Neptune's Blessings Ch. 043 - End

Chapter 43

Mathias clambered onto land and gave the tree that his tail had previously grasped a brief look, before settling down to watch Alula nervously move towards him.

Now that she had shown more interest than shy glances and occasional blushes, Mathias allowed his eyes to roam eagerly from her dark brown eyes down to her lowest pair of teats.

"Like what you see?" she mumbled, obviously flustered.

A smile tried to tug at his lips as Mathias hummed out an, "Mmhmm."

As she drew up to him he brushed a thumb along her reddened cheek and pulled her closer. Mathias found it adorable for the usually rather calm and collected harpy to be so red cheeked and embarrassed.

"I don't get battle lust," she blurted out.

Mathias made a curious noise and kissed her cheek, prompting her to elaborate, "Um, how the other harpies get turned on by pain and violence."

"I don't either," he responded before kissing her chin and asking curiously, "Are you a virgin?"

"No," she said stiffly before leaning into Mathias as he kissed down her neck.

"It's okay if you are," he told her equitably and rubbed his tongue into her plender gap.

"Oh goddess," she mumbled, and tangled her hands into Mathias' hair as she tilted her head back.

When he moved to suck on her left collarbones she huskily admitted, "I've just never been with a guy before."

"Neither have I," he cheekily mumbled as he moved to sucking on her other set of collarbones.

Laughing shakily she trailed her hands down his neck and asked, "Are you where Clara got that hand licking trick from?"

Mathias looked up at her in surprise, then with a smirk hovering on his lips he answered, "She put her hand over an aroused merman's mouth."

At that, almost shyly Alula pressed her lips to his once more. Mathias made a soft sound of pleasure as he invitingly parted his lips for her. With her tongue caressing the roof of his mouth, Mathias let out a soft muffled moan and yanked her in to press her chest to his own. His hands gently raked through the mottled brown feathers on her back as she rubbed their chests together.

Eventually Mathias impatiently tugged at her hips, trying to get her to grind against his lower belly. Once she started doing so he shuddered and voiced his appreciation and encouraged her to explore by guiding her hands down from his shoulders to his chest.

Alula broke the kiss to nibble along his jaw line as she trailed her hands in feather-light caresses over his chest. Mathias hoarsely whispered, "Touch me like you mean it," as he carefully teased his claws up and down her sides.

She pressed her little hands more firmly into his skin and traced the contours of his chest and neck as Mathias caught her lips once more.

His hands moved forward to play with her nipples, eliciting soft little murmurs of pleasure from them both.

Alula moved down and sucked one of Mathias' nipples into her mouth while her smoothly scaled thumb pad moved around the other one. Mathias squeaked and twitched, but when Alula gave him an uncertain look he merely gave her an encouraging smile and continued playing with her nipples as he enjoyed the unusual sensation of her playing with his.

Once she started to really gyrate upon him, Mathias pulled her closer to feel her nipples rub against his skin and recaptured her lips while he reached back to tease at her damp slit. Sucking upon her lower lip he watched her face lustily as he dragged her juices over her little clit and drove her to a fevered pitch.

Somehow Mathias didn't think that Alula would enjoy him getting stuck inside her quite as much as the others did, and he did not think he would enjoy her panic if she were to do so. So once her passage softened sufficiently he pulled her down onto his throbbing shaft as his tail wrapped about the tree.

As he slid in, gasping in pleasure Mathias held her tightly and buried his face into the crook of her neck until she started to bounce, pressing close enough that her clit rubbed against his lower belly and scales. He loosened his hold slightly to allow her to move, and rained kisses along her neck while she moaned loudly into his ear.

All too soon he was holding her tight once more as her wings flapped erratically. Once she calmed down again, he grabbed her hips and urged her back into rapid motion as he sought his own release. They achieved his goal quickly, as Mathias held Alula to his lap with their lips tangled together.

They leaned against each other to catch their breath and then Alula, awkward and flustered once more, climbed off of him to give him space to reenter the water.

Mathias caught her cheek before she could move very far and pulled her close for a gentle kiss to her other cheek and to murmur into her ear, "Thank you."

As he let the harpy go they exchanged brief wishful smiles before Mathias made his way back into the water with Alula following after.

The rest of the day passed without much of note aside from when at least an hour apart from each other, just as he seemed to start getting lost in his thoughts, Cora and Callie took turns dragging him back onto land to have their way with him. In between, Helen left and returned with a variety of hand pastries.

Eventually the hour grew late enough that the harpies had to head home, and Mathias had to take the merlings to seek their rest.

When Mathias' course altered from the norm the merlings cautiously moved closer while giving him oddly excited queries. Mathias tried to pull a smile onto his face, but all that he managed was a painful twitching quiver. So instead he took a deep breath and tremblingly explained to the overlapping and therefore unintelligible questions, "We're going to the kelp forest, where all the other merfolk in our pod who aren't nest bound sleep."

"Uncle Dare?" the bright eyed Quick asked when the others fell into a thoughtful silence.

"Yes," Mathias agreed with a fractured chuckle which quickly faded as he went on with, "And Uncle Tito, but not Uncle Linus. But Your Grandma, and your Mother will be there too, as well as many aunts, uncles and cousins that you've never met."

At the mention of their mother the whole lot of them fearfully shrunk against him. And he had to wonder, 'How can they be so scared of her and not have rejected her yet?' So he spoke up to nervously ask, "Where is your mother?" After a group wide flinch they unerringly pointed in the same direction, which wasn't quite where they were heading, but was still pretty close.

With a sigh, he stared morosely in the direction that they had pointed before forcing himself to brighten up and say as cheerfully as he could, "C'mon guys, hang onto me and maybe we can get there early enough to socialize before bed."

They stared at him dubiously as they slowly swam along with him, with only Shadow and Follows climbing onto his back. Mathias forced his face into a more genuine looking smile as he coaxed the rest aboard, "It'll probably be the funnest part of our night."

He could have simply told them to hang on, and they would've, but as much as he was looking forward to seeing his family again, even more so he didn't want to go back to the kelp forest.

His words prompted Curious to move onto his back though, and the others to slowly follow suit with Rambunctious being the last to wiggle into place and hold on. Sighing in resignation, Mathias sped up towards what felt like his certain doom.

As they approached the looming kelp Mathias shuddered with dread. The ominous feeling that suffused his dreams of the place descended upon him all at once. His merlings, ever in tune with their father, squeaked and somehow shrank further against him.

Before Mathias could panic and retreat a friendly voice called out, "I was wondering when you'd show up!"

Mathias narrowed his focus down onto the other merman, and his two older merlings who were racing towards him, with their three younger siblings tagging along behind them while the older two squealed gleefully, "Uncle Matty!"

Mathias tried to stretch his trembling lips into a smile and held himself stiffly still so as not to flinch away from his nibblings as he hoarsely answered, "Hey Felix, nibblings."

Felix flashed him a mischievous smile and teased, "Hey Matty, I've been waiting here every night for weeks. I didn't think my merlings were that much older than yours."

Mathias started to shake his head, but then his brows furrowed as he counted his brother's younger merlings and mumbled, "Didn't you have four?"

"Yeah," Felix agreed with a sad smile, "I lost one of them..."

Mathias shook his merlings loose and told them to play with their cousins before forcing himself further into the kelp to clasp his older brother sympathetically on the shoulder.

Felix squeezed the hand on his shoulder gratefully and turned to silently watch the merlings cautiously circle around and poke at each other.

With only a few weeks between the majority of them they were around the same size, aside from Glutton and the two older merlings, so it took Felix a few moments to double take and incredulously ask, "Do you still have all ten?"

A small rare smile tugged at Mathias' lips as he proudly watched the merlings start to play and answered his brother in a shy little rasp, "Yeah."

Grinning, Felix pulled his startled brother into a hug and messed with his hair for a few minutes before firmly declaring, "I'm following you out tomorrow."

Mathias batted the older merman's hands away and fixed his own hair before sourly responding, "If she even lets me choose where to go."

Snorting Felix rolled his eyes and scornfully said, "Like that harridan is going to want you going anywhere other than where she's already stuck you." At Mathias' continued gloomy doubtful face, he ruffled his hair more gently this time and grinned maliciously as he pointed out, "We're brothers, and brothers, especially when their merlings are of the same age, stick together. She can't stop me from following you anymore."

Finally Mathias felt reassured enough to pull a small smile onto his face and bump shoulders with his brother as he mumbled out, "Thanks."

Felix's grin softened as the pair turned to watch their merlings. The silence didn't last long though before Tito's voice interrupted with a dry, "I see your vigil finally paid off."

And then Darius was excitedly calling out, "Niblings!" As he was swarmed by fifteen excited merlings, he looked over to where Tito was moving out of the way towards their other brothers and dismissively said, "Oh and hey Matty, Felix."

Felix disgruntledly asked, "Is he always this bad with you?"

