Archive of Our Own ^beta

Kaveh feels like he’s been walking for hours. His legs are starting to feel like lead, and his backpack seems to get heavier with every step he takes. The mossy, overgrown path cutting through the forest is a nightmare to navigate, and every few feet, he has to stop just to make sure he hasn’t wandered off the trail and gotten himself lost somewhere deep within the winding trees. 

Glancing up, he’s once again met with the dark ceiling of the canopy above. Its thick foliage bathes the forest floor below in shadows, and the woods seem to get darker every time he dares to look up. He spots some shifting in the branches right above him, and then a bird starts to sing before it dives down from its perch and flies off deeper into the forest. He watches it soar away before sighing and turning his head back to the path, swearing as he still can’t make out the end of it. 

It’s hard to imagine that less than a century ago, this entire area had been filled with little houses and shops. But when he looks carefully into the trees around him, he can see the ghosts of old buildings sitting dilapidated, mostly reduced to mere foundations. It makes the architect in him a little sad to see people's hard work eroded away through time, but in the same breath, the way nature has reclaimed the abandoned structures is beautiful in its own way. He is sure plenty of critters have made this abandoned place their home, so in that respect, the work of the long-forgotten people who built this place lives on.

A mouse or maybe a shrew darts out of a bush right in front of him, and he nearly topples over in his haste to get out of its way. It dances in the face of death right where his boot is about to smash down, and Kaveh’s heart almost pounds right out of his chest as it barely manages to escape and run back into another bush.

“Careful!” Kaveh stage-whispers, hoping somehow the little thing will get the memo not to try that again. “Goddamn it, we’re never safely getting construction equipment through here.” He curses under his breath as he keeps stomping forward.

A stick cracks loudly underfoot, and he flinches a little at the sudden noise. With a whispered apology to the branch, he keeps walking, being a bit more careful about where he steps. In the distance, he thinks he can just about make out the sound of rushing water, and his mood lifts a little. He knew the place they had got planning permission for their house was right beside a little waterfall. With any luck, he wasn’t too far from his destination.

He hikes his backpack up and picks up the pace a little, still keeping his gaze fixed carefully on the ground to avoid any critter casualties and to make sure he isn’t walking off into the seemingly limitless chaos of the forest beyond the path. The sound of water crashing against rocks seems to get louder and louder with every step he takes, and Kaveh is practically skipping as the trees finally seem to thin, and he can make out a clearing a few dozen feet ahead. He rushes out of the endless forest and comes to a crashing halt at the sight he’s met with. 

“Woah,” He mutters, his eyes widening at the luscious, mossy green ground he’s standing on. From a distance, most people would probably think it was grass, but standing on top of its cushiony surface, there’s no mistaking it. He giggles as he bounces on the balls of his feet, the ground beneath him squelching a little at the motion. The moss covers the entire clearing, making the blue pool and waterfall cut into it stand out all the more. It’s one of the most beautiful things Kaveh has ever seen, and all he wants is to slump down on the moist ground, pull out his sketchbook, and etch this place into its pages so he’ll never forget exactly how this little paradise looked.

There are little flowers scattered around all over the mossy lawn, and the pool is much bigger than his clients had let on. The watery surface was swathed in lily pads and little pond creatures going about their day-to-day activities, seemingly unbothered by his sudden intrusion. He watches on in amusement as a pair of frogs seem to squabble at the water's edge, awkwardly tussling with each other as they slip and hop around in the mud. Rolling his eyes, he starts to make his way over, hoping to separate them before either of them gets hurt, but before he can get any closer, a hand shoots out of the water and yanks them beneath the surface.

 Kaveh freezes, left reeling a few feet away as the ripples on the water’s surface smooth out like nothing had ever happened. He almost couldn’t believe it, and as he grappled with what he’d just seen, Kaveh could swear he saw something impossibly iridescent, shimmering and twisting around just beneath the surface of the pool. He presses his eyes firmly shut and takes in a deep breath. His shoulders are trembling a little even though the spring sunlight is hot on his back. Braving another glance, he opens his eyes just in time to see one of the quarreling frogs dragging itself out of the pool as a huge, translucent green fin flashes out of the water behind it, catching the light and glittering as it disappears again deep beneath the water.

