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Not being able to hear a thing is strange. It throws Pogue off, makes it hard for him to balance, and certainly makes it more difficult to defend himself in the thick of the trees. Sirens descend on him from all directions, mouthing words he can’t make out and raking their long nails over his skin. They tear at his coat and die soundlessly for their efforts — and yet, Pogue can’t seem to make progress in any direction. He’s trapped, screaming incoherently for his crew, and that’s when it hits him.
They can’t hear him, either. The earplugs might stop him from being tempted, but they do nothing to help him communicate with Star or Gresh or Kenz, and the roaring in his ears is enough to help him decide. “Fuck!” he screams, ripping out both earplugs and slicing his way out of the mess of sirens. There are more than he thought, but now that he can hear them, it’s easier to sense the attacks before they happen.
Until they start to sing.
Pogue has always loved music, particularly singing. He might joke about the sea shanties his crew prefers, but a few of his hands have amazing voices, and Pogue could get lost for hours listening to them. Sometimes, he prefers it to the sound of the seas themselves. And those voices don’t have anything on the sirens’.
He hears songs from his youth, melodies his mother used to hum, and a tune that Wayke loves above all others. It’s that particular song that changes things for Pogue. He might be a pirate, a terror of all the salt seas, but there’s one thing about him that these sirens don’t know: he doesn’t consider the connections he has with people to be a weakness. He considers those bonds his greatest strength, and the very thing that sets him and The Heartbreak apart from every other ship with black sails and a thiever’s heart.
And this final confirmation that he truly does love Wayke has him nearly laughing. “Fecking fools,” he mutters, sucking in a deep breath and holding those songs close to his chest. He knows to his depths that they aren’t real, so why should they bother him? Why should they tempt him, when he knows there is only one path he can take to the real thing?
As their faces change to match the voices they’re adopting, Pogue hesitates. Cutting his way through the line of Waykes and Kenzes and those with his mother’s face is harder than he thought, but adding this to the list of his recurring nightmares is easier than giving in, easier than letting them take him.
When he reaches the beach, he can barely stand from the weight of the blood soaking his clothes. He strips as much as he can off of him until his tattooed skin is exposed to the sun overhead, but just as he’s dropping his coats and regrouping, he spots a single earplug in the sand. A quick glance around tells him that his crew is accounted for and still fighting strong, with one notable exception. Kenz is nowhere to be found. It doesn’t take much for Pogue to put the pieces together and realize that his brother must be in the forest somewhere without at least one of his earplugs, and that’s such a dangerous combination that he doesn’t bother trying to look for the second. One gone or both, the end result will be the same if he doesn’t find him quickly.
Fear for his brother swells as he heads down the beach and closer to the forest again, and only gets worse when he sees Kenz’s custom cutlasses discarded by the treeline. He looks around wildly for any sign of which direction his brother might’ve gone. The trail of thick, dark blood stops there, and Pogue takes a small level of comfort in that. Maybe his brother isn’t bleeding... or isn’t bleeding yet, anyway.
He follows the boot prints in the muddy ground and the sirens’ songs deeper through the trees and stays alert for any sound other than the ones urging him forward. So far, there’s no sign of Kenz. No yells, cries, screams, or slew of loud cusses he’d expect of his presumably kidnapped brother. Just those traitorous songs and the fading sounds of battle from the beach, the fading sounds of a crew he’s abandoned twice in as many hours.
But this won’t end until he finally has Abesti. That’s the only way he can truly help his crew now, so he pushes forward, letting the songs lure him deeper and deeper. More than once, he loses himself and his mission to the melody, the thrum, the inalienable urge to give in... but he doesn’t. Not quite. His grip on his cutlass is tight as his half-naked body is cut and scraped by the branches he squeezes through, and over and over, he yells his brother’s name.
Over and over, only the sirens answer him and there, finally, he sees Kenz.
He’s curled up in a siren’s lap, his eyes closed and face more peaceful than Pogue’s ever seen it before. The siren’s voice is identical to their mother’s, but Pogue can see its true face, and more importantly, he sees the other siren sneaking out of the trees with a long, sharp blade.
“Let him go,” a voice says from behind him. “It’ll be a more peaceful death than any he’ll get with you. It’ll be painless, quick. He won’t feel anything but comfort.”
Pogue hesitates as the assassin gets closer. The siren is right; he knows their lives will end painfully. But this, here... Kenz looks like he’s ready.
“No,” Pogue says forcefully, snapping himself out of it. “Not like this.” He reaches into his boot, grabs the only dagger he still has on his person, and launches it at the would-be killer, and it lodges in the siren’s throat.
The siren’s song ends abruptly and the screech he releases sends a chill down his spine. It’s enough to snap Kenz out of it and his eyes flutter open, instantly locking on his brother. “P?” Kenz looks up at the siren he’s lying on and when it begins singing again, he grips the creature’s throat to stop him. “P!”
“Don’t kill it!” Pogue yells, turning to stab the siren behind him before he can become another casualty. “I’ll bet me arse that’s the one we’re after!”