Shaking his head, Mathias bemusedly replied, "No, must be because you're here."

Felix rolled his eyes and muttered, "Figures."

The trio then settled to watch with palpable amusement as their goofball brother played with the merlings until he "died." Then Felix called out, "Alright youngsters, it's time to go say hey to your grandma and greet your cousins."

Mathias' offspring watched in confusion as the other five left. Then Mathias chirped and called them over before following after Felix himself. He chose to ignore the curious look Felix gave him over the chirp for now.

Chapter 44

As Mathias followed his brothers deeper into the forest he couldn't help but feel like he was just waiting for the net to descend.

They heard the voices first, it started as a soft murmur of unintelligible entwining conversation, and then as they got past more of the sound eating vegetation they could pick out occasional words and individual voices and the shrill excited squeals of merlings at play.

Mathias could not help but slow down even as his heart sped up, and he gulped in great big gasps of water. Felix continued on ahead of them with one brief glance back, but Tito and Darius exchanged looks and dropped down so they could wrap a comforting arm around their brother from either side.

Mathias came to a complete stop as he shuddered and trembled fearfully. Eventually he managed to whimper out, "I can't do this."

Pressing his head to the side of his brother's, Darius murmured soothingly, "It's just our family, it's really not as many as it sounds like."

Tito gave him a gentle squeeze and gave him further reassurances, "Our siblings' mates and our sisters' merlings won't even be there until you're more comfortable."

Mathias eyes darted around, not quite taking his brother's words in as he searched for an escape from the hidden danger.

Tito patted his shoulder, pointing out, "We'll be right there with you."

Darius sighed, pressing Mathias' ear to his chest he covered his eyes and other ear with his hands. Mathias stiffened up at first but Tito gently caught his hands before he could start thrashing.

Slowly Mathias relaxed, his breathing evened out, and then Darius carefully lifted his hand from his ear as he coaxingly said, "Take your time Matty, and like Tito said, we'll be with you the whole way."

Mathias mutely nodded against Darius' chest as he grasped Tito's hands before he could pull away. He took in his brothers' comforting presence and the steady thrum of Darius' heart beat in one ear as he absorbed the scents and sounds of the place. He reminded himself, 'This was home. More good things happened here than bad. Everyone waiting for us up ahead loves and cares about me and my merlings.'

It didn't entirely help. Even so, he was able to slowly calm down to the point he could let go of Tito and pull away from Darius. Cracking his eyes open he looked from Tito's worried frown, to Darius' cheerful grin and over his merlings anxiously clinging forms.

Forcing a smile onto his face, Mathias focused on his youngsters as with only a slight tremble in his voice he managed to say with a fair approximation of cheerfulness, "Let's go catch up with your cousins." They perked up considerably at their father's act and turned to chase after the already departed uncle and cousins.

Trusting that his brothers would watch his surroundings, Mathias kept his attention on his merlings as he followed after them. He didn't even notice when they arrived amongst the others, so when Sophia, one of Felix's clutchmates, rushed over squealing happily, "Matty!" Mathias whimpered and jerked fearfully to the side.

Before she could even react though, Darius had gotten up into her space and batted his eyes playfully while asking, "Am I still prettier than you?"

She pulled up short and groaned in exasperation while rolling her eyes and replied, "Ugg, yes, you're still disgustingly gorgeous. Now, would you please let me see my favorite brother."

In the background all three of her clutch-brothers simultaneously let out an outraged, "Hey!"

To which she dismissively replied, "You're all jerks and you know it." Further ignoring her six clutchmates' playful bickering she gave Darius a pointed look.

Darius thoughtfully tapped his chin before shaking his head and letting out a regretful sigh as he replied, "Nope, no can do. I can't subject him to your ugliness after having graced him with my gorgeous looks for so long."

Sophia scoffed at that, "Oh come on! You are not that much prettier than me."

By this point Mathias had recovered from his fright, and so after reassuring his merlings and sending them off to play he draped an arm over Darius' shoulder and leaned against him as he pulled on a happy mask and greeted his enthusiastic sister, "Hey Phia."

"Matty!" she squealed happily once more, then tried to get around Darius. But it didn't matter in which direction she went, Darius and Mathias simply turned with her. Finally she stopped and narrowed her eyes at Darius, giving him a disgruntled growl. After a moment of him smirking back at her while Mathias started feeling an actual urge to giggle, she brightened up and moved forward, enveloping them both into a hug.

Mathias stiffened up until he heard Darius loudly proclaiming, "Oh ew! Gross! Why'd you go and hug me for?"

Smirking, she gave Darius a loud kiss on the forehead before smugly telling him, "Because you wouldn't let me hug Matty."

Scoffing himself, Darius told her, "If he wanted a hug, he would've sought it out."

Pulling back, she grumbled and crossed her arms, "If he didn't want one he could've said no."

Their mother put an arm around Sophia and pulled her back even further as she said, "Hey Matty, Darius." Her eyes roamed over what she could see of Mathias before settling onto his fixed smile before she asked, "How are my grandmerlings?"

Mathias relaxed slightly as he looked to where the merlings were playing. He took a moment to watch them before he softly responded, "They seem to be settling in."

A subtle smile tugged at the corners of her lips and with a nod she offered, "That's good, why don't you join us and tell everyone what you've been doing for the past year?"

"Okay," Mathias agreed weakly, and held onto Darius like a remora as they moved over to settle down with the other adults.

When they had done so, Tito sat on the other side of him and leaned companionably against him. He took a deep breath, and watched the merlings instead of any of his adult relatives. They waited patiently, although not silently he noticed, at least until he started speaking, that is. When he spoke with what they no doubt considered uncharacteristic shyness, they fell quiet. Whenever he started feeling overwhelmed or overly upset, Darius would distract everyone from him by asking something that would get someone telling a story of their own.

Even so, Mathias did not dare to divulge most of the abuse that had happened, nor to let slip even the slightest bit about the harpies. In addition to not wanting them to know the extent of his shame, he could feel unfriendly eyes watching and every so often when the current shifted he would get a stronger scent of Chloe that had him shuddering in fear.

It had to end eventually though. The moment came when Chloe swam in amongst them, right up to the fearfully trembling Mathias. She smiled sweetly at the group and let out a gentle laugh as she said, "It's time to go Mathias."

Not daring to look directly at her, Mathias watched her approach from the corner of his eye. At her words he flinched, and failed at not cringing as he called over his merlings who were already racing over to cling to him.

Chloe's nose flared in annoyance, but she maintained her smile as she twisted about to lead Mathias away.

Mathias could feel the panic building up within him, in the same way that his little ones were trying to burrow into his back as he swam. But his brothers had dared not follow, and he did not dare to stop or turn away with her right there.

Arriving at her sleeping area, Chloe said not a word. She merely gave him a disdainful look before curling up.

Mathias hovered there, gasping and trembling before he stuttered out, "G-go see your M-mother." After they had slowly moved off his back and to their mother's side, Mathias fled to a spot that had just enough kelp to shield him from having to see his mate, where he collapsed into a panting, whimpering heap.

Mathias spent several minutes fighting the urge to go and pull his merlings away from their mother when a pained squeal had him up and moving faster than he could think. His motion was quickly arrested however when Shadow came barreling into him, with the other merlings not far behind hir.

Mathias gathered hir into his arms and moved back to where he'd been trying to curl up and carefully checked hir over in the dim filtered light. Even in such lighting he was able to make out the bruises on Shadow's left shoulder, but at least he could smell no blood.

Sighing mournfully he curled protectively around his youngsters, and hummed them a soothing lullaby, before following them into a fitful, nightmare filled slumber.

Chapter 45

The only upside to sleeping so near to Chloe, if it could be considered as such, was that her scent kept Mathias too terrified to move or cry out even in his sleep.

When he woke up stiff and sore and achy from having slept so badly, it was to Chloe looming just inches away with a curious expression on her face. Mathias jerked and strangled a scream as he cringed away from her with his tail pressing protectively over his still drowsy merlings.

Chloe snorted in annoyance and narrowed her eyes at him as she hissed out a warning, "Don't you dare start following your brothers around. Do you understand?"

Whimpering Mathias repeatedly nodded as she tapped her fingers on the ground impatiently until he managed to stammer out, "Y-y-yes."

With an aggrieved sigh Chloe rolled her eyes before slipping on her well practiced friendly mask as she turned away from him and went to do whatever it was she did everyday.

Whimpering softly Mathias repeatedly checked over his fry until he felt like he had enough control of himself to swim out. As he moved Shadow slipped under his hair to attach hirself to his back.

Swimming out, Mathias tried to keep his eyes on the ground in front of him. He could not help but watch everything from the corners of his eyes though, which led to several instances of him flinching away from someone just swimming by him. When they occasionally tried to stop and exchange greetings Mathias would whimper fearfully and swim faster for a beat or two. Within a few short moments that felt like several hours he had burst out of the kelp forest and was heading to the desolate coral.