Kaveh has half a mind to bolt right out of there, pretend he hasn’t seen a thing, and try to talk his clients out of building anything here or even coming near again. He’s filled with fear at the idea of anyone else coming here and disturbing this place. It seems to feel stranger the longer he stares around him, almost sacred in its beauty. Its unique landscape is practically surreal, even without the incomprehensible happenings. His eyes flick back to the pond, and his heart stops at the wide eyes staring back at him from where they peek just above the surface.

He thinks he screams, but the blood rushing through his ears completely dulls out the sound. The eyes vanish beneath the surface again, leaving ripples in their wake. Kaveh just stares at the water, his heart pounding in his chest as the ghost of the sight haunts his mind. Clenching his fists, he straightens up and squints into the blue waters, hoping to catch a glimpse of anything. After almost a minute of staring at the pool, nothing has shifted, and the ripples have leveled out. Tentatively, he takes a step closer to the water. The mossy ground squishes underfoot as he tiptoes over it. 

As he takes another step closer, he hears a commotion in the distance. Glancing away from the pond, he stares out into the all-encompassing darkness of the forest as birds scream and screech from within. The screeching gets louder, and Kaveh instinctively takes a step back as a crash echoes from somewhere close by. 

“What in god’s name,” He whispers to himself as the sound seems to get closer. He stumbles back a few steps until he’s standing with his back to the pond, his heels in the shallows. The hairs on the back of his neck stand on end, and he has to bite down on his tongue to stop himself from crying out as a bloodcurdling scream reverberates from barely thirty feet away. An impossibly colossal shadow seems to move from within the nearby forest, and Kaveh's heart feels like it is about to burst out of his chest. He looks around desperately for somewhere to hide, but before he can move, a hand clasps around his ankle and drags him back into the water at breakneck speed.

He wails soundlessly into the abyss until another hand comes up to cover his mouth. Kaveh twists in the creature's grasp, but he’s never been a great swimmer, and he hadn’t even taken a deep breath before being pulled under. In the waters above him, he sees tiny fish schooling, only for them to be quickly obscured by an ominous shadow plunging the pond into darkness. Struggling is futile, and he quickly stops thrashing against the solid arms as his body shifts from aerobic respiration to anaerobic, and all the energy begins to drain out of him. His vision starts to get fuzzy as dark spots cloud over. The hands keep dragging him deeper, and he’s sure he’s about to die when the beautiful visage of a silver-haired man appears before him, his silky hair flowing like liquid metal in the water. Strange grey eyes stare fearfully into his, and Kaveh wonders if an angel has come down to take his soul away. He closes his eyes and relaxes because if he’s going to go, at least he’s going with the image of a pretty angel in his mind, but as soon as his eyes flutter shut, there are lips pressed against his breathing oxygen into his lungs and dragging him back into the waking world. 

Opening his eyes, Kaveh realizes the person kissing him is none other than the silver-haired man, who–now more alert–he discovers isn’t a man at all because men didn’t have long opalescent tails. The shadow above them finally moves away, and the pond is bathed in glorious sunlight once more. The (mermaid?) has his eyes closed, his brow furrowed, and his hands trembling around Kaveh’s wrist. He looks at home in the water. The lips against his are plush and soft, and Kaveh melts into them as he shuts his eyes and leans closer, letting the strange creature breathe air into his lungs. They stay tangled together beneath the water for what feels like a lifetime, but eventually, the silver fish breaks their connection before pulling Kaveh into his arms and swimming up right into the battering current of the waterfall, breaking through it and crashing out of the water.

The merman shields Kaveh from the brutal current as they float there, watching as an incomprehensible shadow melts back into a tree right in front of their eyes.

Wordlessly, the stranger swims him over to the edge of the pool and drags him out onto solid land again. Kaveh just lets him, his eyes still transfixed on the tree that monster had just melted into.

“Are you alright?” A surprisingly gentle voice rings out right beside his ear, the man's warm breath hitting the back of his neck. Kaveh shivers and turns to look the creature in the face. The man's pale face glitters in the sunlight from the water droplets all over his skin. He really is a sight to behold. Kaveh drags his eyes over his body and has to bite his lip at the toned muscles on display. His eyes catch on his tail; it seems almost holographic, and he’s nearly overwhelmed by the desire to reach out and touch it, to know how those scales would feel under his fingers. “Hello?” 

