Unwelcome Tides (Aurelius)

        Him? A King?
    As much as Finn enjoyed the flourish within a title like that he had to disagree. His Kingdom was no bigger than this ship and his vassals only the crew aboard. That was more than enough for the Pirate Captain, much larger and he'd start feeling the weight of it, he already had enough on his shoulders fretting over the safety of The Bane while they would be on land and away from it, but, as if on cue, the new man aboard that put those tensions a bit more at ease appeared without making a single sound, even to the Wolf's ears.
He'd never get over how utterly impressive that was, unable to mask his chuckle at the way the hunter was clearly now the hunted with the sound of militaristic heeled boots traipsing over head.
Finn placed a finger to his lips with a coy little smirk, pointing to the deck overhead to let Kukinta know Dalia was just above and still, very much so, on the prowl.
"I'd say she's all bark and no bite," The Wolf huffed out in a soft laugh, "But I'd be lying. That one's only bark and bite in equal parts. Do forgive her. She's got a lot of heart and only so much boat to let it loose over."
She was a tough one though.

"Ems!" Finn called out, about to make an incredibly vital request when it was already met, a bottle dropping down from above, forcing Finn to quickly snatch it from the air.
"You really get me, Emmy-boy!"
"Yuh. Really get that yeh got a problem, lad."
"Tis only a problem when it hinders my lifestyle," Finn shot back, traipsing backwards across the deck to look up at Emerson who was leaning over the railing to eye his Captain taking a long swig from the bottle.
"Plus it's not like you're one t'talk. How much tobacco have you smoked or chewed in the past day?"
Emerson only grunted in response, spitting the damning evidence to the side.
"You keep my boat so clean," The Captain drolled with an arched brow, "We have any trouble docking?"
"Eh. Couple'a blokes made a shot at boardin' all bui'd'ness like, but I gave them a stern talkin' at...though I t'ink the broken nose from Dals' boot was more coercive."
"She's a lovely one, Mr. Emerson!"
"Damn fackin' straight, Cap'!" came the crew boss's voice from somewhere up top, as if on cue, prompting both the Captain and his first mate to let loose a fond little laugh.
That girl might just take to Captaining her own ship one day.
Would be a tragic day to loose her, though, to be sure.

    Now that that much was settled, Finn turned to the view beyond the boat's edge.
Ramshackle buildings held together by a wing and prayer, but many were the same he'd seen before taking off, so he supposed prayer had been doing a bang up job so far, even if he didn't put much stock in the practice, himself. Beyond that everyone here resembled a large rendition of the lot down at Calypso's back in Taras, save for the part where none of them feared Lavi's swift hand and behaved as such, but there was a lot more colorful appearances among these folk, more so than the nobles all cut from the same cloth back on the mainland.
Gypsy women that looked much like Lavinia or Dalia, with their braided or dread filled hair, others wearing it in loose, cascading waves attempted to be managed by colorful cloth tied over their scalps, gold rings hanging from the ears and coating their wrists. The men ranging from those either nearly as flamboyant as Finn himself, or more commonly, a much more disheveled and unclean depiction of the man. Some even looked like the lot of Aur's people, but with less furs and more straps of leather.
Many from the mainland of Atelus ventured close to Ziorang and pinched their noses at the thought of it all. The lawless abandon, the stark lack of any rules or regulation of any kind, but the most affronting thing to any from Taras would've been the blatant disregard for any sort of societal class structure.
Finn had always seen that in Ziorang. The best and worst part of it both, being, that everyone here was entirely equally. It could serve your purpose or hinder it, but that was the way it was and always would be until Atelus might one day get a handle on the small island comprised of hedonistic abandon.