From behind he heard Felix call out, "Hey, Matty. What's the rush?"

Whimpering softly Mathias all but stopped as he glanced over his shoulder to whisper hoarsely, "Hey Felix... I'm not supposed to follow you guys."

Narrowing his eyes Felix growled out sarcastically, "Good thing I'm following you then."

As Mathias' lips tried to twitch into a smile his brother grumbled to himself, "Sick controlling hagfish." Mathias flinched at those words, so Felix made an exaggerated show of looking around at the lack of anyone within sight and raised his eyebrows as he asked, "So where are we going?"

Pulling the barest trace of a smile onto his face Mathias replied, "If you're tagging along, we'll go to the sandy shallows."

Once they'd started into motion again Felix curiously asked, "The hunting there still good?"

Mathias shook his head and explained, "Not really, they've outgrown it. But it's the safest place and you need to reteach your fry a few signals."

Felix gave him a baffled look as he asked, "But why? The chirps and whistles say so little."

Mathias chirped his merlings into hitching a ride and waited for Felix to follow suit with his words before speeding up and answering, "Explanations for what the danger is, why they need to come now or hide can wait till after they're safe."

A soft "Huh" popped out of Felix's mouth before he lapsed into a thoughtful silence.

They soon arrived at the sandy shallows, although Mathias did not bring them as near the shore as normal, much to his merlings obvious confusion when he called them to his front.

Ignoring his curious brother for the moment, Mathias looked his youngsters over. With a sad frown his gaze settled onto Shadow's bruises and with a sigh he asked, "Where is your mother?"

With them all pointing unerringly in the same direction he wordlessly grumbled and cleared his throat to explain the day's plan, "Okay, so before we go hunting, we're going to practice some signals. Are you all ready?"

After Mathias received a chorus of yeses he turned to Felix and said, "We'll take turns giving them signals. Then once your three have the hang of it we'll go somewhere with decent hunting."

Felix nodded and then they took turns whistling and chirping at the merlings. Felix was surprised the first time Mathias' offspring burrowed into the sand, but as Mathias pointed out there was nowhere else to hide. They both were amused by the merlings obeying and rushing to whichever merman had signaled them. When they were but fry, they would've only obeyed and gone to their parents' signals.

"I guess that's why the signals get phased out," Mathias murmured in amusement as he peered under himself at where thirteen merlings were trying to cram themselves into his shadow.

Chuckling Felix readily agreed, "Yeah, it could get rather chaotic when there are a lot of mermen. But with just us I think you're right that we need them."

Mathias turned a somber gaze onto his brother and pointed out, "Even so, it would be wise for them to continue using the danger and hide whistles."

Felix tapped his chin thoughtfully for a minute before nodding in agreement.

Mathias pulled a smile onto his face and addressed the merlings, "Are you guys ready to go to the swamp?"

Ten of them shot out from under Mathias on a heading directly towards the swamp while they chattered happily. It only took them a moment to realize that their father was not with them, and so they turned back and stared at the other five with eager cries of, "Swamp," and "Hungry," intermixed with each other.

"Coming," Mathias called out reassuringly and gave his brother a questioning look as he moved on after his merlings.

Chuckling, Felix looked to his own confused offspring and said with a gesture, "Come on you lot, let's go see what a swamp is all about."

Since they weren't hitching a ride this time, Mathias' youngsters still kept to their habit of scrounging as they swam even though they weren't going at a particularly leisurely pace.

Mathias peeked back curiously at his still slightly chubbier niblings, who seemed astonished at the sandy floor they swam over. Astonished, that is, until they noticed how shallow the water was getting.

Mathias couldn't help the grin that curled up on the right side of his face as the trio disappeared under their father's hair, who himself gave Mathias an alarmed look. "You'll get used to it!" Mathias called back, with a soft laugh hiding in his voice.

"I don't want to get used to it," Felix grumbled loudly enough for everyone to hear.

Turning his head back to watch his merlings, Mathias supposed that he should feel bad about enjoying his brother's discomfort. But it was so nice to have permanent company, that he couldn't bring himself to do so.

As they started swimming up the river Mathias looked to Felix once more, finding his brother's hair puffed out, his teeth bared in a silent snarl. At Mathias' flinch Felix pressed his lips together, covering his fangs.

Mathias smiled reassuringly and opened his mouth only to have Felix sarcastically interject before he could say anything, "I know, I'll get used to it."

He could not withhold a snicker at his brother's tone and so, to the tune of said brother's grumbling, Mathias turned with a small smile on his face to watch his merlings show off for their still-hiding friends at how much fun it was to swim against the current.

He knew that they would tire of their game soon, and then they could make much faster speed once they were riding. 'Besides,' Mathias thought, 'it would give Felix more time to get used to the freshwater before I subject him to swimming amongst trees.'

When they entered the swamp proper, the merlings let go of Mathias to browse while waiting for their father to settle down. Once again Mathias turned to Felix who had a rictus of a smile on his face, and again before Mathias could say anything he ground out, "I'm getting used to it. Can't you see?"

Mathias shook his head and solemnly said, "No. It looks like you're dying over there."

"Well, well..." Felix started before puffing his cheeks up in frustration, and shooting Mathias a glare as he failed to properly articulate his feelings.

Mathias' lips twitched as he fought down a smile and he helpfully supplied, "the words you want are, 'Fuck you.'"

Without taking any time to think about it Felix snapped out to the world at large, "Fuck you!" Then, after panting for a moment or two he calmed down and gave Mathias an astonished look as he said, "Thank you, that felt surprisingly good."

That smile finally broke through as Mathias softly replied, "You're welcome." He then turned about to graze upon the vegetation as he sought out a good hunting spot for their merlings.

Soon Cuddles swam above hir uncle and held out a small sprig of greenery as ze said to the forms that were clinging to his back, "Eat!"

Both mermen stopped to look at hir, and with a smile Mathias explained, "Cuddles sweety, you need to give them time to get used to the swamp. Why don't you try and offer it to Uncle Felix instead?"

Felix shot Mathias a look of alarm that was completely wiped off his face by the time Cuddles was in front of him and thrusting the sprig into his face while demanding, "Eat!"

With a well practiced smile he took it while graciously saying, "Thank you." Cautiously he popped it into his mouth and slowly chewed.

A look of surprise took over his face as his cautious chewing became leisurely chewing. Finally swallowing he stated in amazement, "That was good. What was it?"

Cuddles puffed up proudly and declared, "Ress!" before swimming off again.

Chuckling Mathias elaborated, "It was watercress."

"Neat!" Felix exclaimed as he looked around with far more curiosity and started asking questions about everything around them. Pretty soon, his merlings had emerged and started learning about the swamp alongside their father, and soon after that Mathias found a spot to settle down and keep an eye on his merlings from while he taught Felix. As Felix's merlings had quickly remembered that they were hungry and joined their cousins.

Eventually though, Mathias got distracted by a shadow, and looked up to watch the large blurry form flit among the trees. A tension that he didn't even know he'd been carrying relaxed, as this had been the first time that he had come to the swamp without having some eyes in the sky to help him keep a lookout.

As it flew out of sight, Mathias let out a small sigh and fought off a pang of longing as he looked back to his brother who was most definitely smirking at him.

Disgruntled, Mathias furrowed his brows and grumpily asked, "What?"

"You're making love to them," Felix singsonged out smugly.

Snorting to hide his alarm, Mathias rolled his eyes and grumbled out, "Don't be ridiculous, everyone knows that you can't make love to anyone else when you're mated."

Chortling as if Mathias had just confirmed everything Felix threw out a sarcastic, "Oh yeah, tell that to the rock I make love to nightly."

"What?" Mathias asked dumbfoundedly.

While using his hands to help illustrate his point Felix fondly reminisced, "It has curves in all the right places. It's just missing a head and a voice."

Blinking Mathias simply repeated, as if his brain was stuck, "What?"

With a happy little sigh Felix continued, "It even has the perfect hole."

Blinking a couple more times Mathias blurted out, "Aren't you ever worried something else will already be in the hole?"

Smirking, Felix shook his head as he responded, "Nah, the thrill of the unknown is part of the excitement. Besides, Ellie likes to watch and pretend it's her."

Dazedly, and without properly thinking about the words coming out of his mouth, Mathias mumbled, "You should use your tongue on her while she watches, especially that nub at the top of her channel."

It was Felix's turn to blink at Mathias in surprise. He however quickly recovered and smugly replied, "Thanks for the tip, I'll have to try that."

Mathias shook his body at those words and turned sharply away as he stiffly said, "I don't make love to harpies." Settling down to watch the merlings he mumbled, "And it doesn't sound like you make love to rocks."

Outright cackling, Felix pounced on Mathias and rolled him over so he could see the form flying above them once again. Then with an arm still wrapped around his brother he smugly asked, "So, tell me about this not making love thing you do with harpies?"

