Chapter Text
Massimo hadn’t wanted to wait, even though Giulia had pleaded and insisted, telling him that it was her right as his Almost-Not-Quite-Yet-Little-Sister to be there.
"You don't understand!"
"Don't I?" Asked Massimo.
It was Spring Break when Giulia presented another spirited debate, this time insisting that summer was the best season for adoption anyway because you can't sign papers when it's cold outside, doing her best to rope a stunned and stuttering Alberto into the argument.
She'd reached across the table with her fork dramatically after that particular argument fell on its face.
"You have to wait!" She elbowed the boy next to her. "Right? Doesn't he?"
"Uh- I- I'm," said Alberto, who was so rarely lost for words.
Massimo sighed and looked at her from under his brows. "Giulietta."
"Papá."
"The lawyer already explained why. The paperwork is coming in before summer break."
"So just don't sign them until summer break."
Her father had snorted at that one. "I do not think I can ask to pause an adoption because it does not line up with your vacation."
"Sure you can! Right? Alberto?"
The boy next to her was staring almost too hard at his plate. "Um."
She groaned at his response, turning instead to Luca, who was silent and wide-eyed as he ate dinner with them, “Right, Luca?”
His pasta slipped from his fork as it froze on the way to his mouth, looking between them all. He cleared his throat. “It would be nice if we were all there… I mean, not all of us! Giulia needs to be there, since it’s her family, your family, and I could be there, too, to- to celebrate-” He caught Massimo’s eye and slunk down. “But I mean… uh… if we can’t-”
“See? He agrees!”
“But-”
Massimo hid his smile behind his wine.
“Waiting is the right thing to do,” she declared, hitting her fist against the table like a judge, calling their court to order. “Right Alberto?”
Alberto stared at his plate.
“Alberto?” She tried again.
The boy didn’t move.
Massimo leaned forward, and then all eyes were on him. There was a patch of red steadily making its way up the back of Alberto’s shirt, his neck, all the way up to his face. He said something under his breath that was too quiet to hear.
“Alberto?” Giulia dipped her head to try and catch his eye.
“I said…'' His voice broke, and he cleared it. He raised his eyes, but quickly dropped them again, using his fork to shuffle a tomato around his plate. “Are you really sure?”
The shift in the room was palpable. Massimo turned, full attention to the boy in question as Giulia huffed and got up to wrap him in her arms, standing tiptoe to reach him in his chair. They’ve had this conversation many times since the process began, the doubt swelling to a tidal wave.
“Of course, I am sure. It is all arranged.” Massimo speaks low, gentle. He reached across the table to place a comforting hand on his arm.
Alberto grinned, a vain attempt to push the uncertainty away. It barely worked. His voice kept cracking around the edges. “Okay. Only if you’re really, really sure.”
“I am.”
“Okay.”
They sat in silence for a moment, the only sound being Machiavelli licking up the last of the crumbs from his food bowl. They watched as he sauntered over to the table, a devious look on his face as he regarded Giulia’s now empty chair.
Her eyes narrowed, “Machiavelli…”
The cat’s tail swung, body poised for the jump.
“Machiavelli, no!” She yelped, letting go of her almost-brother to race after the cat, who had a clump of pasta in his mouth.
The silence breaks into laughter, tears clinging to Alberto’s lashes.
Giulia returned sour faced with a very happy cat in her arms.
The topic wasn't abandoned for long after that. After more dinner had been scooped onto Giulia’s plate, and her rightful seat at the table was once again occupied with a person instead of a pasta-stealing cat, she began again with renewed vigor.
"I want to be there!"
“Giulia-”
“It would be an injustice if I wasn’t there! Right, Alberto?”
Alberto shoved a chunk of bread into his mouth.
“This is too important to miss!” She waved her fork around. Machiavelli waited by her chair, hoping to get lucky a second time.
“And you’ll be there,” Massimo said to her, reaching out to pluck her fork from her hand, dropping it onto her napkin before it took out someone’s eye. “Maybe not here . But you’ll be a part of it.”
“But Papa-!”
“How about this,” he’d told her, pouring himself another glass of wine. “When you file all the paperwork to adopt a child, you can decide the season.”
She’d stabbed at her pasta in defeat.