        _"Well..."
    Finn muttered with a partial shrug, glancing back at his friend who'd aided his uneasy journey through the night. Taking in the sight of the man who looked so much more himself, so much more- enticing- when in his usual furs and exposed skin. Even with the nerves keeping his body fueled mostly by adrenaline at this point, Finn could still not resist a lidded look with embers of a flame still left waiting, not yet snuffed out, from their day spent at Okadun Bay.
Perhaps they'd be able to pick that matter back up again, not now, not while Finn's mind was so preoccupied, but at some point.
The pieces still lay there, waiting.
Finn enjoyed finer fabrics and finer things, but they seemed more ill suited on Aurelius's person. He liked the picturesque stance of his friend looking exactly like himself, like the day they'd met and blood had tainted those shimmering strands of gold. He'd looked like a Gladiator come to behead some great beast, and even Finn would admit he felt a little flushed faced like a prince who'd just watched a great knight behead a dragon before his very eyes.
Twas quite the sight to be beholden to, indeed.

"Aur!" Finn piped up, his voice an anxious crackle in a shallow hole beneath the prelude of excitement, waving his hand for the man who'd taken up prominent residence inside the Pirate's chest to come stand beside him so he could show his friend the not-so-scenic view of his hometown.
It was not unlike staring into the contents of a waste-bin, Finn had no misconceptions about that, but it was where he'd grown up.
He'd skinned his knees trying to hop from post to post, just to the right, where a fisherman tried to haggle his catch. Had his first kiss with a young gypsy girl the same age he'd been back then, his old best friend, just beneath the docks before them. And the tanner's hut, further out, Finn and a group of his friends had tried to walk along the slats of that roof, pretending to be Pirates adjusting the mooring of a ship when the tanner's wife had burst out and shooed the lot of 'hooligans' off with a broom.
But most of all, to the left just at the end of the boats and the cart merchants, was a bustling tavern with a crooked sign that read "Siren's Song", though the G at the end was dangling loosely in the wind now, but still.
Finn's eyes had located the building and he'd gone rather quiet, the bottle he'd been sipping at resting against the edge of his lips held beneath a thousand yard stare that was so steady one might mistake him for a statue with how still and rigid his whole body had gone.
His mother's place of employ for as long as Finn could remember.
And the derelict building he'd called 'home'.
It was as if the Pirate had walked through a door to find a room privy to a meeting between every last one of his personal ghosts, and the moment he'd entered they'd all gone quiet and turned to stare at the one man in the doorway.
He felt like a hollow man with wind blowing through him.

"There ya are ya, Blighta'!"
Dalia's voice like a whip cracking through the air as she vaulted over the railing of the helm, disregarding the use of stairs to land in a crouch that sprung off into a sprint, her green eyes flickering with an excited fire as she bolted past her Captain and his friend, nearly flying through the air with a crazed smile in the attempt to tackle Kukinta.

    Finn disregarded the commotion, lowering the bottle from his lips to set it aside. The comforting hand that enveloped his neck was much appreciated. He knew his friend was right, the longer he stood here in stunned silence, the worse the anxieties got in his mind, feeling that urge he'd felt last night to jump off the opposite side of the boat and just swim until he couldn't any longer.
It wasn't until he tried to swallow that he felt the blockage in his throat, like the air had suddenly been drained of all oxygen and he could no longer pull in a suitable breath needed to clear the haze in his mind.
He clutched at Aureliu's arm, shutting his eyes to simply gather himself for a few seconds, drawing in a deep breath and holding it for a time, then exhaling. The meditative practice seemed to help him gather himself, nodding at the Bear before stepping away to head down the plank.
He could feel Emerson's concerned gaze following the back of his head as he moved, but he couldn't look back to regard the man, if he did, he was sure his feet would begin to carry him back to the safety of his Wolfsbane.
He had to do this now, or he feared he never would.

    Dodging the onslaught of rude people who threatened to shoulder-check a man from the walkway like he knew to expect the charge, the second nature movements still very much ingrained in his being, but all too soon he was at the doorstep.
The one he must've crossed a million times before, so long ago. And yet, now the minuscule ledge seemed the equivalent of scaling a mountain side. The Pirate curled his fingers around the coin that hung from his person, as if hoping the piece of metal might instill him with the strength to move his leg.
He'd been wearing the brim of his hat low, hiding his face from those around him, not that he was really certain he could look all that familiar to the same disheveled and horribly groomed rambunctious child that had left this place half Finn's lifetime ago.
Then he was over the threshold, the sound of conversation within only interrupted by the slamming of tankards and flagons on tables.
It felt like stepping into a portal through time for the Wolf who had such a perplexed and distant look in his eyes which circled the walls of the room abuzz with patrons.
How he'd ever slept through this noise as a child, he'd never know. He could barely do it now with the peaceful lull of the ocean to try and aide him along.

