Perseus gazed deeply into the startlingly blue eyes of the man that lay beside him. He felt his chest swell with emotion. Two weeks past, he would never have imagined that he would ever meet his mate, but now he was laying right next to the very stuff of his fantasies. The friend of his heart from his youth that he had spent five hundred years pining after.

Perseus and Jason had just finished a rather vigorous round of lovemaking. Perseus was certain that Jason had managed to rock the ship from the mere vigour of his thrusts. Perseus was a little bit sore, but truth be told, he would not have had it any other way.

When Jason woke up, the sun was already shining brightly through the window of the captain’s quarters. It wasn’t too great an inconvenience. Perseus was well aware that Jason didn’t have much more to do that day than hopefully find a worthy crew for the ship.

“Good morning, sunshine,” said Perseus, as the sky-fae blinked bleary eyes at him. He pressed a kiss to Jason’s face and tried to shift, but found himself well and truly stuck.

“Why am I sticky?” Jason groaned. He stretched his arms above his head. Just as he did, Perseus saw an opening and jammed his fingers in Jason’s armpits. Jason roared with laughter. “S-s-stop!” he begged as Perseus mercilessly tickled him.

Jason’s memory of the first time that he had gone through one of the merfolk Waterways was both fuzzy and not-so-fond. That had been quite the traumatising experience.

Jason had, after all, gone through the Waterway clinging just to the very end of Perseus’ tail. Even then, he had only just barely been able to hold on.

Truth be told, Jason liked to think that the entire ordeal had been quite the turbulent experience for the both of them. He still hadn’t wrapped his head around how close he had been to getting catapulted to gods know where—and left to drown there without any help.

Thankfully, Jason never had to go through that terrifying darkness again.

Nico sat on a fencepost at the end of the farmland that had been left to him after his father’s untimely death no more than a year and a half ago. He did not want to look back on that time, but when everything in the farm reminded him of the family he’d lost, it was difficult at times and almost impossible at others.

Mournful notes drifted from the wooden flute that Nico held to his lips. Behind him, much of the farmland that had lain fallow since the last winter—the last time that he had had help with the management of the farm.

The song Nico played was a lilting and grieving one. It was difficult not to grieve. The solitude of being a lone farm boy on a property much too big for one man to handle, much less a boy just on the cusp of becoming one, was almost crushing.

Nico was at a loss for what to do. He hadn’t known where to go or whom to talk to for the longest time. “Bianca,” he whispered, to no one in particular. The notes from his flute fell silent. “I wish you were here,” he said.