Chapter Text
Percy wakes up feeling an anticipation in the air. A slight thrum in his bones that he wouldn't be able to describe even if he wanted to. It coils around his legs and feet like a playful dog. To his nine year old mind this is completely normal.
He pads over to the window opening the curtains and lets a slant of sunlight in, illuminating the walls in deep sea greens and blues dusted with motes of dirt and mold. Opening the wooden frame he breathes in the polluted air. It's sharp and cloying. He breathes out and takes a moment to just exist.
Still waking up he goes over to his clothes drawer and pulls out a small t-shirt and shorts, pulling them on he nudges the door wide and prepares to greet Gabe in the morning. Already slightly dreading it. The man is a disease, he doesn't know why his perfect momma puts up with him.
However he frowns when he enters the living room and finds it devoid of any life. Usually Gabe is passed out on the couch, like an ugly dragon hoarding empty beer cans and cigarette trays. Percy grimaces and feels an anxious spike shoot through his stomach.
With a rush in his step, he checks to see if his mom has left any notes in the kitchen. He scurries through a second door and nearly collides right into his mom. Relief floods him like a tide reclaiming a forgotten land.
Her bubbly laughter greets him and she hauls him up with practiced ease. Immediately pressing her face into the cruck of his neck. She inhales and squeezes him tighter. “Guess what my little seal?”
Percy basking in his mother’s presence, something he usually doesn't get as she's at work, he sleepily replies “What, Momma?”
She twirls him around with a gleeful shout. “My grandmother wants to see us. She hasn't met you yet, little seal. She doesn’t have internet, or well cable. Actually, anything like that really and we’ve only just received her letter.” There's something hidden in her eyes, relief he thinks, but he can’t tell.
Percy tilts his head in confusion while blinking slowly. “I thought Nanna went to the sleepy place? She went on the plane with grandad, remember.”
His mom smiles a hint of sadness colouring her eyes “Not your Nanna cherub, my Nanna”
Percy’s eyes widen, wow, she must be like a hundred! This is some serious numeracy for a nine year old “How old is your Nanna, Momma?”
Sally places him on the floor and begins puttering about in the kitchen “I think the last time we spoke she was a hundred and two?”
His eyes go wide “But that's like, like ten more than you?”
She pauses for a moment then laughs a sound that rarely graces the house's walls. The kind that could keep him going for years. Percy doesn't remember the last time she’s laughed like this. “A little bit more than ten my darling boy, Try eighty something.”
He stares for a good few moments. Not even being able to understand such a big number. He can't wait to meet her. But then Percy then realises one massive problem. One human sized waste of space problem. “Bu-But what about Gabe momma?”
Sally continues what she’s doing but there’s a swiftness to her actions now a sharp and quick anger in her. There’s a tightness to her jaw and a blaze in her eyes. Percy has only ever seen her like this twice before. Once when a mean man was hurting one of momma’s friends and when the creepy man was trying to follow him home. “Don’t you worry about Gabe, my precious pearl. He’s gone to visit some family in Chicago. When he gets back we’ll be long gone I promise”
She gives him a small smile fire alight in her eyes. A bounce back in her step. “So! Let's get packing, yeah!”
The next few hours are a blur of movement and noise, a kind of beautiful chaos that Percy doesn’t fully understand but feels buzzing under his skin.
Sally movies like a woman on a mission, swift footed. She pulls out a number of suitcases from the hallway closet. Ones Percy’s only seen once or twice, usually when rent got tight and they had to move apartments but this feels different, she doesn’t sigh. She doesn’t look tired. She hums.
Percy tries to help, grabbing clothes from his drawer and tossing them into an open case. He includes a few odd things: a cracked action figure missing an arm, a rock he’s convinced is special, and his favourite hoodie even though it’s got holes in the sleeves. Sally doesn’t stop him. She embraces it and moves with him.
She’s more methodical. She folds neatly, sorts quickly, her hands flying between drawers and bags like she’s done this before. She murmurs to herself sometimes lists, maybe, or reminders. "Documents… medicine… snacks… letters…”
She opens a drawer Percy’s never seen her touch before. Inside is a wooden box with worn edges and a brass latch. She holds it for a long moment, fingers brushing over the lid like it's fragile. Then she tucks it into the bottom of her case with care and reverence.