    Then Finn's eyes settled on the elder man behind the bar. Even in his evident age he still looked rather capable. Fit enough to swim the ocean. The only evidence of his advanced age was his translucent and graying hair and the wrinkles of a man who'd lived a hard fought life, which was more than indicated by the blinded right eye that gazed out vacantly with a ghostly blue pallor, surrounded by a massive scar that branched out in an odd pattern, the edges giving the indication of an incredibly old explosives injury.
"Freddy?" Finn whispered out, surprised by how much older the man looked and yet still so much the same.
Ghosts were everywhere in this room.
"Ol' Freddy Powder Keg?" Finn questioned as he approached the bar, sparing the constant glance around the room, trying to see if he could spot his mother among the barmaids milling about, but no such luck.
"'Oo's askin'?" The gruff man huffed without looking up from wiping down the counter.
_"Ah-"
Shit.
He knew Freddy had never once treated him cruelly after the whole- incident...back then. If anything, he'd seemed more to Pity the young wolf after his first transformation, as if he'd seen how a were-curse affected a person in the past, and understood how awful it had been not to even know such a transformation would be coming. Even knowing all that, Finn still felt hands wrenching his throat shut at admitting who he was, but if anyone knew where his mom was, it'd be Freddy.
"It's.... Brigid's son?" whispering the words across the counter but he was only met with a bark of laughter, the man still not even bothering to grace Finn and Aur's presence with the simplest of looks.
"Get t'fook outta, 'ere."
"Freddy-"
Before Finn could finish his protest the large man slammed his fist on the bar-top, clearly about to lay into the Woflsbanes' Captain when their eyes met and Frederic caught himself, squinting hard at the same eyes he'd caught running around with that unruly mop of dark hair. The man could clean up and put on as much finery as he wanted, but Freddy knew those fierce eyes anywhere. The ones glaring at him now, challenging the much large man to just try to throw him out.
"Finnea--" he caught himself, looking frantically around the room before leaning in to speak in a much softer tone.
"Finny boy? Bri's li'l lad? S'really youse? We'd all had a wager goin' ya'd died out there with 'at smarmy French Cap'ain."
"Nope, still kickin'," Finn assured the man with a lopsided grin.
"Whas'at posh speakin's yah got? An' the outfit- ye look just like 'at ponce yeh ran off wit'."
"I do no--" Finn started to protest, clearly affronted at the suggestion that he was anyone but himself, but he chose to disregard it, pressing his hand to his temple before gesturing to his companion.
"Freddy, this is a dear friend of mine, Aurelius- Aur," he turned to face his companion with a fond smile, gesturing from the King to the Tavern Owner, "This is Frederic, Freddy, Thompson. Knew me my whole childhood."

    The earlier motion to protect the Wolf from the explosive man before them had not gone unnoticed by Finn who was in the midst of sizing up his friend with an appreciative grin. Interrupted from the knowing look he was giving the Bear when Freddy grunted out a little greeting towards the Foreign King.
Still, something was uneasy in the Pirate's stomach as he looked around the room for what must've been at least the tenth time since entering and once more was unable to place his mother's face in the crowd.
"Freddy- Where's my mum-?" Finn asked, the words hollow. He didn't know if he wanted the answer. There was a sinking feeling inside him that made him want to hurl, or pass out. He felt white, whiter than the ghost on The Wolfbane's upper deck last night that been rescued by his friend.
Something felt wrong, very wrong.
And the shadowed look that passed over Frederic's face did nothing to help the situation.
Finn's ears were ringing. Ringing so loudly he was sure his companion, Aur, might hear it too, like an alarm bell going of inside his skull, echoing around the chasm and screaming in his ears. He couldn't even hear anything anymore.
Nothing but Freddy's voice that was trying to calm the death-strikken face of the Captain before him.