And she was there, in her own way. Her and Luca, over the phone from Genova. The paperwork for the final round of state approvals had arrived at the Marcovaldo’s in a thick, manila envelope, and he’d at least made sure to wait until all of his children’s classes were done (Giulia and Luca back at her mother's, Alberto home from the little school up on the hill) to peel open the seal.
“Am I his sister yet!"
“Not yet,” Massimo had said, looking for a pen in their cluttered junk drawer.
"How about now?"
"Giulia."
Giulia could hear her father sitting back down. In the background, she also heard Alberto’s voice, crackling like static.
“Are you sure? Because if you’re not sure- ”
“Found a pen,” said Massimo, ignoring Alberto.
“Only if you’re sure- ”
“What’s he doing?” Asked Luca.
“Pacing, mostly,” said Massimo.
“Only if you’re really, really sure! ”
“Alberto!” Giulia grabbed the phone from where it was resting on the bedspread where she and Luca were sitting. “Stop pacing! This is exciting! ”
“Only if you’re super, duper sure, ” whined Alberto.
“Out of ink,” said Massimo, and went to go find another pen.
“Papá had to get him a birth certificate and everything,” Giulia explained to Luca while the people on the other end were busy. Massimo was trying the second pen. It also didn’t work. Alberto was in the midst of a panic attack. She toyed with the phone's spiraled chord. “It's on the wall next to mine. I'll show you next time. And my Mamá, our Mamá, had to sign off, too.” She wriggled. “She said he's going to visit here next break. You hear that, Alberto? She's really excited to meet you!”
“If you’re not sure I’d understand- ”
Luca bounced a little in place. “This is so cool!”
“Yeah!” Giulia beamed. “You know what’s even cooler?”
“What?”
“He gets a new name, too.”
“So cool!" Luca grinned.
“Alberto Marcovaldo ."
Luca repeated it back to her.
“Sounds important, said Giulia.
“Super important,” agreed Luca.
“Oh my god, oh my god, oh my god, ” choked Alberto, who was definitely still pacing.
“Alberto,” said Luca into the phone. “Are you okay?”
“Oh my god ,” said Alberto again.
Luca snorted. “Alberto! He’s sure !”
“Only if you’re totally, completely, 110% sure. ”
“Found another pen,” said Massimo, the chair squeaking as he sat down.
There was some scratching of ink against paper, and a child pacing wildly around ( are you sure, are you sure, are you sure ), while in Genova, Giulia and Luca waited with bated breath.
“It’s signed.”
The receiver nearly broke with the sounds of two screaming children, the third barely listening, clinging to Massimo, tears hanging off his chin, soaking through the sleeve of the man he now called Papá.
“Only if you’re absolutely sure ,” Giulia heard him say around a sob.
Her father laughed, and dipped down to press a firm kiss to brown curls. “It took me this long to find a pen,” he said. “We’re not taking it back.”
It took three more months to officially approve.
The first round of paperwork had been sent months before, and the second had been filled out with anxious children on the phone; signing off on all the documents before sending them back once more to be stamped; for the state to officially recognize the newest member of the Marcovaldo Family.
Almost miraculously (as if Giulia had manifested it with her endless debates), the final manilla envelope appeared during summer break.
They weren’t even home when the Postino left it on the chair next to Massimo’s back door. All of them had gone out on the boat; Massimo staying aboard with a book with Machiaveli curled up beside him, the kids taking turns jumping off. Giulia was still trying to figure out how a flip worked and kept flopping onto her back. Alberto wanted to show off how fast and far he could drag her down.
“Please don’t drown your sister,” Massimo said, lazily flipping to the next page.
“I’m not, technically, yet!” Giulia piped up, which apparently meant he could drown her as many times as he wanted.
“Yeah!” Said Alberto, before dipping underneath the water to grab her ankles, his tail flicking behind him. Her head disappeared mid-laugh.
Luca, ever the responsible one, tried to show her how to jump out of the water, but apparently human legs didn’t work like that.
“That’s okay,” Luca said, trying to be kind. “You’re still a good swimmer.”
“She’s not!” Alberto crowed.
Giulia dunked him.
They all ended up back on the boat after, eating sandwiches with fresh bread, thick slices of mozzarella, and whole basil.
Giulia tried to get the water out of her hair, scrunching the salt-stiff curls in a towel. They all sat wrapped in towels around their swimsuits, and the boys (beneath the clear sky) slowly began to shift back. Scales lazily vanished into skin, starting with their heads and ending at their backs.