Percy watches her closely, catching the flicker of something serious in her expression. She catches his gaze and smiles, not one of her big ones, but the kind he trusts. The kind that means everything’s going to be okay even if it isn’t.
Some things are left behind. A cracked photo frame. A chipped mug Sally always used. A soft toy Percy used to sleep with but hasn’t in a while. He hesitates over it, then puts it back on the shelf. It feels like saying goodbye.
There’s a rhythm to it all: the zip of bags, the crinkle of plastic, the soft thud of shoes hitting the floor. Every so often, Sally reaches out and squeezes Percy’s shoulder or ruffles his hair. Like she’s making sure he’s still real. Still with her.
By the time they’re done, Sally has three cases lined up by the door, and Percy has two, one proper suitcase, and a backpack stuffed with snacks and odd treasures. The apartment looks different now. Emptier. Like a place that’s already forgotten them.
Percy bounces on his toes, excitement fizzing in his chest. He doesn’t know where they’re going exactly, or why it has to be today, but momma’s smile is back and it shines brighter than any answer.
They take a taxi to the docks and Percy is thrumming with energy. The Sea! Percy absolutely loves the sea. He can smell it before he can see it and oh. It's glorious.
The moment the taxi stops he’s out like a whippet. He grabs his suitcase and pulls on his backpack. The breeze rushes past him, cool and alive, whipping his hair into his eyes. For a moment everything feels perfect, like the ocean is welcoming him home.
Sally catches up and clasps his hand with a laugh rolling from her throat; she leads him toward one of the larger boats docked nearby, a ferry thrumming with energy and crowded with people boarding in noisy, slow-moving lines.
They reach a man at the gangway checking papers. He’s tall, grey-uniformed, and stiff in a way Percy doesn’t like. “Papers please.” He states, his voice monotonous and bleak.
Sally hands them over and the man looks at them carefully shuffling through them. Then continues to shuffle. Much longer than he did anyone else.
He gets tenser and tenser. Percy watches the man’s face tighten. His mouth thins. His eyes cold and glassy flick down toward Percy. There’s something wrong with those eyes. Too still. Too knowing.
“Ma’am” He says, voice now glacial. “I’m sure you know as well as I do but it is forbidden to take…certain cargo outside of the states. Cannot have certain things mixing, I'm sure you understand.” As he speaks his eyes flick to him. Not at the suitcases, not his mom but directly at him.
“Please” she says gently, pleading, but Percy can feel the anger beginning to rise. “it’s only for a week su-”
“No ma’am.” He snaps cutting her off, “These are the rules. Please step back you will only be issued a warn-”
A voice crashes through the air like thunder on thick water. “COUSIN SALLY! OVER HERE!” It’s loud and joyful and thick with an accent he doesn't know but immediately loves. It’s rich, rolling and musical and leaves absolutely no room for argument. Heads turn and the officer stiffens. At the top of the ramp to the ferry, waving one arm like a flag is a tall woman in a sea green dress that snaps in the wind like a sail. Her hair blazes red and gold like a roaring flame. She spots them and near sprints down the ramp more like water down a valley than feet on wood.
Slipping past the man with practiced ease and a singular fluid motion she flings her arm around his momma. Percy watches his mother go rigid for a heartbeat. But then, as if a thread inside her has been unknotted, she exhales and melts into the embrace. They whisper quick, urgent words exchanged too fast and too soft for Percy to catch. The woman’s fingers brush Sally’s face, her forehead, like she’s checking something only she can see. Then she turns and locks eye’s with Percy.
She stills, her face going slack. Then like the sun breaking through the clouds her eyes brighten. She carefully detangles herself from Sally and sweeps Percy into a hug, wrapping long arms around his shoulders and pulling him in close with a delighted gasp. “Oh sally! He’s precious. He looks just like Aunty Sheila. Poor thing, lucky too mind you, she did break a few hearts.”