"Finneas," Powder-keg pushed his hand through the air, trying to tell the Wolf to just reign it in, calm it down a bit.
"Finn, she ain' dead, but..."
She wasn't dead.
That was better. He'd needed to hear that, though the 'but' still had his teeth set on edge, his stare practically beating the Tavern Owner over the head with its intensity to continue that thought.
"She ain' doin' too goods. Got the yellow fevers. Bad."

    The ringing in his skull shattered like glass, every muscle in the Pirate's body folding in like they'd forgotten how to hold him upright. His hand was trying to grab hold of Aur's arm to steady himself, but he couldn't get his fingers to clasp hold, instead falling into the counter.
His expression masked by the shadow his hat was casting over his face, but the veins in his neck could be seen pushing out against his skin, indicating the strain it was taking to not implode entirely and turn to a puddle on the floor of the Siren's Song.
_{"How bad...?"}
The voice sounded foreign coming from Finn. Much too deep, too quiet. Pain burning through every utterance that struggled past the young-man's lips.
"She ain' got long, son."
Teeth barred like fangs, the white of them casting an eerie expression with his eyes still hidden from view. Lips twitched and teeth clamped so hard together one could see the attempt to fracture enamel in the tightness of his cheeks where a thin stream of water slid down, tracing the tense lines and pattering to the counter.
Finn felt as if he was falling.
He didn't move and yet it was as if his spirit had broken free of its bodily confines and sunk through the cracks in the boards under his feet.
He was falling and nothing could hinder the descent.

    Frederic didn't need Aur to tell him twice as he beckoned the two men to follow him towards the hallway in the back. Finn knew the way well, or he had, once.
Looking at it now, it was like an image twisted and curled in on itself.
Up felt like down and the air felt far too heavy.
Finn was sure he must've started walking, because the view was changing and warping before him as if he was, mostly certainly, moving in a forward direction, but he could not feel the uneasy strides his legs were taking, if not for Aur he wasn't sure he'd be moving at all. He might've stayed there where he'd felt himself sink out of reach below the ground.

    The smell in the air, that lilac and lavender scent of perfume mixed with the overpowering odor of incense. Frankincense. She'd always loved the smell of Frankincense.
Had it burning so often the smell had been permanently embedded in the clothes and hair of the young wolf pup.
More tears fell to the ground, some still from the earlier revelations and others at the memories now bursting loose inside his mind, triggered by the scent clouding the air.
His mother's soft hair against his cheek when she hugged him.
The sound of her voice, singing like an angel. Freddy had always said that's why he'd renamed the place "Siren's Song". Finn never learned if that was a truth or just another fantastical story Freddy always liked telling to the kids.
The eyes so much like his own staring down at him from those lids covered in colorful shades of makeup day in and day out.
All of those memories came rushing in all at once, playing out behind his eyes. Each step drawing a new one to the surface.

        Finn could hear the same rattle of the doorknob.
    The same creak the door had always made.
"Bridgy, love?" Freddy called softly into the room, holding up a hand to momentarily stop Finn and Aur's approach.
"Someone 'ere t'see ya, Sweet'eart."
There was a pause and he waved the boys through.
Freddy gave them a short nod before giving Finn and his friend some privacy with the Wolf's mother.