“It is!” Kenz says without doubt. “Fecking quim! Gag ‘em!”
Pogue runs forward just as Abesti breaks free of Kenz’s grip. His song is much more powerful than the others’, so the moment he starts singing, Pogue is rooted to the spot. He watches helplessly as his brother falls under the same spell, and all at once, their grand defense shatters around them.
Abesti transforms before his eyes, and suddenly it’s their mother that’s singing to him and holding out her hand. “Come here, my son. There’s room for yeh both.”
It’s so easy to believe the lie. So easy to step forward, wanting to leave all the troubles of a tired pirate at the feet of the only woman to ever love him. To join his brother and believe for a moment that their family could be almost whole again... if it was ever whole to begin with. Pogue takes a couple of hesitant steps in that direction, his boots moving whether he wills them to or not.
She continues to sing, her hand reaching out to lure him forward. “I’ve missed yeh, P.”
Something about the nickname nags at him, but it’s not until he holds out his hand to take hers that he realizes two things: those aren’t his mother’s eyes, and the only person that has ever called him “P” is Kenz. Whoever this is isn’t his mother; they’re not even a good imitation of her up close. They’re a fraud.
Rage builds and blocks out the siren’s spell until he can finally think clearly again, so the moment their hands touch, Pogue uses that to pull Abesti down and shove his face into the dirt. “Fecking bilge rats, sirens. Yeh tricksy quims almost had me... but not today. No way a Hallam would e’er consort with the likes of a stinkin’ siren.”
Kenz once again snaps out of it, and the anger he feels for falling under their spell is apparent on his face. Despite that, he doesn’t lift a finger for almost a full minute, until Pogue’s nearly begging him to gag the siren below him. “Feck,” he whispers, standing up to pull off his bloody shirts, and he ties them around Abesti’s face to keep him from singing anymore.
“Feck is right. He won’t be alone; we need ta hurry.” Pogue wraps his arm around Abesti’s neck and squeezes the sides until he passes out, then throws him over his shoulder and tries to balance. “Take me cutlass.”
~
KENZ FEELS LIKE HE’S underwater; his movements lag as does his brain when Pogue speaks to him, but he pulls out his brother’s favorite blade and frowns down at it as he looks around for his own. “Where’s mine?” he asks, forgetting that Pogue said “hurry” altogether.
“The beach where yeh dropped ‘em. Now move, Kenz! Quim’s heavy and there’ll be more coming.” Pogue pushes forward. “He won’t be asleep forever, now move! That’s an order!”
“Aye.” Kenz follows, prepared for a fight, but still unsure of his movements. Instead of dwelling, he ignores how heavy his arms are and cuts down the first sirens to rush out of the trees. Their singing dies with them, and his movements become muscle memory as he cuts down branches and creatures alike.
Pogue grunts behind him as Abesti starts to wake up, but at least he’s still gagged. “Kenz! Move faster!”
The Quartermaster growls and starts running, clearing a path for his Captain, and when they finally reach the beach he feels like he swam from the Isle of Dread. Star comes running, and the beach is covered in so many selkie bodies that it's hard to find a safe place to step, but it looks like they’ve cleared the beach.
“Quims kept on comin’. The feck did yeh go?” Star slaps Kenz’s head.
“Wanted to feck a siren,” he lies, and it rolls off his tongue easily.
She doesn’t argue, but Pogue is looking at him like he’s from another planet. “Go get yer blades then get to the jolly. It’s time we leave this fecking island before our little prize’s love comes ta call.”
“I thought yeh said that quim was dead?” Astaryn whispers sharply as Kenz ventures off to grab his cutlasses.
He doesn’t hear Pogue’s response even though he’s only a few feet away, so he repeats her question and ignores his brother’s annoyed glare as they climb in the jolly boat.
“Do either of yeh really wanna take that chance?” he snaps.
“The feck is wrong with ‘im, Captain?”
Star’s question has Kenz looking around and trying to find out who she means, and when he sees they’re both staring at him, it clicks. “Wrong with me? Feck’s wrong with you?”
“Enough!” Pogue yells over them both. He’s wrestling Abesti and trying to keep him inside the jolly, but he’s losing quickly. “Quit fecking arguing with each other and help yer damn Captain!”
Kenz stands and brings his fist down with all of his weight behind it. It connects with the siren’s head, knocking him out cold once again, and he sits down with an indignant grunt. “Aye, Captain.”
“Now you get ta carry his limp body up the ladder,” Pogue says as he pushes the siren onto Kenz’s lap. “I was tryin’ ta avoid that.”
Knowing he should have thought of that, Kenz takes Abesti with a grumble and puts him over his shoulder. “You two first. Wouldn’t want this quim fallin’ on yeh.”
As Astaryn and Pogue climb back aboard The Heartbreak, Kenz hauls the limp siren up behind them. Pogue takes over when they reach the top of the ladder, quickly securing him to the mast and calling for clean gags.
Rat comes running, amazed by the restrained creature, but he hands some clean rags over and tries to peek under Kenz’s shirts. “Did yeh hear ‘em?” he asks curiously. “Their song.”