Exasperated, Mathias shoved his way free as he snapped out, "Would you just fucking let it go already!"

"Alright, alright," Felix replied while holding his hands up placatingly.

When Mathias had stopped huffing and glaring so hard, Felix folded his hands together and thoughtfully said while gazing up at the sky, "But you know, if you ever want to spend some time with someone who feels like a true mate, I'll help you."

Mathias gave his brother one last suspicious look and irritated huff before turning his attention back to the merlings.

Chapter 46

On the way back to the kelp forest Mathias could not help but think about his detestable mate's words, and his brows furrowed anxiously. Without even looking at his brother, nor thinking terribly much about his destination, he abruptly altered his course, startling a chorus of squeaks out of the tired merlings on his back.

Felix looked back and forth between the direction they had been going and their new heading and asked in confusion, "Uh, where are we going?"

"She didn't want me following you," Mathias mumbled almost as if to himself while his brain chased itself as he puzzled out the problem.

"Which is why I followed you," Felix agreed with proud confidence.

"Doesn't matter..." Mathias muttered giving his brother no other explanation or thought no matter what he said, or how he asked.

It wasn't until Mathias had been curled up within his nest for a bit that he finally looked up at his fidgeting worried brother. "Darius gets away with coming to visit me once or twice a week," he slowly began.

Felix sat down on the edge of the nest as he sullenly, stubbornly mumbled, "She can't stop me from following you."

"No," Mathias sadly agreed, "but she can punish me if I allow it too often."

Startling, Felix went wide eyed with guilt and worry as he asked, "Do you want me to stop coming with you then?"

Looking around at the nest that Chloe had never been to, Mathias shook his head as a sly smile grew on his lips and he answered the other merman's question with a question, "Do you think you'd be able to find this spot again?"

Felix looked around as well, a look of awe slowly growing upon his face before he finally whispered, "This was Dad's first nest."

Perking up Mathias asked excitedly, "Really?"

Flashing him a grin Felix enthused, "Yeah! I lived in this nest right here, and then later you guys hatched in it. I probably wouldn't remember the place though, except Dad decided he needed to move you guys the second you hatched so Mom gathered us merlings up to help Dad escort the lot of you to the new nesting site, and then Dad put us to work helping him build a new nest."

Mathias hummed contentedly for a moment before quirking an eyebrow as he asked, "Sooo?"

Felix looked confused for only a moment or two before he perked up and answered, "Yeah sure, I can find this spot no problem."

Looking down Mathias fiddled with his claws as he laid his reasoning out for Felix, "If I appear to be complying with her desire for me to stay isolated then her ire isn't likely to get too bad. So if we meet up here instead of traveling together from the kelp forest and then neither of us actually directly talks about each other when mentioning what we'd done for the day, then she'll hopefully assume that I've been giving you the slip every day."

"Hmm," Felix said thoughtfully as he tapped his chin, "But if we're talking about the same place, won't she get suspicious?"

Shrugging, Mathias levelly pointedly out, "She never asks me about my day, so I have a lot of days I could talk about."

Scowling, Felix mumbled and fumed about how if someone wasn't even going to ask about their merlings then they just shouldn't reproduce.

Smiling wanly, Mathias patiently waited.

Finally Felix sighed and rolled his eyes as he held a hand out to Mathias. Once Mathias took his hand, Felix pulled him up out of the nest and sourly said, "It's a plan a shark wouldn't even eat, but it'll probably work so I guess I'll play along."

"Thank you," Mathias faintly rasped out.

And with that, their very tired merlings clinging to their backs and discussions still ringing of what part of their day not to talk about, they set off for the forest once more.

Approaching the kelp, Mathias found it even harder than the day before to force himself forward. He was about to turn around and flee back the way he came when Darius appeared in front of him and firmly grasped his shoulders while letting him look at nothing else.

As his breathing slowed to match Darius' deep even breaths, and the roaring of his heartbeat faded away, he heard Tito quietly reassuring Felix, "Go ahead, we'll take care of him."

"Well, if you're sure..." Felix murmured uncertainly before swimming off with one last uneasy glance at Mathias.

Gently bumping his shoulder into Mathias' trembling arm, Tito dryly said, "So hanging out with Felix all day, that must've been a trial."

Mathias' lips twitched as he tried to smile and after a couple tries he quietly replied, "It wasn't so bad."

With a cheerful smile Darius asked, "Everyone has been waiting. Are you ready, or do you need more time?"

Whimpering softly, Mathias closed his eyes and spent another moment gathering himself before nodding to his brothers and setting back off with them to either side.

When they arrived at their family's gathering, Felix was in the middle of telling the harrowing tale of his journey upriver. Mathias managed to drag a smile onto his face as he visibly ignored the adults and went to lounge amongst the playing merlings.

He must've drifted off at some point though because when he blinked, someone else was in the middle of talking and a couple of his older niblings were curled up atop him.

Mathias tensed up, eyes darting around as he located and counted his merlings. Before he could relax, however, Chloe showed up once more. Convulsively swallowing his whimpers of fear, he carefully shook himself loose and called his youngsters over as she exchanged pleasantries with his family who had varying levels of success in hiding their displeasure at her presence.

Turning towards him, Chloe arched a brow at his timid approach and then, with a pleasant smile and not a word to him she turned to lead the way back to her sleeping area.

It was no easier to follow her than the night before, however this time when Chloe curled up to sleep Mathias neither tried to make his merlings stay nor retreated himself. Instead he curled up as near his abusive mate as he could force himself to do and tried to go to sleep.

He must've had some success, his awareness kept swimming in and out as his merlings left and returned to his side repeatedly. He never felt them go further away than their mother so he tried to ignore it, but his rest that night was even worse than the previous.

When Chloe's early morning stirring had him allowing himself to open his eyes and checking over his merlings, he was met by an extremely dismaying sight. None of them were as bad off as Shadow, who hadn't left his side all night, but every single one of them had light bruises on their shoulders or arms.

Not daring to look directly at her, but needing to speak up in the faintest hope that it might help, Mathias watched her from the corner of his eye and cleared his throat.

When she turned her curious gray eyes onto him as he soothingly patted the backs of their merlings he, with as much confidence as he could muster said, "Merlings are more delicate than they seem and should be handled with great care."

His shoulders tensed up as she stared at him with narrowed eyes, and he fought the urge to cringe away from her. Eventually she left with nary a word spoken.

Releasing a breath he hadn't even been aware of holding, Mathias swam out of the forest in much the same way as he had the day before. Only this time there was no brother waiting to follow him.

Once they were free of the kelp he had his offspring hold on as he made for their old nest, where he could collapse and safely take a nap while awaiting his brother's arrival.

Although he was napping, he was not sleeping very deeply and so quickly woke up when he heard a pair of large merman sized creatures moving towards them.

As his head shot up and around to watch the approaching noisemakers his merlings watched with their cheeks bulging with the seaweed that they'd plucked from the nest. Once he had identified the sound as Felix and Darius he relaxed and tugged a smile onto his face as he asked of his merlings the question that would become part of their morning ritual, "Where is your mother?"

Immediately they all pointed in the same direction. Slumping his shoulders he sighed and explained to them how much safer they would all be if they could get away from her.

Mid-explanation the other five arrived, and as he finished speaking, Darius cheerfully supplied, "What your dad is trying to say, is that if you will just reject the bitch already you can all go be happy without her!"

Smiling faintly Mathias neither agreed nor disagreed, but the smile did not last long as he said fretfully to his brothers, "What am I going to do? I tried leaving them with their mother and that happened," he gestured to Shadow's shoulder before continuing, "So I tried sleeping next to her and then the rest happened..."

Darius looked over the merlings in obvious dismay and Felix said grimly, "Sleep separate." At Mathias' worried, confused look he elaborated, "Sleep separate but nearby. It'll satisfy their need to be near their mother while keeping them from wanting to actually roam to her. Ellie and I have done it a few times on accident when we're upset with each other."

Giving Felix a thoughtful look Mathias asked, "How separate?"

With a shrug Felix answered, "With just enough plants to shield you from sight should be about right."

Mathias nodded slowly and gave himself a shake as he informed his brothers, "We should practice the signals a little more and then we can go to the drop off."

Mathias' niblings seemed to have a better grasp of what the signals actually meant, instead of just following what their cousins were doing by the time that they went to the drop off, and Felix was far more comfortable with this environment. Which led to several moments of Darius or Mathias having to prod him into being more alert.

All in all the day passed by without incident, or much variation from the previous. They went their separate ways and, with great difficulty and, once again, the help of Darius and Tito Mathias went to hang out with his family with the same result as the previous day.

Mathias curled up that night in the same spot he had tried to sleep in on his first night back, and fell into the same restless sleep, expecting to awaken to more of the same.

Chapter 47

Mathias awoke to the predawn light filtering through the water and leaves. After a careful examination of his youngsters he let out a sigh of relief that they seemed to have suffered no new harm and the bruises they had were slowly fading. Felix's advice seemed, thankfully, to have been sound.

