Awww. He and his mate had a baby? I loved babies. I had baby fever at the moment. Oh my god, I bet it was adorable. A soft gurgle, a muffled coo, left me.
The male drew closer, his steps slowing when I made that noise, to find my beloved crouched over me, nervous burbles starting back up and leaving me as Brushe and Permelia moved to fan out along the hall and allow him space to draw closer. What in the world...
He was very exotic looking, webbed, finned, slick skinned creature feature now. In a way, he was kind of like me, yet not. My heart sped up but not in fear. There were beings like me! And he was full of strange magicks. Not like the ones coming off of Permelia, but as Segrid said mine did, calling them ancient.
At the idea of peppering him with questions, I let out a chirp, not aware I was reforming until a garbled out sound of awe escaped me. The large zippered hoodie Seg had put on this morning before we’d left came around my shoulders. Dismayed to find I was Kelped out but too excited to find another odd fish person so close to care right that very second, I clasped the ends of the jacket over me together and met my King’s eyes excitedly. “There are more people like me, Seg,” I croaked out excitedly. My voice was a little hoarse from all that gurgle burbling, my eyes watering with emotion.
“My sunshine, Queen of my heart,” Segrid murmured in that deep, bass voice of his, “I assure you, you are one in the millions.” My toes curled when he leaned in and planted a kiss on me, a proprietary action that was not lost on me. “But,” he added, purple eyes twinkling once more, “I am happy for your feelings of kinship with the Mer-djinn Guardian.”
The fish beast man let out a soft, rolling croak of a noise in his throat. It was questioning, curious, thoughtful. His beast thought his mate would like to meet us.
“Thank you,” I called out softly, to several pairs of confused looks, even the fish man’s.
“You heard Dax?” Brushe asked eagerly, grinning at my nod. “Oh, ho-ho. How cool is this?”
“Pretty cool,” Permelia replied instantly, as if she was expected to, but she kept casting a questioning glance to a door near the end of the hall with a frown. She seemed distracted.
The fish guy, a literal creature feature, let out another noise. I felt pressure at my temples, as if he had some sort of other way to communicate and was trying, but it wasn’t working. His beast half, as it thought of itself, was easy enough to understand. He thought very loudly and was quite vocal. Every noise he made meant something
“Vivienne. Segrid,” I introduced, then reached over to grab Seg’s free hand and entwine our fingers. My Troll let out a happy rumble that had the fish man glancing between us and grinning. His hands lifted and he began to motion with them, but I didn’t know the first thing about signing. Halfway through signing at us, he paused, cocked his head, blinked, then began signing and making those noises I understood.
As if Permelia’s gaze had willed it, that door she kept looking to opened and two men came out. One looked like an older, silver haired version of the man at the front desk and Brushe mixed together, and smelled like them, too. The other man, a brunette with shoulder length hair streaked with color, who smelled so strongly of the sea I could smell the stink of sea salt heavy on him all the way over here, I knew instantly was something like me and Dax. A Mer-dwyn or Mer-djinn, possibly? Another Kelpie? A Selkie-Kelpie?
“Hey!” Brushe called suddenly. “You guys gotta come see this, the puddle guppy lady can understand Dax!”
The two men glanced up in surprise and made their way over.
“Does this mean she’s Dax’s mate, too?” the tall male Permelia hopefully wasn't too attached to, Brushe, blurted suddenly.
“Oh my god, you carpin’ dingle berry,” Permelia muttered, rushing to throw herself in front of the overlarge male like that might somehow save him.
Then the brunette guy who’d just showed up let out a strange, ugly noise and parked it in front of her, magicks crackling off of him.
Then the guy who’d strolled up with him threw his hands up, palms out, in a placating gesture. “Now hold on just a minute!” he immediately started to shout, like that might help.
“What?!” my usually laid back Troll suddenly burst out, followed by, “MINE!” as I held my form with everything I had and flung myself at him. His eyes were burning purple gems, literal ethereal flames erupting along his shoulders and down his arms as his runes lit. Mine lit, as if to match his ire, until we were both covered in flickering bluish purple magicked flames licking at us.
“Sweet seaweed wrapped shrimp, that is badass,” Brushe breathed, unaware of his imminent Troll maiming. “I want flaming runes tats. All I got was rune rocks. Some Paras have all the damn luck.”
“It’s odd cursed magick,” the brunette who was broken out in lumpy, hard scales all over his arms, his face shining like he’d put shimmering makeup on it, his hair longer, a million shades of brown and faded cotton candy colors. He looked like Merman Ken. My gaze stuck on his webbed hands. Mine flexed, regretting them being gone for the first time ever in my life.
“They are mine,” Segrid snarled low. “Stay back,” he warned, his hand going to my belly protectively.
“She’s pregnant and he’s feeling protective. Come on, guys, give them some space,” the grey haired male, Brushe’s sire, called out.
The brunette cursed and tried to crowd Brushe and Permelia backward.
“Ugh. Move, Brushe, you guys are squishing me!” Permelia protested.
“But I want to see-” Brushe’s voice was nearly a whine, plaintive and low. “Ease up, fishsticks, he’s a Troll, not homicidal! I didn’tseeanyone kicking the bucket, okay?”
As if all he’d heard was homicidal, Segrid started to puff up.
“No one is killing anyone!” I bellowed over the shit storm suddenly brewing as chaos threatened to break loose. “Your friend did you a favor and you made me come here, remember, Troll-squatch?!” I turned to my mate to remind him. “It would be rude to-”
“What in the hell is going on in here?!” A woman burst in suddenly through the double doors the large creature feature had come through, her hair a wild tangle of streaks of color around her head. The baby in the sling she was cradling fussed but soon settled as she adjusted her hold on him, moving her shirt so he could latch on to breast feed, and strode closer without breaking stride. “Do you have any idea how long I’ve been trying to settle this little guy?” she fairly snarled. Her eyes were obsidian, eclipsed in inky blackness, irises, sclera, and all. Her exposed skin erupted in scales before my eyes. Her fingers began to web, teeth coming to sharp points. “Dax?” she asked of the creature male.
Dax went to her immediately, wrapping his arms around her protectively, I noted from my vantage point as Segrid slowly turned and began shuffling back, like he was trying to plan out the fastest exit strategy.