Before Percy can respond, she’s already turning, scooping up one of Sally’s suitcases with a casual strength that surprises him. She points dramatically up the ramp. “Well then ONWARDS!”
The man who's been watching this then stands Infront of the ramp and tuts. Trying and failing to reclaim some sort of control over this situation. “Now see here mis-”
“Oh be a dear and tell someone who cares. Now run along, hmm?” Her voice is like a knife wrapped in velvet and leaves no room for argument.
He recoils back as if stuck, her voice carries something underneath it, it wraps around the moment and folds it in half. Percy feels the air… a twinge is the best way he can describe it. Like someone plucked a string to a guitar only he can hear.
The man looks slightly dazed, he blinks rapidly as if someone has just poked his thoughts.
He then swiftly and quickly turns and walks away. The woman throws her head back and laughs. It’s a laugh like breaking waves loud, full of life, utterly unbothered. “Right, so where were we? Ah yes… onwards family!”
Sally chuckles and catches up and the three of them stride up the ramp together. The boat gently rocks beneath their feet as they step onto the deck, the ocean breeze catching their hair and clothes, a soft whisper of things to come.
They set the suitcases on a soft lounge chair near the edge of the boat and the woman drapes herself over it, pulling him onto her lap. He startles slightly and cries out, more in indignation than fear. But she merely shushes him like an angry cat. “Caoimhe (Keeva), darling call me Caoimhe. Or if you're rather old-fashioned about it, call me Auntie.”
He goes to respond but he’s shushed as she places a hand to his lips and another on his cheek. She starts humming a song almost immediately his eyes begin to droop and he can't keep the purr like noise from leaving his throat. He hears Caoimhe clear her throat, the sound still ringing in his ears. The melody carrying him away. “So Sally, Cousin. Tell us why you’ve been ignoring our letters?”
He feels himself drift off to the sound of the melody and the rocking of the boat. It lulls him gently until it feels like he's being cradled by the sea. It doesn't pull or press; it simply is. He drifts downwards. Light flickering on his skin from bioluminescent algae.
He blinks and spirals of coral rise high above him. Windows wreathed in sashes of garment and silk. Three thrones sit at the centre of the room. Two large and symmetrical. A smaller one to the right. A figure turns and the world shifts sideways.
She is not made for land. Her limbs move in graceful arcs in a way that is unbothered by gravity. Her eyes are ancient and of the deep, they meet his and she frowns.
“Tri-”
The sea washes him away, it pulls back, back, back. He’s lying in soft warm grass. Sunlight and honey thick music washes over his ears. A massive paw leans on his chest and a deep rumbling purr emanates from all around him.
A hand brushes his curls lovingly and calmly. The scent of crushed herbs fills the air and surrounds his nose. She hums something older than the world. Older than song. It's haunting and eldritch but safe, Warm and loving.
A lion nudges his hand purring. He begins stroking between its ears and it sighs content. “Soon child, soon you shall be less. But in that absence you will be more.”
She sighs as if annoyed at the world. “You will learn to tend your own garden, to uproot what must wither to water what dares to bloom. There will be weeds, little one. But also wildflowers that are so bright you dare not disturb them."
He tries to question her but all the lions yawn at once and he’s falling into the cold briny sea. A shore made of shadow rises in front of him. Mist curls like the breath of sleeping giants. A man stands barefoot in the foam both one and different from the waves lapping at the shore. His face is hard to place, sometimes young then sometimes carved by time itself.
He raises his hand and the shore parts. He winks and disappears into the waves.
From the break in the air stands a woman with wildfire hair and eyes the colour of crashing waves. She watches him too closely, as if she hears every thought he’s never spoken. She tilts her head. "Do you know what you carry? What you will carry? Hm, or most importantly why do you carry it?"
Before he can ask what she means, the sand melts into stars, and he falls.
He lands on wooden floorboards. Golden light and a scent like lemons and bowstrings. He’s in a cabin without walls. Music flutters around like birdsong trapped in jars. Paper spirals in lazy curls drifting on the wind.