Quietly, he nudged his still sleepy offspring onto his back before making his way out to his nest. At that early hour not very many merfolk were stirring and so he successfully escaped the kelp without coming across anyone.

Gratefully he collapsed into his nest. Mathias barely noticed that someone had come by and tended the seaweed within it before he drifted off to sleep.

Mathias was woken up by the sound of someone approaching. He checked upon his merlings who had stayed obediently confined to the nest while he napped. Yawning, he rubbed his eyes and asked about their mother, only to get the disappointingly predictable answer before he gave them permission to exit the nest.

Once Felix showed up instead of answering his question about where they were going that day Mathias gave him a measuring look and asked, "Can you help me with something?"

Perking up with eager curiosity Felix spouted out, "Yeah, sure, anything!"

Nodding decisively, Mathias turned his back to his brother and pulled his hair out of the way, exposing three parallel stitched up claw marks over the top of his right shoulder blade. Before the other merman could properly react Mathias tonelessly inquired, "Can you remove my stitches?"

Hesitantly Felix placed a hand between his younger brother's shoulders as he worriedly asked, "Err... umm... How?"

Mathias had spent some time thinking about how to remove the stitches on his own, but unfortunately he could not reach these with any of the methods he'd thought up. So he evenly said, "Work your eyetooth between the skin and thread and snip it with your incisors, then pull it free of my skin."

Felix however hesitated still as he worriedly pointed out, "But I might nip you."

"You might," Mathias agreed carelessly.

He leaned slowly towards Mathias' back before pulling sharply away and worried in a mumble, "But won't it hurt?"

"Not much," Mathias reassured with a shrug.

Felix's eyes roamed over his brother's many scars. Huffing unhappily he sarcastically spat out, "Define 'not much.'"

Letting out an exasperated sigh, Mathias let go of his hair and whistled the merlings to follow as he twisted around to go back to his old nest.

Following after as well Felix growled in frustration, "Barnacles Mathias! You really need to remember how to communicate."

Shaking his head, Mathias glanced back at him and sorrowfully said, "I shouldn't have asked that of you, I'm sorry."

Rolling his eyes, Felix snapped out, "If it needs doing it needs doing, and I'll do it too. Even if I don't like it. So don't apologize and get back here."

Mathias was already going slow enough that the merlings could keep up. Surprised, he dropped back to swim beside his brother, and let him grumble for another couple of minutes before he slowly asked, "Would you even do it if there was someone else who could do it with less risk?"

Giving Mathias an askance glance Felix suspiciously quibbled, "It depends on why this someone else isn't going to do it."

With the corners of his lips twitching, although whether his face was trying to smile or frown even he was unsure, Mathias simply replied, "The fewer people trying to keep a secret, the easier it is to keep."

Felix gave Mathias a long, considering look before responding, "I'll keep the merlings distracted."

After exchanging a soft "thank you" and a gruffly bewildered "you're welcome" they continued on in silence until they reached the old nest. The mermen separated there, with Mathias instructing his merlings to stay with their uncle while he went to place the yellow rock at the top of the boulder.

He took a moment to clean up the rock before he lifted it and swam up to place it. Then he swam back to rejoin the others as they waited.

Gazing thoughtfully at the nearby boulder Felix conversationally said, "It's a nice rock, but I still like mine better."

Choking out a laugh, Mathias shook his head and tried to get into the bantering mood that Felix was setting up. "You know," he responded dryly, "you're probably not the only merman to visit that rock."

Felix stuck his nose up and pretended to be offended as he asked in mock outrage, "Are you saying your rock is better than mine because it's more faithful?"

Shaking his head, Mathias gravely told him, "No, I'm saying my boulder is more mine because I don't have to share it."

Felix gasped at that and placed a hand over his heart, as he gave Mathias a sorely wounded look. It didn't last long as Felix soon dissolved into helpless giggles that made it easier for Mathias to bring out a smile of his own.

Chuckling still, Felix briefly gripped Mathias' shoulder and said, "But no seriously, this nesting site is just awful."

"Yeah," Mathias agreed gravely and stared off at nothing. Just as Felix was about to try and regain his attention Mathias morosely pointed out, "But, she laid the eggs in the sand as near the shore as she could get."

Felix's face turned an interesting shade of purplish red before he managed to spit out, "Someone needs to beach that thing."

Pulling that smile back onto his face Mathias plopped his head onto his brother's shoulder, who still fuming muttered, "If she's going to abandon them, she should just do it properly and leave you to raise them without her flipping interference and depredation."

As Mathias' shoulders started shaking with an odd unhappy silent laughter, Felix wrapped an arm around him and continued to grumble, albeit more quietly.

They stayed like this for another hour until a pair of shadows circled them three times and flew back towards shore. At Felix's questioning look Mathias shook his head and said, "Not yet."

When a new, slightly larger shadow passed overhead and started to circle Mathias told his youngsters to stay with their uncle once again and moved off to meet her at the boulder.

As he was swimming away Felix called out, "Hey!" When Mathias paused and looked over his shoulder Felix continued, "Maybe sometime when Darius comes with me, we could actually spend the day apart."

"Maybe," Mathias easily agreed before continuing on his way.

Reaching the top of the boulder, Mathias smiled up at Helen and wiggled up beside her as she peered curiously into the water.

Following her gaze to the distant fuzzy form he answered her unasked question, "My brother Felix, and his three merlings who are the same age as mine."

She turned her perceptive gaze upon Mathias and guessed, "So that means that he has an excuse to follow you around?"

Humming an agreement he nodded as the healer's stare narrowed suspiciously, as if she could tell that he was hiding something from her. But she rarely pressed him on such things, and today was no exception.

Releasing a soft sigh at his stubborn silence Helen said, "Alright, turn around and let me see how your back has healed." Once he had turned his back to her and pulled his hair out of the way she easily removed the stitches.

Letting go of his hair Mathias cautiously asked, "How is everyone?"

Smiling ruefully she let him know, "We're doing alright, but we do miss you. How about you guys?"

Ducking his head shyly he admitted, "I miss you gals too." Then he perked up, turning his eyes to the water as he continued, "The merlings are doing alright though, they've made so many new friends that I don't know how they're not feeling overwhelmed. And my family is doing what they can to take care of us."

Helen draped her wing over his back as she watched the water with him and soothed him, "You should hold onto that. That your family is there."

Mathias nodded, twitching his lips into a small smile as they sat there in companionable silence for a few minutes.

With a sigh he rubbed his face and broke the silence to say, "I really should take them somewhere with decent hunting though."