The bottom of the boat, covered in water, made the Change a little tricky, and it was strange to see scaled legs, long tails, and webbed feet on only half their bodies.
“I can’t believe you don’t have to deal with this…” she grumbled at Alberto and Luca, whose own hair was still soft, like it hadn’t been in the ocean at all. “So royally unfair.”
Alberto licked balsamic off his fingers. “Well, the whole world is a little unfair when you’re born without my looks.”
She threw the towel at his head, and his sandwich flew into the water.
“Wha- hey! Dad! Did you see- ”
“It wasn’t my-!”
“She- that was-”
“You heard what he said-!”
Luca huddled off to the side, chewing on his own sandwich, while Massimo rolled his eyes and took an extra one from the cooler.
He always packed extra, now.
(It helped, if the Paguros showed up)
(Or if his children decided to get a little… rambunctious…)
(Which was always)
“Giulia. No hitting your brother.”
“Ha!”
“And no teasing your sister.”
Alberto took a too-large bite of his new sandwich, making a point to stare directly at her. “That’s my job!”
“Not yet, it’s not,” mumbled Giulia.
“Kids,” warned Massimo, picking up his book again.
They got back just after lunch, baked by the sun and breathless from laughing. Giulia and Luca were sent up to the house while Alberto helped Massimo tether the boat.
Massimo dropped the rope into the harbor when he heard a shriek.
“Giulia-!”
“ It’s here !”
She ran out of the back gate, Luca just behind her. There was a manilla envelope above her head.
On the dock, Alberto froze.
Luca was by his side, grabbing his arm, pulling on it excitedly over and over again. “Can you believe it’s here!”
He still didn’t move.
“ Mah , Giulia! Not so close to the water!” Massimo chided, plucking it out of her hand.
She didn’t seem to hear him, bouncing around next to Luca.
“Let’s get up to the house,” The man ushered them up, clapping a hand down on Alberto’s shoulder. He was trembling, eyes on the envelope in Massimo's hands.
“Open it, open it, open it!” Giulia was chanting when they walked into the kitchen, already holding out a letter opener to her- to their - father. Luca was bouncing on the soles of his feet behind her, eyes wide.
Alberto sank into a chair while Massimo flicked the envelope open. There was a bubbling in his gut, and it made his hands shake and his knees weak.
He took in Massimo’s face, looking through the documents without a word. His nails bit into his thighs. “They said no.”
“They did not!” The cry came from Luca, his eyes already filling with worried tears as he rushed to look at the papers.
Giulia scoffed, but her eyes were filled with barely concealed worry as well. “They didn’t say no, you guppy.”
“They probably said no!”
“Why would they say no?” She snapped, arms crossed over her chest.
“They said no,” his voice cracked. “I know they did.”
“Alberto-”
He was breathing a little too fast, now, and Luca moved away from the papers to grab his arm while Giulia clung to her father’s side.
“What did they say!” She bounced on her heels, tugging at his shirt. “Papá!”
Massimo flipped to another page, looking at both sides and adding it to the back of the pile.
Curiosity was almost more powerful than disappointment, and Alberto cautiously made his way over to see the papers himself. He stopped just short and backed away before he could.
“Alberto,” Massimo’s voice interrupted the start of what promised to be a very long argument, spreading the table full of papers and leaflets, “This is for you.”
He picked a single paper out of the pile, holding it expectantly towards the teen. Alberto could see in his hand just how thick the cream colored paper is, as he closed his fingers around it.
There was a glittering gold seal in the bottom corner next to a stamped Italian flag and a row of chicken scratch signatures. It was indented slightly and Alberto rubbed his thumb over it while his eyes skimmed the rest of the page.
Certificate of Adoption
By approval of the State of Italia, this is to certify that
Alberto Marcovaldo
Has been formally adopted into the Marcovaldo Family-
There were some more words after that. Something about promising to provide education and financial care and looking out for wellbeing and good health . More even on the papers Massimo was flipping through.
He couldn’t read the rest, because the words began to swim, and the paper in his hand was shaking too hard, and he swore that he heard someone crying before he realized it was him. Arms wrapped around him, ears filled with the sounds of laughter and cheering.
“Luca, have you met my brother? His name is Alberto! Alberto Marcovaldo!” Giulia cowed in pride, her arms were squeezing tight, wrapped around one of his own.