A boy stands at the window sunlight curled in his hair like a laurel wreath. Sky blue eyes meet shifting greens. The boy startles and he falls. Falling off a bridge and Percy reaches to grab him but sunlight searing and bright fills his mouth. He stumbles back and hits a different wall.
The scent of people and smoke. Of old paper. Of warm rope and storm-slick leather. Percy stands in a cabin with too many walls. They fall in and suffocate.
Strings of paper receipts, letters, playing cards, wanted posters spiral through the space, They flutter and twist, ink shifting on their surfaces. A lantern sways from an unseen beam. It doesn’t glow. It winks, like it's keeping secrets.
There’s a boy at the far end, leaning in a shaded corner with a boarded up window, elbows braced, back turned. In the crook of his arms a younger girl sleeps. She appears to be about six or seven. The older child glares protectively at any of the shadows that get too close.
Beside him on window sill maps spread beneath his hands constellations of magic and modern subway lines. He’s humming. The sound is small. Sharp. Almost defiant. Then His shoulders stiffen. He turns. Electric eyes meet shifting sea-green. The boy flinches.
He stumbles back like he’s been caught stealing thoughts. The map rustles. A small scythe charm rolls from the table and hits the ground with a sound like judgment. Percy steps forward instinctively. “Wait-”
But sand explodes between them. Course. rough. And getting everywhere. It fills his mouth, searing hot and bitter. Like trying to swallow lightning. Like being punished for seeing something you shouldn’t.
He chokes. Staggers. Falls. Paper flutters around him. One lands on his chest. He looks down. It’s a wanted poster. His face. The ink smears. The words shift: “Thief. Oath breaker. Oracle’s Curse.”
He falls again and lands on a surface Craggy and jagged. Darkness now. But not the comforting shadow that wraps around you in comfort. But the hollow dark cold and decaying.
Something breathes behind him and chains rattle from deep below. The ground beneath him is dust and broken time. The air tastes like rusted bronze.
“Child of sea and mist. Come take the leap. You know what you're meant to become.” the voice slides into his ears, a blade drawn slow against his face. It coils beneath his ribs sharp and golden, waiting.
“You will break, little tide. You will beg. All things decay.” Time pulses backward. The shadows writhe, hungry. His limbs feel heavier. Like he’s being wound up, like something old is pulling the strings beneath his skin.
“LeT. mE. iN”
The pressure builds and then a laugh. As old as winter, dry as bone. Full of teeth and blood It echoes from somewhere far. From behind a veil never meant to be seen and a chasm so far and wide but it crosses and it sings with fury.
“Oh no no, not for thee. This boy belongs to me. Threaded deep sewn with ash. You dare to reap? Don't be so brash.”
The ticking stutters and the shadows recoil. “He is not yours, not yours to twist. Not yours to chain or drag or kiss. He walks the wild where old roots sleep. His soul is briar, seed sown deep.” The hunger. The anger, the voice from the pit presses forward but is buffeted by a gnarled hand. A Will that will not budge.
“Begone O’ Hunger wrapped in gold. The flame of your seat you no longer sit beneath. He is ours of sea and prism. So run back screaming to thy prison” The darkness snaps like wet wood and he gasps awake.
He lurches forward but strong arms wrap around him and the scent of sea foam and brine fills his nose. “Shhh, Percy shh” He feels himself lifted as he’s placed in his mothers lap. He buries his head into her neck and tries to steady his breathing.
“What’s wrong my little pearl? What's wrong?” She rubs soothing circles into his back and he feels his pulse calm. Her voice is low, careful. Like a lullaby only meant for him. The scent of her: salt and sleep and something sweet grounds him.
“Dreams. Momma dreams” even thinking about the dark makes him want to gag.
“You know Percy.” Caoimhe’s voice slips into the quiet like a tide soft, certain, and ancient. He hadn’t even noticed her nestle beside them, but now she’s there, tucked in close, her hand resting lightly on his ankle, “The place dreams happen can be called many things. Tir na nog, the other world, tel'aran'rhiod and sometimes even aptly called the Dreaming.”
He watches as his mom gives Aunt a look. That subtle tilt of the brow, the quiet tension behind the eyes Don’t go too far. But she ignores it and somehow… the sea stills. The wind hushes. It’s like the world itself leans in to listen. Because this is important. This matters.