Chuckling, Helen withdrew her wing and gave him a nod as they exchanged farewells before he slipped back into the water once more.

~~~~~

That evening after Chloe had led Mathias back to her spot, she stopped him before he could flee to where he'd been sleeping, "Mathias. Settle them down and then come back."

Shuddering, he kept his face turned so she could not see the fear and revulsion on it as he nodded and quickly fled.

He knew he would not have long before she came and dragged him back, and he was thankful at least that she would allow him the chance to settle the merlings down so they would not have to witness his shame.

Still, his hands trembled, and his voice stuttered as he coaxed them into a pile without laying down with them. Once Cuddles had closed hir eyes and the rest looked like they would stay put, Mathias steeled himself and returned to his mate.

She wanted exactly what Mathias had feared she wanted, and she got it in the same way she always did. Mathias could not entirely hold back his distressed whimpers, even if he did succeed in keeping his face blank this time. And so when he saw her angry face he didn't even attempt to dodge his punishment, hoping to just get it out of the way sooner.

Slumping down beside his merlings to tend the bloody rends in his chest, Mathias didn't even notice Darius on the other side of them. Until he plucked the needle that Mathias had just taken out of his ear from his trembling fingers and said softly, "Tell me what to do."

Mathias averted his eyes in humiliation and swallowed around the lump in his throat as he pulled a string off his wrist. Offering it to his brother he raggedly, and unable to look him in the face, guided him through threading the needle and stitching his chest closed.

After Mathias put away the needle and curled up with his merlings, Darius curled around him. He hummed soothingly, holding the silently sobbing merman as he fell into a dreamless slumber.

The next morning when he woke up to the bright morning light, it was to find both Darius and Tito curled up with him and his merlings and no sign that Chloe had even tried to chase them off. As time passed on, except on mornings after she had injured Mathias, as long as Darius was gone by the time she was leaving for the day there would be no objections.

Darius theorized that it was because she felt guilty on those mornings, while Tito posited that it was because it gave her an excuse to have her brother in a sleep pile with her. Felix was sure that she was a psycho bitch and it was impossible to predict what she would do so they should just take the wins they could get. Mathias however, did not care to try and spare her more of his thoughts than he had to.

Chapter 48

Over the next six months the three brothers slipped into a predictable pattern of Darius and Felix openly following Mathias whenever he was too injured to reasonably give them the slip. About once or twice a week, they really did separate so that Mathias and his merlings could more easily spend time with the harpies without having to worry as much about someone slipping up.

The last time Mathias had seen the harpies, Cora had told him that they'd most likely have a surprise for him. Mathias thus found himself anxiously waiting in one of the river's meanders. She had told him it would be a good surprise, but good surprises had been so few and far between in his life for the last two years that even coming from his harpies he could not help but worry. It didn't help that they were taking longer to appear than normal.

Finally he spotted a trio of shadows fly overhead, and he wondered if perhaps Alula had come along as well. But when he popped out of the water near the bank he stared in amazement as the third harpy was someone completely different from Alula.

They stared at each other for a few minutes, her grin getting wider and wider until finally he managed to excitedly squeak out, "Clara?"

She let out a delighted little laugh as Mathias looked between the beaming harpies. Then Clara chirped out, "Come on out girls and meet your dad."

A small genuine smile blossomed upon his face as he watched in a happy daze as seven little harpies fluttered down from their mother's and aunts' backs, hopping over towards the new person.

"Hey girls," Mathias greeted them softly. He curiously looked them over as Clara introduced them by name. Their hair ranged in color from his own medium blonde to their mother's dark brown, all with a sparkly green shimmer to them. Their feathers, also highlighted with sparkling green, covered everything except their feet and faces, with the occasional tuft of white down adorably poking out between the outer feathers.

He did have to wonder if such feather coverage was normal, so he asked, "Are baby harpies usually so covered in feathers?"

"Well," Clara explained as the youngsters chattered and bumped against him, "they'll lose the chest feathers when they grow up. Leg feathers aren't too uncommon though, when the dad is a minotaur or satyr. Or, I guess, merman," she finished with a laugh.

Humming happily, he nodded his acknowledgment as he ran his fingers over the heads of his bevy of blue eyed girls. Soon his merlings were popping up out of the water as well to peer curiously at the little harpies whose heads were. for the most part, not that much smaller than theirs.

Beaming at the youngsters as they investigated each other as well as they could given their different elevations, Mathias started to say, "Merlings meet your..." only to stall out as he realized, if they slipped and told someone about their sisters it would raise even more questions he could not safely answer than anything else.

Deflating Mathias let out a sigh and corrected himself to say, "Merlings, meet your new friends."

Cora gave him a sadly understanding look as she and Callie jumped into the water, causing a splash big enough to startle the fledglings into the air. The merlings disappeared under the water briefly before coming back up near the adult harpies and calling out to the other youngsters to come play with them.

As they flew over to circle curiously around their aunts, Mathias wiggled onto land to sit beside Clara and watch with her. After mere moments of companionable silence he abruptly spoke up to say, "Sorry I wasn't more help with naming them."

Shrugging, she wrapped a wing about him pulling him closer as she pointed out, "Most harpies don't get help from the dad. Besides, I think Marina is an awesome name."

Chuckling, he snuggled up to her as he shyly admitted, "It's the name I would've gone with if I'd grown into a mermaid."

Cackling briefly, she gave him an amused look as she incredulously asked, "You would've named yourself after a harbor?"

"It's a pretty word," Mathias said with a stubborn pout, "and harbors are safe."

Humming an agreement Clara nodded as she replied, "Yeah, true, that's why I named the first hatchling that."

Happily he nuzzled into her neck as they fell into a companionable silence. It amazed him how much he had missed her when they had only directly known each other for one day.

The peace was broken when one of the fledglings swooped into the water after a merling and all of the adults lunged towards them in a panic. Before anyone could move very far, however, she was flying back up and out, water rolling off of her wings like it would a duck's.

Mathias remembered what Cora looked like after her dunking, and was the first adult to stop staring in stupefaction and bemusedly ask, "Is that normal?"

The three harpies shook their heads in unison but it was Callie who dazedly answered, "Never heard of it before."

Getting a visible hold on herself Clara called out, "Girls, your feathers are still growing in, don't catch a chill." But even with those words of warning the adults all relaxed a little bit and watched as the merlings jumped out to briefly join their sisters in the sky while the fledglings swooped down to skim over, or even dip briefly into the water, wanting to join their siblings.

Eventually Mathias broke the silence once more to ask, "It keeps slipping my mind, but did Tito ever decide to spar with some of the harpies?"

Surprised, Clara simply blinked at him for a minute before confusedly replying, "I would've thought he already told you."

Shrugging he morosely pointed out, "Only time we've had the privacy that he could do so in, I was either asleep or had more distressing things on my mind."

Furrowing her brow worriedly, Clara slowly nodded her understanding before answering his earlier question, "Well, it took him several tries but he did eventually knock someone up. She laid five eggs. They're just waiting a lil' longer before someone asks him if he wants to do it again."

After that they settled into trading stories about their youngsters and painting a decent picture of how their days typically went.

"Going back to this kelp forest every night sounds like hell itself," Clara remarked dryly.

Giving a one shouldered shrug Mathias evenly replied, "I no longer need help to enter."

Huffing she rolled her eyes as she groused grumpily at him, "That doesn't mean it's any better, just that you've learned to endure."

Nodding, he gave her a brief kiss on the neck as he admitted in a soft sad voice, "I actually miss sleeping in the desolate coral."

Nodding to herself, Clara muttered about various ways that they could catch and disembowel the bitch if they could just lure her close enough to the surface.

Her words of violence brought a certain warmth to Mathias' heart and he startled himself by letting out his first carefree laugh in ages.

Clara's voice petered out as she stared into his mirthful face, and then her lips were crashing into his as her little hands tangled into his hair. Surprised, Mathias nevertheless reciprocated by cupping her cheeks and eagerly exploring her mouth.

When she moaned into his mouth, his whole body shuddered in anticipation and arousal and he quickly slapped a hand over his slit before anything could emerge. Flushing, he pulled away and glanced nervously over to where the fledglings were taking turns resting on their aunts' shoulders.

Following his eyes, Clara let out a soft snicker before calling out, "Can you gals keep the kids occupied?"

Turning to look at them, the other two took in Mathias' flushed face and belly, and exactly where he was pressing a hand into and with a smirk chirped out in unison, "No problem."

Rolling her eyes she called out a grateful, "Thanks!," before she muttered to Mathias, "You know, they practice that creepy human twin thing."

He let out a small nervous laugh before glancing towards their daughters once more and asking worriedly, "But aren't we still a little too exposed?"

She looked over consideringly as well, and then let out a decisive, "Alright," before swiftly straddling Mathias and hooking her arms under his armpits to lift him up.

Squeaking once more, his arms flew up to wrap around her neck as she whispered into his ear while dragging him off into the bushes, "I've been without dick for far too fucking long. Do you wanna help me out?"

Planting enthusiastic kisses along the line of her jaw, Mathias breathed out an eager, "Yes!"

Clara deposited Mathias against a tree and bit into his neck as she told him in a soft growl, "The women at the rookery are nice, but they're too sweet. Show me how wild and savage you can be."

He shivered in pleasure as he looked over her shoulder to make sure they were sufficiently screened. Satisfied with what he could see, or rather not see, he trailed his hands down Clara's torso to grab her hips as he hooked his tail around the tree he was leaning against. Then, before she could bite him again, Mathias twisted his whole body so that her hips were pinned a couple feet off the ground against the tree, his face level with his hands.

Letting out a low growl of his own he stared up at the startled harpy for a moment from under hooded eyes before burying his face into her feathered nethers.

Digging her talons into the soft leaf strewn earth, she tilted her hips to help him find just the right spot faster. Mathias could not help but chuckle as she moved. Shuddering Clara moaned out, "Goddess, yes, laugh more."

Smirking, he let out a purposeful laugh as he twirled the tip of his tongue around her clit. Her hips jolting within his grasp she panted out, "Fuck! You have the best tongue."

Tracing her ridges and playing with her button, Mathias listened to the music of her gasps, moans, and curses. Then once he'd worked her into a proper lather, he nosed further back and thrust his tongue into her tight cloaca.

With Mathias' nose grinding into her clit and his tongue wiggling and exploring her cunt, Clara curled forward and dug her blunted talons into his shoulders. His grip tightened on her hips, keeping them safely pinned as he drove her to a loud wing beating orgasm.

He kept the panting harpy pinned as he nosed his way up to her lowest pair of teats. He had yet to allow himself to take a proper look at them, but he took a moment to do so as she slowly pulled herself upright.

Watching the swollen teats sway under her rounder breasts in time with her heavy breathing, Mathias let out an appreciative growl and latched onto the nearest one. Squealing, she arched into him as his hands released their grip to travel up and down exploring the boundary of skin and feathers.

Only the barest trickle of milk dribbled into his mouth, but that wasn't the point, the point was to lave his eager attention onto the enlarged stiff nipples and puffy darkened areolas.

Reaching up to roughly fondle her boobs, he pulled off of her lowest nipple with a loud pop before moving onto the next to the sound of Clara's stifled moans.

Slowly he moved up her body, teasing and tormenting her nipples along the way with varying lengths of intense suction. When he reached her boobs he slid his hands up over her collarbones and neck to cradle her ears as he subjected those nipples to the same torment that the other six had enjoyed.

Finally, gripping his wrists with sudden ferocity Clara spat out, "Fucking... fuckity fuck Mathias! Fuck me already!"

As he kissed his way up along the same path that his hands had taken, his voice rough, he mused, "Fuckity? That's a new one." Before she could reply he captured her lips, plundering her mouth with his tongue. His claws teased down her neck before he pinned her little arms to her wings and her wings to the tree.

He simply enjoyed the desperate happy sounds issuing from her throat and the feel of her body against his own as she struggled against him for a bit. Mathias then released Clara's wings and arms to dig his claws into the tree above her head and using a combination of pulling with his arms, and pushing with his somewhat eel-like tail he maneuvered himself into position.

As Mathias plunged in they both gasped and leaned into each other for a couple minutes. Then he readjusted his grip to a more comfortable spot for staying stable and rested his chin on top of her head as he rapidly and roughly undulated in and out.

Scrabbling at his back, Clara breathlessly mumbled and moaned as she alternated kissing and biting his neck, which only served to draw great shuddering moans and groans out of Mathias as he fought not to cum in her quite yet.

Finally with a wild cry she spazzed against him, her wings flapped wildly and her cunt clenched down, so he allowed himself to press forcefully against her and cum with his own nearly soundless cry. Afterwards, he carefully slumped back into the soft grass and dirt, keeping a careful grip on Clara as he simultaneously made sure that he didn't land too hard for himself.

Once they had settled, Clara experimentally tried to pull off, only to quickly settle back down with a self satisfied smug expression when she couldn't.

Watching her, he could not help but let out an amused laugh as he caressed her legs and teasingly asked, "Is it everything you wanted?"

She seemed to ponder this question quite deeply before firmly nodding and agreeing, "Yep, can't wait to do it again."

With a smile that did not seem able to leave his lips Mathias shook his head and responded, "Another day, perhaps."

"Alright," Clara agreed smugly and settled more firmly into his lap as they got to chatting once more.

They got so lost in getting properly reacquainted, or just acquainted perhaps, that they didn't even notice when his penis slid back into its slit. It wasn't until an amused and exasperated voice called out, "The girls are getting a little hard to keep corralled here!" that they exchanged sheepish grins and separated.

This time though, Clara crouched down, and Mathias climbed onto her back to be half carried back to the water.

Once they finally parted for the evening, Mathias still could not wipe the smile off his face.

Chapter 49

Somewhere deep down, Mathias had expected things to get better after seeing Clara again. And in a way they did, being around her and their daughters brought a certain lightness to his life that simply made things more enjoyable. On the other hand, it made going back to the kelp forest, and especially to Chloe even more intolerable. So on the whole, it did not feel like anything was really getting better, especially since he still did not see the harpies more than once or twice a week.

Time passed like this, with impossible highs followed nightly by intolerable lows. The only thing that kept him living was his merlings, and the only things that kept him sane were his brothers and, especially, the harpies. For most of another year nothing changed...