Kaveh’s head jerks up, and he locks eyes with the mermaid. 

“Yes,” he whispers quietly, still staring unabashedly at the man's face, taking in every detail of him. His eyes are a strange grey-green, with his pupils encircled by scarlet, curtained by soft pale lashes that match the man's stunning silver hair. His hair doesn't even look wet, and Kaveh has to wonder if that is some kind of mermaid evolutionary trait. The stranger presses his soft lips together and turns away, and Kaveh thinks he sees a blush dusting his cheeks, turning them a soft pink.

“I’m Alhaitham.” The man–Alhaitham–says bluntly, and Kaveh embarrassingly just sits there for a while unresponsive until the man’s face scrunches, and he realizes he’s probably supposed to give some kind of response.

“Oh,” He gasps, feeling his cheeks heat up. “I’m Kaveh.”

Alhaitham nods and then averts his eyes, reaching down to play with the mossy ground.

“It should be safe to leave now that Dryad can just be a little tetchy sometimes.” He says softly, and Kaveh lets out a soft breath as Alhaitham tucks his tail up under himself, thousands of scales shimmering in the light at movement. “You probably just broke a branch or something.”

“Oh,” Kaveh sighs, still dazzled by the sheer stunning presence of the man in front of him. “Do you live here?”

“No,” Alhatitham replies, furrowing his brow as he looks back at the pool at his back, a longing expression softening his features. “My family used to, a long time ago.”

Kaveh watches as the mermaid's fingers dance across the undulating surface of the water.

“B-But how do you, um?” He pipes up, looking pointedly at the Alhaitham's tail, hoping he isn’t being too rude or pushy.

“You’ve never met someone like me before, huh?” Alhaitham snorts quietly, his face pinching a little as he opens his mouth to keep speaking, only to quickly clamp it shut.

Kaveh looks away out into the endless abyss of the forest beyond, staring into its dark, twisting depths as he tries to process the mess he’s landed in. He hears a sigh from beside him, and he glances back just in time to see the air around Alhaitham shimmer and bend in an indescribable way. It’s almost as if the very fabric of reality is curving and distorting, and the next thing Kaveh knows, he’s sat right next to a very naked, seemingly human man.

His cheeks heat up as his eyes accidentally drift down, and he has to clench his teeth hard to avoid making a noise at the sight. Alhaitham was inhumanly beautiful in the mermaid form, but now, as a simple man, Kaveh can’t deny how attractive he finds him. Butterflies flutter like crazy in his stomach, and he prays that Alhaitham can’t tell how flustered he is.

“Give me a minute,” Alhaitham whispers, and Kaveh can only nod and keep his eyes firmly diverted as the man gets to his feet and wanders off towards the treeline. He kind of wants to glance up, but the fear of making the other man feel uncomfortable or objectified keeps him from lifting his head even an inch. 

He senses the footsteps returning and finally raises his eyes just in time to see Alhaitham leaning down to his level. He pulls back an inch, but the other man catches his arm and gently tugs him closer as he wraps a big fleece jacket around his shoulders.

“You’re shivering,” Alhaitham explains, and Kaveh realizes with a start that he is shivering ever so slightly; he’d been too stuck in his head to notice just how icy his skin had gotten. “The water in that pool is pretty cold. I’m sorry I acted so rashly, dragging you under. I don’t have any towels–I don’t really need them–so this is the best I can do, sorry.”

“Stop apologizing. You saved me.” Kaveh breathes out impulsively, reaching up and cupping the other man’s face. Alhaitham’s face contorts a little, and Kaveh wants to puzzle out what’s going through the man’s head when his face twists like that. He wants to get to know every little kink and quirk until he can read Alhaithams’s every action. He’s always been greedy like that. “Um, do you need a ride out of here?”

Alhaitham’s eyes seem to almost glow as he looks back up, and if Kaveh were to hazard a guess, this expression is his little way of showing genuine interest; what kind of interest he’s not sure yet but maybe Alhaitham will give him the time to figure all of that out.

“Okay,” The little mermaid breathes out, and Kaveh’s heart soars.