers with yours and gripped you fiercely. 

___

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