~~~~~

Before he even opened his eyes, Mathias felt that something was off. It took him only a moment of thought to realize that two of his merlings were not with him. Lifting his head from the hip of the soundly sleeping Tito he took a quick look at the merlings still snoozing with them and realized that it was Curious and Shadow that were missing.

After he roused the youngsters and got them to hold onto his back, which had become much harder to fit them all on in recent months, he swiftly moved towards the feeling of the missing two, managing to summon up a small bit of gratitude through his overwhelming worry that they were together at least.

Although it looked slightly different in the current lighting he recognized the area that he arrived at as the place his family held their nightly gatherings. He stopped at the edge, relaxing slightly as he watched his mother show the two youngsters how to safely handle and disassemble a prickly green sea urchin.

Happily he remembered his mother teaching him this same thing when he was around their age, however before a smile could fully form on his lips he noticed movement from a different direction and looked over as the pair's heads were also turning.

At the same time as he noticed Chloe, entirely too close to his merlings for comfort, Shadow scooped up hir now spineless urchin and eagerly brought it over to show hir mother. Ze was most likely hoping for some of the same affection and praise that ze'd gotten from everyone except hir mother.

Blanching in terror Mathias let out a quick, "Come here, danger!" whistle as he darted towards his errant offspring. That was very likely the only thing that saved hir life.

Mathias watched as time slowed down, to show him every excruciating detail of Chloe's eyes going from the mermaid who dared teach something to her merling, to the round ball that was being offered to her. Her expression screwed up in complete outraged rejection as her hand swung back and around to knock the urchin flying.

Her claws would have also been on target for the not quite three year old's neck had Mathias' whistle had not had Shadow turning without conscious thought and heading towards hir father. As it was, the claw caught the little merling just under the ribs, and continued halfway down hir tail.

Shadow's loud cry of pain and fear had everyone going still for a moment except Mathias, who scooped up Curious and then as he reached hir, Shadow. Only then did time resume its normal flow for him and he continued to flee while clutching the two to himself, his mother's enraged screams soon followed by his sisters' rang through the kelp forest.

It was not until the kelp forest was not even a visible dot that he slowed down his headlong flight and stopped to take stock of his little one's injuries.

Curling his tail to make a platform to lay Shadow on, Mathias ignored the fact that he was slowly sinking as he checked hir over. He was slightly relieved to see that only one of Chloe's claws had connected well enough to need stitching.

Grabbing one of hir little hands with its needle sharp claws he placed it over his side and said softly and calmly, "We'll get you stitched up, like I do to myself when... I need you to squeeze when the pain gets to be too much to breathe through. Until then, I want you to breathe in as I count to eight, and then breathe out as I count to eight. Got it?"

At hir whimpered nods Mathias smiled reassuringly and arranged a couple of other youngsters to help hold hir still and started counting as he prepared the needle and thread and stitched her up.

By the time he finished, they had nearly reached the seabed, and his side had several little pinpricks. Mathias was mildly surprised that the blood had drawn no predators in but he decided now was not the time to question it and so as he cuddled and comforted Shadow he asked his youngsters, "Where is your mother?"