Luca sniffled, eyes trimmed green and blue as he took Alberto’s hand and held it in reminiscence of their old greeting, “Hello, Alberto Marcovaldo. It’s nice to meet you. Again.” Then he twisted their hands around. “Piacere! Girolamo trombetta!”
Alberto Marcovaldo laughed, the sound wet from his tears.
Dinner was a bust before it even started.
Luca was squealing and Giulia was bouncing off the walls and Alberto was teetering between stunned silence and anxious wreck at a shocking speed.
Even Massimo wiped his eyes once or twice when none of the children were looking.
“I have a brother! I’m not an only child anymore!” Giulia was brimming with energy, all of her emotions coming out in the form of jumps and hugs to each member of the kitchen. He can hear Massimo’s deep rumbling laugh as she climbs up his lap, arms flung around him in a tight hug.
“Alright, Giulietta, alright.” He chuckled through his attempts at placating the girl, gaze turning to fall on the boy standing just a few short steps from their hug, “Alberto, figlio, how are you feeling?”
Alberto shrugged, wiping his eyes with the back of his fist. .
It was all he could do. If he opened his mouth, he might have started sobbing. He could feel the pull in his abdomen, wanting to join in the hug of the little family that he’d now become a part of. His body was yelling at him to move, to finally become a part of what they had been working towards for so long.
“Alberto,” said Massimo again.
“Are you… Are you really sure?” He felt himself ask, hands shaking still as they gripped the piece of paper that he couldn’t quite manage to make himself let go.
Giulia was hanging off his right side, and so his left side was free enough to raise an arm.
Alberto crept forward, slowly. Far enough that Massimo could meet him halfway and pull him off the floor onto his other side, until both his children flanked him. He pressed a loud kiss to Alberto’s temple. “I’m sure,” he said.
Long after Massimo had sent them all up to bed, the three Underdogs were awake and laying together in Giulia’s bed. The excitement of the day had gotten them riled up, and it was a welcome surprise that it all had come on the night of Luca’s weekly sleepover with the two new siblings.
“I swear it, Giulia, if it wasn’t against the rules I would take over the swimming part this year.” Alberto was laughing, hands gesturing grandly between them, “Imagine how much faster we would win if they let me into the water!”
The window was open, and the summer air off the ocean was cool and salted. It was a reminder that they had weeks to spend together, and at least a few of those would be spent training for the next Portorosso Cup.
“That’s exactly why they won’t let you, crazy .” Came her amused reply, arms crossed, “No other kid would stand a chance!”
“So pasta eating it is.” He raised his fists above his head, letting one drop to hit Luca in the chest. “You’ll bike!”
“And I’ll swim,” said Giulia.
Alberto snorted. “We’ll have to start practicing with you soon.”
“I’m fast!”
“Uh-huh.”
She kicked him.
He kicked her back.
“Jerk.”
“ Idioti .”
“Is this how things are going to be now?” asked Luca.
“Yes.” Came the simultaneous reply, both siblings glancing at each other before breaking out into laughter they quickly muffled in case Massimo heard. It was contagious, this brimming feeling of togetherness, and Luca found himself laughing along as well while the three of them tried to keep from waking the man in the room across from theirs by shoving their faces into the pillows.
Giulia turned onto her side, pressing her chin against Alberto’s right shoulder. Over his chest, she could see Luca’s curls popping up over his left arm.
Alberto’s skin was still warm from the sun that afternoon. He always seemed to smell like salt and driftwood and basil. It was something she found that followed her to school.
It was beginning to smell like home.
“You know,” she said into his sleeve. “You’ll get to sign up with your new name.”
The uptick in his smile is easy to see from so close, and she felt his chest balloon, pulling in a sharp breath.
“Alberto Marcovaldo.” He breathed it out like a prayer, like salvation.
“Alberto Marcovaldo.” The two on either side of him respond in tandem, Luca’s hand finding his to squeeze while Giulia curled in closer.
“The Marcovaldo siblings. And Luca.” Giulia grinned, head popping up to take in the look on their faces, one filled with joy and the other playful indignation.
“The Underdogs .” Alberto corrected, smiling back at her as he raised a hand into the air. Two others join his, all of their fingers linking together in a three-way handshake they had spent the past few months imagining up.