Aunt’s voice softens, but it carries. “Most people,” she says, “like your momma, like me… they touch the Dreaming like wind on a pond. A ripple. A brushing of something deeper. They fall from their own dreams, sometimes they touch it for a moment, a flicker.”
She reaches out, as if cupping something fragile in her palm. “But you, Percy…” Her eyes catch the light. Ancient. Sad. Certain. “You, I suspect, are like Grandmother. She doesn’t just touch the Dreaming she can enter it. Walk it. Shape it. Bend it.”
Her voice dips lower. The sea leans closer. “But she can also be taken. Shown what others want her to see. That’s the danger, little seal.”
Percy doesn’t breathe. She leans in. “The Dreaming can be shaped by you. But it can shape you, too. Others may try to pull you in. To make you forget what’s yours and what’s not. But always remember this-”
Her hand gently taps his chest, just once, over his heart. “You, and you alone, are the master of your dream. You are the tide. Not the driftwood.”
Percy stews on her words, rolling them around in his head like smooth stones. He’s never heard anyone else talk about a place like that, a place that isn’t quite a dream, but isn’t quite real either. It sounds like something from a storybook. Almost like… magic.
The thought sits strange and heavy in his chest not frightening exactly, but vast, like the sea on a foggy morning. Something old. Something waiting. It’s amazing he realises, something that he never knew in his short life but makes so much more sense now that he knows.
Finished speaking and letting the words sit, Caoimhe loops her arms tighter and closes her eyes. “Now let us rest we have a few hours till we’re there”
Time slips by like water between fingers. Percy spends it running and playing along the deck. He gasps and points whenever he spots something glinting in the water, a flash of silver scales, a ripple he swears is a dolphin.
He walks along the deck like he’s always belonged. He dances and plays with his Auntie a bond instantly formed between them as naturally as sea foam clings to the tide. His momma watches on the side, her eyes light and free. A burden has been lifted from her shoulders. Even Percy can see it.
The longer they travel he feels something uncoiling in his chest. It’s weird but doesn't hurt so he ignores it. No need to ruin his momma's mood. He just places a hand against his heart every now and again.
As he’s running along the deck he then sees it. Masquerading as a pirate he spins to face his auntie and momma with an imaginary sword in his grasp. “Now I have yee. Giv-” A gasp leaves his lips and his arms go slack. The mist is parting and revealed behind it is a beautiful island.
It’s green and gold beneath a sky the colour of old silver. It isn’t large not at first glance but it stretches wide and deep, like a folded thing waiting to be opened. Hills rise and roll like sleeping giants beneath a patchwork quilt of heather and stone. Thin mist clings to the higher peaks, as though the clouds themselves aren’t ready to let go.
Percy presses his hands to the ship’s railing, breath caught in his throat It’s not just beautiful. It feels… alive. He can't explain it. Like lots of things these days. But he just knows it. Like he knows the skies are blue.
The trees near the shoreline sway, though the wind is soft. The fields glitter strangely where the sun hits them, as if dew has settled in patterns. A standing stone juts out from a hill, worn by centuries and yet something about it gleams, like it remembers being shaped many moons ago.
Farther inland, he glimpses a flicker of red not cloth, not bird, but something too quick to name. A fox, maybe. The ship turns slightly, following the curve of the bay, and he sees it then: a small village nestled in a hollow of the land, roofed in slate and stories. Smoke rises from stone chimneys. The shoreline glistens with black rocks and white sand.
Somewhere in the hills, a lone crow calls once, sharp and clear a sound that feels like both a greeting and a warning.
He feels a hand slip into his warm, steady, grounding. He looks up. His mother is beside him, eyes soft and shimmering like the sea at dawn. Her smile is quiet, but it holds a hundred unspoken things, memory, love, the ache of return. “Welcome to Ireland little pearl. The home of our ancestors.”