For the first time he was met by a crowd of confused looks at the question. He let out a sigh of relief. Relief tinged with guilt, true, but real relief nonetheless. He did not feel that they were safe quite yet though, and so after polishing his needle as best he could and reattaching it to his ear he called the uninjured nine onto his back and cradled Shadow to his chest with one arm. Then he chose a new direction, and continued to swim.

~~~~~

Sophia was having a really good morning. Her mate woke her up with the sweetest of kisses. Her younger merlings wanted an extra hug and kiss before they went off with their father. And her elder merlings were telling her all about what their cousins had done the night before for the third or fourth time as she escorted them out to where their school would be gathering.

She was having a really good morning, that is until she heard the one whistle that she had never expected to hear in the kelp forest.

Stopping on the spot, she blanched as she could think of only one person who would even think to use that whistle here, and the situations that he would do so in were very few and far between.

Quickly she snapped out to her merlings, "Go find your father and hide out in the coral today!"

As she hurriedly swam in the direction the whistle had come from with only one brief glance back, they didn't argue or follow. For once they did as they were told without question, for which she could only be grateful. Because shortly after that whistle rang out, she could hear her own mother's enraged scream.

Passing by Mathias who was swimming blindly in nearly the opposite direction, her nose flared as she took in the scent of blood. It had a slightly sweeter scent than Mathias', whose blood she had become distressingly familiar with. With that, all the pieces fell into place and she let out her own enraged growling scream and found another burst of speed as everything took on a slightly reddish tinge.

Somehow she arrived before anyone else, and somehow she retained enough control to just watch for a moment.

The thing didn't seem like she'd ever been in a fight that she hadn't been allowed to win, whereas Sophia had never been in a fight where she was allowed to win, not even with her own clutchmates.

For the last few years Sophia had often wondered if Chloe might've been behind the untimely demise of some of her and Mathias' schoolmates, particularly her own siblings that suddenly disappeared. But from seeing her current fight, she now rather doubted it.

Still, Chloe was scoring more hits than Sophia liked, and this needed to be over. Before someone who would intervene, even in favor of the one who would harm her own merling, arrived.

Sophia had kept in control, and taken her moment to watch the fight. She had watched like a predator. Finally spotting an opportunity, Sophia darted forward. She grabbed a fistful of hair in one hand, clamped the claws of the other over the wretch's shoulder and wrapped Chloe's tail with her own, reinforcing the grip her mother had already established on their foe. With Chloe's mobility all but shut down, the older mermaid was then able to shift her tail upwards and squeeze, putting distracting pressure on Chloe's guts.

Once Sophia's grip was as secure as she could get it she wrenched her fistfull of hair back to fully expose the neck of the enraged, confused mermaid between her and her mother. Neither mother or daughter noticed nor cared that Chloe was still landing hits upon their torsos and arms. Sophia stared dispassionately into the eyes of her brother's tormentor as their mother finally took hold of her throat and sliced it to ribbons.

Once the corpse stopped twitching, Sophia finally allowed some emotion to return to her face. She looked to her mother as they both ignored the hushed crowd that was slowly gathering and asked, "Should we go after Mathias?"

Shaking her head slowly Felicitas evenly said, "It is best not to drag him into a war zone. Without her dragging him down he'll be fine until it is safe for us to go find him."

Hardening her face, Felicitas turned to the crowd to tell them of a merling who was simply seeking hir mother's approval. How that mother showed that she would not stop at abusing her mate.

Epilogue

Felix looked over the seven merlings who were following close to his shadow. His sister Sophia had lost her mate in retaliation after she and their mother had killed Chloe. But at least the merman had managed to successfully protect all of his offspring, even if it had cost him his life. It had taken months for the full backlash of that day to play out, ending with their mother having taken over the pod. They hadn't lost anyone else since.

Felix was the one amongst their siblings who had the least amount of merlings of the same age, so he willingly took on the duties of daytime father and nighttime uncle To Sophia's brood.

Letting out a tired sigh, he cast his gaze over his brothers as they approached the boulder. With the exception of any brothers among the batch of merlings that had fled with their father, they were all with him, even Romulus whose mate had not gone gravid that year due to stress. Well all of them except Darius, Tito and of course Mathias.

Sophia and a handful of their cousins had been sent off to fetch their fathers and younger cousins from where they had been waiting. Everyone agreed that Sophia needed her father's comfort and would be quite useless until she got it. Besides, they should, according to his mother, be back by nightfall, midday the next day at the latest. Felix was quite curious to see them again as most of the merlings that left would be adults by now.

Tito and Darius had gone off seeking Mathias. Tito had an idea as to where Mathias might've gone, but he refused to tell anyone or bring more than Darius with him.

It was hard to let them go. Tito was so small and weak that surely he'd never be able to make the journey alone, and Darius had saved so many mermen's lives with the skills Mathias had taught him that no one wanted to see him go even for just a day or two.

Felix however had the feeling that if they hadn't let them go, they would've just snuck off without anyone knowing.

Shaking his head at the thought he felt the shadow of his normal sardonic smile tug upon his lips and told his brothers to stay and wait for him for a moment.

He tried to get his and Sophia's merlings to stay as well, but they were having none of it and just clung to him tighter as he tried. Finally he gave up and swam over to that boulder with the merlings in tow, that same rock he had teased his brother about so long ago.

It took him a bit of hunting, but eventually he found what he was sure was the proper rock and cleaned it up before going to place it just so on the boulder.

Rejoining his brothers once more he sourly grumped at them, "You know that the merlings won't be able to eat here, you guys should at least take them to the drop off."

Romulus, who kept refusing to believe that he didn't need comforting, draped an arm over his shoulder and said, "Our mates will bring us food."

Felix scowled off into the distance, still keenly feeling the loss of his mate. They might not have been in love, but they had been best friends. He muttered, "Those of you that still have mates."

"Sorry about Ellie," Romulus murmured mournfully.

It finally hit Felix that while he had lost a mate, his older brother had lost all but one of his clutchmates, the siblings he was closest to. And so he might be projecting, just a little bit. With a sigh he let his head fall onto his brother's shoulder, letting him draw comfort from giving it.

Slowly the cuddle pile grew, but before the mermaids could show up with food a pair of shadows circled overhead three times and flew off. Felix perked up, but stayed put until a single shadow started to circle overhead. Then he wiggled free and swam over to the boulder without even bothering to tell the merlings to stay behind this time.

Popping out of the water at the top, he stared at the aged harpy. She had lines in the skin around her eyes and lips, and gray streaks in her brown hair. She stared suspiciously back until the merlings popped up around him, then her gaze softened and she asked before Felix could loosen his tongue, "Where has Mathias been?"

It had been several months, of course they were worried. Shaking himself out of his stupor Felix explained, "He fled the same morning that Mom and Sophia killed his mate. Tito and Darius have gone to see if they can fetch him back."

She nodded and a small almost lizard-like hand popped out from under her wing to gesture for him to go on. Felix gave her a tired smile and continued, "I came as soon as we were sure that we'd won the civil war to let you know what was going on, and see if you guys could help us work out some treaties with the humans."

She stared off into the distance for a little while before finally saying, "Call me Helen."

"I'm Felix," he answered with a nod.

Once she returned her gaze to him they settled into an earnest conversation about their current environment, and what kind of relationship they wanted with the humans and harpies around them. At the end of it they had arranged a meeting between their three leaders up the river.

~~~~~

Tito was rather glad to have the big and friendly Darius along with him, although he would've been perfectly willing to try and sneak out alone if he had to. Darius was good at following his lead and being as quiet or noisy as he needed to be. Besides, it was hard to find anyone who could say no to that smile of his.

He let out a soft sigh, almost wishing that he could be as cheerful as his brother, but then Mathias used to be almost as cheerful as Darius and that hadn't helped him any.

Finally they spotted another merman, or rather a pair of mermen. They were hauling a tuna between them, and they had matching nearly black hair and pale skin. But that is where their resemblance to each other ended. One had brown eyes, and the other green. The green eyed merman had streaks of dark blue in his hair and a wild mottling of blue and pink, whereas the other had streaks of royal purple in his hair and a more subdued mottling of purple and pale orange. Clearly this pod was not as old as their own. Tito worriedly hoped that this would be a good thing.

Darius cheerfully called out, "Hullo!"

Curiously the pair slowed down and looked over to them as they responded in kind.

Catching up with them Darius chirped out, "We were wondering if you guys had anyone by the name of Mathias or Jennas in your pod?"

Immediately the pair turned wary and closed off as the purple one stiffly replied, "We can take you to our pod where you can ask our pod leader."

"Great!" Darius enthused.

As the four of them resumed swimming, now with a more certain direction in mind, Darius kept up his one sided conversation the entire way.

As they approached what Tito assumed was the heart of their pod from the increasingly dense swirl of bright and dark colored merfolk, they reached a point where the other two told them to wait.

It wasn't long before they were approached by what was quite possibly the oldest mermaid either of them had ever seen. With hair and scales so white that she nearly seemed to glow, she was quite easily older than their late unlamented pod leader had been.

It almost startled Tito, and did visibly startle Darius when she spoke in a soothingly dulcet voice, "I hear you're looking for someone."

Hiding his nerves somewhere deep inside Tito spoke up to say, "We're looking for our brother Mathias, or his friend Jenas."

She gave them an ethereal smile as she apologetically informed them, "I'm afraid we don't have anyone by those names here."

Tito fell into a thoughtful silence as he tried to figure out how to get them to talk. The reaction of the two mermen earlier was not that of someone confronted by unknown names. And while Jenas was a bit unusual, Mathias was a common enough name that surely they had a couple of men with a similar name at least.

But before he could come up with anything Darius launched into a long dramatic telling of what their missing brother had been through in the past three years, and then what their pod had been through in the past three months. He ended it with a softly forlorn, "I just wanna know if my brother is okay."

Tito had been watching this pod's leader, and the growing crowd around his story telling brother. And the way that adults and merlings alike seemed to lean into her and form an unselfconscious cuddle pile while listening loosened up a worry in his chest. If this pod were hiding his brother away, it would be alright, he would be alright.

For the first time she seemed sympathetic to their quest as she shooed the crowd back about its business before turning to the brothers once more and sharing with them, "Not too long ago one of my grandchildren left with his merlings to go traveling with a friend of his. I often wonder where they are and what they're up to. However, I have to keep myself content with the thought that as long as those boys stick together, they should be alright."

Darius didn't seem content with this answer. Tito however thanked her and yanked on his brother's arm, softly reminding him, "We should get back to mom before she worries too much."

"Alright," Darius sulkily grumbled as he followed his brother away.

Once they were a sufficient distance away to ensure privacy Darius asked, "So what are we going to tell mom?"

Tito replied with a shrug, "The truth, he's safe with a friend and doesn't want to come back."

As Darius thoughtfully nodded Tito grinned a bit rakishly, as he remembered some ladies that he hadn't dared visit in months and so he blurted out a question to his usually more impulsive brother, "Do you want to go play with some harpies with me?"

At first Darius brightened up and looked like he might just agree, but then his face fell and he shook his head letting out a regretful, "No, I'd be afraid of forgetting how to be gentle. And I still want to have merlings someday."

Chuckling, Tito nodded and patted his shoulder as he agreed, "That is a valid concern."

And so, unsatisfied but relieved, the brothers went home.

Authors Note: That is the end of this story. In the next one, which I might just post all in one block we'll find out where Mathias went, and join him on his journey to healing.