With all of the excitement of the day, it was inevitable that one of them should fall asleep soon. During talks of the race and their competition, Giulia’s voice grew shorter and quieter, her eyes soon sliding shut against Alberto’s side as her breath evened out.
The other two were silent for a while, listening to her breathe. Alberto stared at the posters on her wall, the pictures of all of them leaning on the bookshelves, her collection of seashells that he’d helped her find on their boat trips.
He thought Luca had fallen asleep, too.
But-
“I can’t wait to sign up.”
Luca spoke up, breaking the stillness of the air. Alberto turned his head to look at him, catching his eyes looking up at the ceiling where they had pressed little glowing stars above the bed during winter break. They’d had to jump on her bed to reach. Alberto had knocked his head twice.
“Yeah, for sure.”
Luca stifled a laugh with his fist. “At least we won’t have to deal with Ercole this time.”
Alberto snorted, careful not to jostle Giulia.
It had been right around the end of the fall season when Ercole had decided to throw an absolute bash of a party. Alberto remembered hearing the music from his room, stuffing his head under the pillows while Massimo stalked the halls cursing about crazy kids and can’t they let anyone sleep? and I’m not a violent man, but-
It turned out, the party had been for his 22nd birthday.
Ercole hadn’t cared about the noise violation or the warning or the citation or even the fine he got from the officers, and had made it his mission to wake up the whole of Italy.
When none of their tactics worked to knock the smug smile off his face, the police officers had written a report, snatched one of the invitations scattered around his front steps, and stomped back to town.
The next day he’d been found begging at the stoop of Signora Marsigliese.
“Can’t you just overlook it!”
“No.”
“I’m still young!” He’d said, hands clasped. “You have to make an exception!”
“I have to?” she’d said. “I had no clue that I had to.”
When he’d realized that begging and pleading would not sway her, he had taken to picking apart the rules themselves.
“Children running around Portorosso in some off-brand Tour de France? Pah!” He’d spat, eyes wild, “And you even allow outsiders in! Outsiders! Sea monsters !”
“ Fourteen year old sea monsters.”
“Do you hear yourself!”
“Good day, Signor Visconti.” Her reply had been filled with cool indifference, before the door closed mere inches from Ercole’s nose.
Alberto had called Giulia that night.
“The Empire has crumbled!” She’d screamed into the phone until her mother gave her a look. Luca could be heard in the background, laughing hysterically and asking him to repeat the story until Alberto had gone to bed blue in the face and hoarse.
Luca squeezed closer to him. “It’ll be so cool,” he said. “You using your new name.”
“Yeah.”
“You know your Papá’s going to make a new sign, probably.”
“Say that again.”
“He’ll make a sign-”
“No. The other thing.”
Luca grinned against his shoulder, reaching down to twine their hands. “Your Papá?”
Alberto swallowed. “Do you think they’re really happy?”
Luca’s gentle sigh tickled against his cheek, “Silenzio, Bruno.”
“But-”
“Alberto, Signor Marcovaldo signed papers for months just to make it happen. He wouldn't just... not want you.”
He remembered. Each of the envelopes that had come in had been filled out with precision and care, many pens bought and used over the course of a few months’ time. He’d helped with extra shifts at the pescheria just to make up for stamp costs.
“What if he changes his mind?”
“He won’t.” Luca’s voice was sure and strong, and the press of their hands together grounded him as he listened, “I’m positive. I don’t even think he can. I’m not sure that Human Papers work like that.”
“But you don’t know that.”
Luca rolled over onto his side. Alberto tilted his head and was met with almost tangible concern. “Why do you think-?”
He stopped himself before he could finish the question.
Alberto turned back again. Back to the little stars.
He’d never noticed it before, but a few of them were shaped like fish. He looked away quick. It made his chest hurt to look.
Luca squeezed his hand. “Alberto…”
“It’s fine.”
“It’s not,” said Luca, honestly. “But they know that. So Mr. Massimo can help you. That’s what he’s supposed to do. Right?”
Alberto swallowed.
He felt the bed shift as Luca leaned up on an elbow. “You did tell them, right?” His voice was getting louder, and Alberto shushed him. “Wait. You didn’t-”
“Shhh,” Alberto said again. Giulia stirred but settled fast enough.
“Why didn’t you-”
“They don’t have to know.”
It was so rare that Luca got angry. He was calm by nature. A constant sunny presence in the Marcovaldo house.