The ship docks and people begin to filter out. His mom and aunt Caoimhe grab the suitcases two each and Percy cradles his backpack. They move to the ramp as one and disembark. They walk along the water stained wood and move to the small town
As Percy steps off the dock and onto the cobbled path that leads into the village, something jolts through him. Not painful, just sudden. A shiver that shoots up through the soles of his feet and touches his heart. Like the land has noticed him.
He stumbles. Caoimhe catches him instantly, steadying him with a firm hand. “Careful, love. Don’t want to go falling into a fairy ring, now do we?” She and his mom laugh and he laughs too. But something in his Aunt's voice tells him to definitely be careful. He pockets the warning away in his head.
He glances up, curiosity winning over caution. “So where does Nanna’s mom live?”
Caoimhe responds with a tilt to her lips in a way that makes her look like she knows the punchline to a joke no one’s told yet. “Over the hills and through the dales. Past the old oak and over the stream”
Percy frowns. “But… How do we get there?”
She gives his head a little ruffle. “Oh, don't you worry little Seal, a friend of Grandma’s is picking us up”
That seems reasonable enough. He nods and turns his attention to the town. It’s small but full of life. Smoke drifts from cottage chimneys. The air smells of turf and bread and rain. People move like they belong to the place slow, knowing, quiet-footed. He lets the sounds wash over him the soft lilt of voices, the gulls, the clatter of hooves on stone. There’s music somewhere, maybe just a whistle, maybe something older.
Across the road, a woman with bright blonde hair catches his eye. She lifts her hand in a slow wave, eyes bright. Percy waves back with a grin, impish and easy. She’s gone a second later, swallowed by the crowd. But the smile lingers on his lips.
They don't wait long by the cobbled road. Soon enough a cart rolls into view. Not a car, not a van, an actual cart made from wood and hewn rope pulled by a short and stout pony. Percy stares and looks at the adults. His aunt looks like this is an everyday occurrence and his mom has a fond look on her face.
The ponies Hooves clatter against the cobble like thunder in the sky. It's a drumbeat that rolls out on the stone. It trots on seemingly unbothered by pretty much anything.
The woman driving it looks ancient. But in the way trees look old. Or old ruins are reclaimed by nature. Cloaked in green and browns, her clothes are layered like bark, her hair is tucked beneath a faded kerchief that might’ve once been blue but is now a faded grey. She sits like she’s part of the cart. Like she grew right from it.
She brings the pony to a stop with a soft sound between her teeth and slides down, knees cracking, boots thudding into the stones. “Well now,” she says, eyeing Sally with a smile that creases her entire face like a folded map. “Still breathing, I see. That’s a blessing. Heard all about your troubles west. I can sort that out, you know. Us gardeners are everywhere”
Sally hugs her. It’s a quiet hug, no fuss, no words, just warmth and shared memory.
Caoimhe offers a nod and a grin. “Still hoarding weeds and rumours, I take it Brídín (BREE-jeen)”
“Some things keep better than others,” the old woman replies with a wink.
Then her eyes land on Percy. She doesn’t crouch, doesn’t call attention. She just takes a long look, the way someone might look at a sapling growing in an odd patch of soil. Not judgmental. Just... wondering. It's slightly unnerving.
“And well, He’s clearly yours. Looks like the spitting image of our Sheila. Course she lives on in him.”
Sally nods.
“Hmm.” She tilts her head slightly. “You’ve brought him far. Mayhaps too far. Only time will tell.”
There’s a moment where Percy wonders if he’s meant to say something but Brídín just steps past him, letting her fingers graze his shoulder as she walks by. The touch is light, but it leaves a prickle behind like nettles. “He’s quiet,” she says, not turning around. “Good. The quiet ones hear the right things.
Percy isn’t sure if it’s a compliment. He shifts his backpack on his shoulders and glances at Caoimhe, who gives him a look that says, you get used to her. Brídín rummages in her cart and returns with a small bundle wrapped in linen. She doesn’t offer it with any grand gesture, just hands it to him casually.
He hears someone say. Grouchy and deep. Barmy old goat freaking out the bairns” He tries to see who said it but he doesn't see anyone else close. Huh, weird.
“Smells like nothing. But it’ll keep your dreams from tangling, if they try. Put it under your pillow.”