The question is almost laughable... almost. “Aye. We heard it... and we’re lucky we have our heads. Yeh never want to hear it, Rat. Not ever.”
“We wouldn’t have our heads if we’d been alone,” Pogue says sharply. He busies himself swapping the gag and cleaning Abesti’s head wound as he barks orders to Renton to get the ship moving again, then turns to face his crew. “Brace yerselves. Stoppin’ or slowin’ down isn’t much of an option.”
“Aye,” a few of them say in unison, and Wystan speaks up after.
“Sirens will all be after us now, Pogue. He say this one needs to be alive?”
“That’s still ‘Captain’ ta you, Wystan. And aye, he needs ta be alive when we drop him off. Now get back ta yer stations.”
“Aye, Captain,” Wystan begrudgingly responds as he storms off to his post. Kenz realizes moments after the encounter that he should have spoken up when Wystan disrespected their Captain by using his birth name, but he was so lost in his own mind that he didn’t even speak.
“Kenz. My quarters. Now.” Pogue storms past him and shoulder-checks him in the process, and Kenz follows without question.
He hates the way everyone is looking at him, so much so that he tenses more with each and every step. He’s starting to worry that the siren marked his face or put some sort of spell on him to make him look off to those around him, because why else would they all look at him like he’s about to shatter? When they enter Pogue’s quarters, he shuts the door and slumps against it.
“Talk to me, brother. Yer not right. Haven’t been. Did it kiss yeh?” There isn’t an ounce of judgement in Pogue’s voice, only concern — but something about that is even worse.
“Kiss me? Course he—” Kenz stands straighter, thinking back to that encounter and realizing how foggy it all is. “What if it did? What’s that mean?”
“Means yeh need to be with someone real. Solid. The effects are stronger when they get their devil lips on yeh. Only way to break it is ta have someone else kiss the same spot.” He scratches his beard and watches Kenz, then nods toward the door. “Yeh go find Henley. No point in riskin’ it.”
The thought of going and asking for help has Kenz squirming where he stands and popping his neck. “Where are we going?”
“Back to the Port of Thieves. Gnash’ll be waitin’ for us there.” Pogue’s eyes darken as they land on a certain part of the map. “Can’t... can’t risk stoppin’ anywhere else.”
Following his gaze, Kenz knows exactly what his brother needs. Not his Captain, his brother. “Yeh can risk a few hours. Maybe I’m not the only one that needs somethin’ real, P.”
“It’ll have ta wait. I just... feck, we haven’t been that close ta dyin’ in years. Wonder if he’d just come along for a little while...” Pogue huffs when he mentally answers his own question, then pours himself a drink. “I’ll be alright, Kenz. Damned things didn’t kiss me, after all.”
“Yeh know how I never override yer decisions? Well, this time I am. Yeh need it. It’s just a few hours.” Kenz attempts to leave before his brother can respond, but he stops to look back at him. “What if I don’t know where I was kissed? How would yeh know if yeh were?”
Pogue takes a deep breath. “Best just get her to kiss yeh everywhere, then.”
“How the feck am I supposed to ask a Captain to kiss me everywhere?” he whispers sharply. “She’s gonna laugh in me face.”
“She’d laugh even harder if I asked her for yeh, and then I’d have ta kill yeh. I’d prefer to stop thinkin’ about this like feckin’ yesterday. Go.” Pogue downs his drink then pushes Kenz from his quarters. “If yeh go topside, tell Renton to set sail for the Haven.”
“Aye, Captain. Are yeh sure you don’t want me to kiss all over for yeh?” Kenz does kissy lips, earning himself a sharp punch straight to his nose.
“Yer sick, Kenz. Now get.”
“Feckin’ quim. Offer revoked.” Kenz walks away, feeling more normal than he has since Abesti first called his name, but it fades more with each step he takes away from his brother.
They were both so close to death today that his mind is whirling, and when he allows his thoughts to drift, he can hear Abesti singing clear as day. His feet move toward where he’s tied up and it isn’t until he’s standing in front of the siren that he realizes he was calling him. “Get the feck outta my head.”
When the siren smirks around his gag, Kenz takes off toward The Anguish, happy to see they’ve joined them again. He has no doubt in his mind that the son-of-a-bitch kissed him, and he needs whatever hold he has on him broken now. Once he barks Pogue’s order at Renton, he has them ready the gangplank, then rushes over so quickly it rocks with each step. “Oi! Where’s yer Captain?”
“She’s tendin’ her wounds, Quartermaster. Down below. Yeh want me ta send for her?”
“I’ll go meself.” Kenz shoves past them and rushes down, ignoring where he’s going completely until he’s lost and has to ask for more directions. When he finally finds her, he kicks the door closed behind him and looks her over. “Yeh hurt, Henny?”
She glares at him until she fully takes in who it is. “Aye, but nothin’ I can’t handle. Yeh that worried about me, Hallam?”
“Aye.” He looks around them nervously and closes the distance. “How about you? Are yeh worried about me?”
She sits up a little straighter. “I am now.”
“It-it kissed me. I need yer help.”