But Luca had told him once that the sun was made of fire.
And now, so was he.
“What did you tell them?”
“It’s not important.”
“Alberto .”
“That…” Alberto blew out a breath. “That he was… gone. So it wasn’t a lie. Not really-”
“Are you-”
“If they want to think he’s dead, they can do that,” he snapped. “I can’t control what they think.”
“You can control what you tell them .”
He looked away.
“Alberto, you need to tell them.”
“Why? He’s not coming back. It’s not like they’ll ever see him.” He could feel the telltale stirrings of anger, burning hard and fast just behind his throat. Luca didn’t understand, he never would. He may have told him about his father, but that didn’t mean he got to tell him who else he tells. He didn’t get to tell the whole damn world about the Tragedy That Was Alberto Scorfano.
So what if he didn’t tell Massimo or Giulia about the person who had left him on the island all those years ago? That was in the past. Luca had called it ‘history’. That’s what they apparently called it in school.
“They don’t need to know,” he said. “They don’t have to.”
“Alberto-”
“They don’t have to know why I’m-”
The word broken hung between them like a star.
Luca opened his mouth, but Alberto didn’t feel like talking anymore. He rolled over to face the window, pulling the summer quilt over his shoulder to tuck in close. Safe.
“I’m tired.” He mumbled, forcing the words out against Giulia’s hair. It tickled his chin.
“… Alberto-”
The room felt too small, and when Luca touched his back, it burned. He sat up, the quilt falling off around his waist in a heap.
“Where are you-”
“My room,” he grunted. Giulia slumped off onto the covers as he climbed to his knees and weaved his way around her legs and Luca’s worried gaze. .
“Do you want me to-”
“Goodnight, Luca,” he said.
He didn’t look back as he slipped out of the bedroom door, making his way down the hall and easily side stepping any loose or creaky floorboards along his path. He could feel all his cracks starting to push their way forwards, clawing at the mask he’d somehow managed to barely keep in place. He made it just past the threshold of his room before it broke, and his hands just fumbled with the door before he sank down into his bed.
Between the thin wall, he could hear Luca shuffle, Giulia’s bedsprings groaning. He was probably considering following him, and Alberto almost wished that he would. Almost wished that he’d open the door and look at him with his brown, sad eyes, and tell him that everything was going to be okay, and he didn’t have to worry, and that maybe, just maybe, they could figure it all out together.
But the springs settled, and soon enough he heard two sets of even breathing.
He curled up onto his side, staring at the slats of moonlight that fell across the floor.
It was a long rest of the night.
Just beyond his window, past the garden and the docks and the little fishing boat and the open water, a dark shadow crept up from the bay onto the shores of Isola de Mare.
The figure was tall, and as he stood from the waters there was the sound of chittering scales.
The last steps onto the beach revealed a long tail, spiked barbs within the fins glinting dangerously under the stars of the Italian Riveria. There was a quick shake, and water flung out onto the cool sands as the figure turned from creature to man.
He took strong, confident steps up the overgrown pathways of the island, his course never wavering as he made his way up to the abandoned tower.
There was a brief pause as the man took in the destruction surrounding the crumbling structure; littered pieces of junk and makeshift ladder all strewn about and covered in overgrown weeds. He scoffed and went around the other side, brushing back vines and roots to reveal a door embedded into the side of the stonework. It only took a hard kick to make the rotted wood give way.
The tower was empty.
And from the looks of it-
(cobwebs)
(dust an inch thick)
(salt cloying to the bricks)
-it had been for a long time.
His expression turned sour, deep green eyes filled with a hateful sort of desperation as he took in the sight. Posters and marks covered the walls, but one in particular stood out as he looked them over.
On the floor, a dusty and torn image of a vespa lay in front of stones covered in tally marks, beginning perfectly lined and even and trailing off towards haphazard slashes.
He’d loved that Vespa.
That stupid, awful Vespa.
He kicked the poster, moving across to the little table. The human stuff his son had collected was still there. It was gathering dust.
With a yell, his arms lashed out, knocking the pathetic things to the floor and hearing them crash to pieces.
“Boy!” He called into the night. Only silence answered him.
The man made his way up onto the roof of the tower, pacing and kicking at pieces of scrap that littered his way. Hands balled into fists. Everything was silent up there, too. A circle of firewood that had been stacked there was nearly gone, picked away with salt and time and gulls.