He accepts it with a quiet “thank you,” though he doesn’t quite know what it is.
She turns back to the cart. “Come on, then. Road’s long, and the rain’s eyeing us from the west.”
The pony snorts, unimpressed, then They begin to move down a narrow path that threads along the shore and curves into the green. The bumps of the cart are soothing, as much as they are a pain. He sits in the back with his mother and aunt on either side of Brídín.
The cart rolls on, a soft lullaby to Percy’s tired brain. Emotion after emotion has been rinsed out of him now he’s just ready to sleep again. The road, well if it could be called that It's more a dirt path, is flanked by stone walls draped in moss and thorny bramble. The hills ahead roll like waves frozen mid-swell, rising and dipping into the distance soft, green, endless. Percy watches them from the back of the cart, chin resting on the edge, the linen bundle from Brídín clutched loosely in his lap. He lets the grown-ups’ conversation wash over him like background music, catching only fragments.
“Why bring him now?” Brídín asks, her voice just above the wind. “I could have sworn she’s been sending you letters since the little one's birth?”
Sally sighs, not annoyed, just tired. “We never received any.” A pause. Percy hears a bird call. Then silence. “We never received any. I tried taking a trip, but I was stopped. His… He doesn't want Percy leaving.
“The sea-lord,” Brídín mutters. “Of course.”
“He thought it was safer. The less contact I had with anyone… the better. No threads to pull. No names to trace.”
“So you were cut off,” Caoimhe says, voice flat.
“Every letter I sent came back unopened. Or just… disappeared.” Sally’s voice grows small. “Phones would die mid-call.”
“And when I did try to come,” Sally adds, “the path closed. Illness. Missed trains. People forgetting they owed me favours. It wasn’t malice, not really. It was protection. But the kind that buries you alive.”
Brídín clicks her tongue. “It was malice. Just wrapped in a father’s love and a god’s fear.” The cart hits a rut. The jolt passes through Percy like a shiver.
“Grandmother had enough,” Caoimhe says after a while. “She was watching the water that night. Said it was whispering wrong. She pulled a few threads, called in a favour I didn’t know she still had. Somehow, a letter got through.”
“Ah,” Brídín breathes. “So she forced the tide to split.”
“Just long enough,” Sally murmurs. “I got Gabe to leave. Then we packed a bag and ran.”
“You could’ve used what I taught you,” Brídín says softly. “That binding I showed you, the long-thread charm. You knew how to cloak yourself.”
“I couldn’t,” Sally says. “I knew what it would cost. Magic draws light. Light draws eyes. And that brings death. I feel it in my bones, Brídín.”
A silence stretches. “It wouldn’t have been your death,” the old woman says.
“Exactly.”
Percy doesn’t turn around. He doesn’t ask. But something in his chest feels tight and strange like hearing a song with his name hidden in the lyrics.
The cart slows. The pony snorts. Caoimhe sits up straighter. “...Did the wind just change?”
Brídín hums low in her throat, like she's tasting something in the air. The pony huffs, then stops entirely, ears flicking. Percy lifts his head. A man stands in the road. Not strange at first glance, just a traveller, really. Cloak pinned at the shoulder, a satchel slung across his chest. Dusty boots, a warm grin, hair windswept and curling like he’s never known stillness. There's a feather tucked behind his ear or maybe it’s a shadow. But there’s something off.
He stands like he belongs in every place and no place at once. Like the road curved just to let him walk it. “Ladies,” the man says, tipping an imaginary hat. “Afternoon.”
His mom immediately reaches back and hides him from view. Brídín steps down rubbing something between her fingers. “You do not belong here, Thief.”
He has a lopsided grin and bows mischievously. “Ahhh, but I'm not here as a thief hedgewitch, I come as Agelos. A mere traveller. A messenger.”
“We want not your message. Leave.” Brídín says and plants herself in the middle of the road.
His eyebrow raises. “Please let us not waste time. We both know how this ends if you stand here now. Against me. A hedge witch. Not even a sorceress against a god?”