“Boy!” He called again.
Darkness answered.
The tower was harder to navigate the darker it got, and he stumbled his way back down. It gave him time to think; a dangerous thing.
He’d left so long ago, hoping to teach a lesson about strength.
Alone was strength.
Islands were strength.
He tripped over a loose brick in the steps, catching himself on the wall. The rough stone cut into his hand and he hissed.
He’d given the boy everything.
And he’d left.
Probably for open waters, off to try and forge that hadn’t been made for him.
The boy had always been bad at listening to orders.
He reached the sand and the weeds again, kicking aside rotting wood and stepping over clumps of knotted, dried seaweed, not sure what he was looking for, but looking all the same. Maybe a clue. A direction.
If he was lucky, a few loose scales. Maybe a marking. A stone.
A harpoon.
There wasn’t anything, and the little bubble of hope shrank the longer he searched. It was getting late, and soon enough the little points of light above were shining. Off in the distance, the Human Town was turning brighter. He could see windows turning yellow and blue smoke furling into the air. Shadows passed through the light. Humans began to flock into the main square and gardens.
He could see a group of children near a dock. A hulking man called them in and they raced each other into the back gate.
The man on the island turned away, stepping back through the grass and the sand, back towards the dropoff where he’d arrived.
“Stupid,” he hissed through his teeth. “Ungrateful. Sneaky. Idioti-“
“Sir!”
He paused his tirade to look up.
The man froze.
A fishing boat bobbing by must have seen him, because it was slowly making its way closer, motor chugging along. There was a lantern hanging from the stern, and it gave the water around it a fiery, yellow glow.
When the boat got closer, he could see the fisherman waving at him more clearly, and he stiffened, hoping none of his scales had begun to show. He never liked dealing with humans; horrible, awful, killing things.
The boat got as close as it could without getting stuck in the sand, and the fisherman waved at him again. “Are you lost, sir?”
He cleared his throat. It had been a long time since he’d spoken to a human, and it didn’t help that just behind the fisherman, stacked in the curved bottom of his boat, were tangled nets. He wondered how many he’d have to move to find the harpoon beneath them.
“Not lost,” he said. “Just… looking.”
The fisherman tilted his head. “It ain’t safe to be here this late. Gets pretty cold out here at night.”
“I manage.”
The fisherman took off his cap, and scrubbed a hand through his black curls. When his arm moved, the man could see tattoos along his shoulder. Sea monsters, stabbed through the middle.
He stiffened.
His disgust wasn’t clear enough, because moments later the fisherman was pointing to the bench behind him. “If you want,” he offered, kindly. “I can give you a ride to town.”
“No. Thank you.”
“You sure?”
He nodded. “I have to wait here for someone.”
“Wait for someone?” The Hunter laughed. “Buddy. There’s no one coming to this island. Not now. Haven’t been for a while. You might get a few cliff jumpers, but that’s it. So unless you’re waitin’ for a bunch of bored teens-”
“I’m looking for a boy.”
That gave the fisherman pause. “A… boy?”
It was probably too much information to give a human, a hunter, but there wasn’t much else he could do. So he nodded. “A boy,” he said again. “Young, Probably 14 or 15.”
“A- oh ! You mean Alberto? ”
The man could have reeled backwards. He stood his ground instead and let the name wash over him. A fisherman. A hunter. They knew the Boy by name. “You know him.”
“Sure! Course we do. He’s a-”
“Where is he?”
He expected the man to say that he’d seen him floating off to deeper waters, and was already planning on thanking him, and maybe giving him a scare by diving into the water and tipping his boat over for good measure, when the fisherman gestured towards somewhere else instead.
The man followed his pointed finger towards-
No.
Can’t be.
Not possible-
“He lives over there,” said the fisherman. “Portorosso.” The silence must have lingered for too long, because the Hunter narrowed his eyes. “Why are you looking for-”
“Thank you,” said the man quickly. “You’ve been helpful.”
“If you need a lift-”
“Thank you ,” he said again.
It didn’t leave much room for discussion.
As the Hunter revved his engine to head back to town, the man turned his eyes in the same direction.
His son, surrounding himself with a town of humans. He should have expected as much.
He stepped into the surf, the change rippling through him in a loud hiss of scales. If the boy thought he could escape to the human town and not be caught, well.
He would show him.