Sally speaks up, her voice cutting. “Please leave. He’s just a child. His father tried his best but it wasn’t enough”
“The lord of the seas will not be kind to hear that. Now please hand over the child.” His sandals flutter and suddenly there's an extra hand on his shoulder.
Brídín acts quickly; she pulls out a fig stick and snaps it between her fingers. Then a gong, something resonates deep and low through the earth. Eyes now watch them. The man straightens. Something like worry in his voice. “What did you do? Witch.”
Brídín smiles, a vindictive thing. “I called help.”
“No, th-” He begins but is abruptly cut off.
From the air stepping from a fold like a dream made real a woman appears. The road boughs under her foot. Her cloak is moss and dusk, her staff blackthorn and storm. Her braid swings long behind her, woven with feathers and bone. Her face is carved from stone and starlight, her eyes ageless, not immortal, but unwilling to die.
She does not look at the others. She looks straight at the man. “Release your hand. Or lest you lose it and I feed it to the redcaps.”
His hand stays for a moment before he releases Percy. “He is his fathers so-”
“Poseidon does not command these hills,” she says, stepping forward. “He does not dream here. He does not rule here. I say his name. Yet he is not called. Names have power. But these hills are sewn with my family's blood. They are my domain. I choose which words have power. His do not.”
“The boy is his blood. He ha-” she interrupts again. The man bristles with anger.
“I am the lady of this land. If I have to rend the blood from his veins and breathe him life anew so be it. I refuse to allow him to be bound by words not his own. Leave winged one, before I make you”
Hermes exhales through his nose, as if leashing something behind his teeth. His wings flutter once at his heels not lifting him, just reminding them who he is.
“You think this ends here?” he says, voice silk-lined but sharp. “That your blood on these hills outweighs the sea’s? That he will forget his son walks beneath another’s watch?” He steps forward just one pace and though he does not touch Percy again, his gaze lingers. “A day will come when he will call. Not with charm. Not with mercy. But with tide and thunder and the full weight of a god’s grief.”
Grandmother does not move. "Let him. Then let Percy choose. Once he has learnt. Once he has become.” she says simply.
Hermes studies her, something colder creeping into his expression now something ancient and unused to refusal. “You protect him now,” he says, “but what will you do when he begins to shine? When the threads wrap around him and the Fates begin to whisper? You cannot stop what he is becoming.”
Her eyes flare silver. “No,” she says. “But I can teach him the difference between being claimed and being chosen. I will teach him to stand firm in the eyes of the likes of you. Like our family has done for centuries. Our blood is old and mixed. We of the hills do not bow. Now Hermes… begone from my roads, you are not welcome.”
The wind stirs between them dry, dust-laced, the road wants him gone too. Brídín watches in silence, her fingers brushing her pouch again. Sally clutches Percy’s hand so tightly his fingers tingle. Caoimhe has her eyes closed with words on her lips.
Hermes straightens his coat. Smooths the fold of his satchel. Then, quietly “This kindness… will not be seen as such forever.”
Grandmother tilts her head. “This isn’t kindness,” she says. “This is mine. He will continue to be mine and you have no say. Olympus will never have a say.” With that, the trees lean slightly forward just enough for the message to be clear.
Hermes vanishes between one blink and the next. No light. No fanfare. Just gone. The wind returns a moment later, the birds begin to sing again and the hills seem to sigh not with relief, but with a promise.
They will remember. Grandmother turns at last. Her gaze falls to Percy. Her voice gentles, but never softens. Her eyes fill with such pure and fierce love he never wants to leave. “The roads may bend. The sea may stir. But while you walk my earth, child, none shall take you and that I swear as this lands Lady.”
She looks at Brídín. “Come. I tire of standing.” And the trees shift again, folding, curling until a narrow path reveals itself, winding toward a low, ivy-wrapped cottage that hadn’t been there a moment ago.
She begins walking. “We have much to tell you, Percy,” she calls back, not turning. “And you, little seal, have much to listen to.”
She steps but then halts as if remembering vitally important. She walks over to his mom and embraces her in a hug so rich with emotion it brings a tear to all eyes present. “It is good to have you back, my precious granddaughter.”
Percy follows, feeling like his life has only just begun.