    The young Captain let himself leave the proximity of the King, his hand placing gently to the man's chest before drifting away to follow its owner who took up residence on the stool beside the bed where a woman eyed him with a curious look lined by a yellow hue, her skin harboring a similar tell-tale color.
There was a tense silence that lingered too long in the air, turning seconds into minutes as the whole room became as still as a grave.
Besides the blatant signs of jaundice having taken hold, the woman and Finn looked so much alike. Both harboring those same elegant jawlines and eyes like ocean tide which sat a little more prominently against their faces, just a tad over the line into having large eyes, soulful, like the sound of rain storms on a moonlit night.
She'd been consumed taking in the man sat alongside her who was so tense and so familiar, but she could not place where. Not with those heavy shadows masking his face, his eyes hidden by hat and hair.
Then her gaze settled on the coin around his neck, honing in and taking a delicate hold of it. Her thumb slid over the surface, furrowed brow receding into a look of eyes so wide they seemed fit to burst free of her skull.
Hesitantly, Brigid raised her hand to lift the brim of the Pirate's hat, sliding the bangs from his face as she did so.
Their eyes were locked. A perfect mirror image of the sets bouncing between each other.
A shaken gasp left her, eyes narrowing, fit to burst with the brimming of tears. She smoothed her thumb over his cheek to wipe his own away.
"Mo Storeen..."
The woman breathed.
A breath that seemed to be the first she'd taken since her son had faded from view over the Horizon on that damned ship.
She'd been broken in pieces on the floor ever since, wishing she'd never told him to "run", wishing he'd stayed regardless.
She knew it'd been the right thing to do, the right way to ensure her son had the best chance he could at living. But it hadn't made it hurt any less.
"Máthair," Finn replied, a sad smile fighting against the quiver of his lips, holding her hand close to his cheek, he turned to press a kiss to the back of her fingers.
His head fell against the hand he still clung to, shaking it in denial.
He couldn't take seeing her like this.
She'd always been so gigantic in his eyes, larger than life, like the Moon that had always been so out of reach.
But now?
Now she looked so small and fragile and Finn didn't know how to approach her for fear of those delicate pieces breaking in his arms.

"I came home," a wavering chuckle.
Trying his best to hold himself together with an ill-mannered joke.
"Yeh pretty damn late fer dinner, Finneas James," she shot back, her soft voice doing its best to sound stern and scolding though she still smiled so fondly.
Clearly she was also the source of Finn's humor-laced coping mechanism.

        He was so much older now.
    The last image she'd had of him was worn down rags for clothing sagging off his nimble and scrawny frame. Hair down to his shoulders a constant un-tamable mess. His eyes wide and scared like a cornered animal as she'd sent him on his way, barefoot and bolting down the docks.
He was almost unrecognizable in this clean and fancied up man that sat before her now, almost. But he was still in there. Even filled with sorrow, she saw the glimmer in his eyes hadn't died as she'd feared it had when she hadn't seen it anymore after killing those people.
Somewhere. Somehow. He'd found it again.
It was still there, perhaps more dim than when he was a child, but still unmistakably present.
Part of her wondered if it wasn't a result of the silent guardian behind her son.
She didn't know who the man was, but she'd seen how Finn had been holding to him when they entered.
He was special to her boy.
One thing she was sure of was that Finn was still not the one to ever ask for help. Never take it when offered. He'd always been that way. Always dusting the dirt off when he got injured and hopping right back to it. Always trying to help keep the tavern clean so she wouldn't have to worry about. He'd even caught many fish to help out with food.
Whoever could get past her son's stubbornness and pride to the point Finn actually let them help him? That was a special person, indeed.
"Who's yer friend, Finneas?" She asked, causing Finn to turn to Aur, reaching out for his hand to pull the Warlord closer.
"Mum, this is Aurelius. Aurelius, my mum, Brigid Whelan."
"Thank yeh," were the first words out of the mouth of Finn's mom as she smiled an expression filled by pure gratitude towards the King.

    The King knelt beside the Pirate's mother and Finn could feel a hitch in his breath at the display unfolding before him between his dear friend and the mother he'd not seen in so long only to arrive at the threshold, a day late and a pound short. But he'd made it at all. He had to try and be thankful for that much. A large piece of him that had kept him awake last night, without the protection Aurelius's very presence offered, had been the fear that he would arrive only to find he'd been far too late and she was already dead.
In this world, in this lawless port of criminals, life was a hope, not a guarantee.
She was alive, even at Death's door. For now. She was alive.
He had to be thankful for that small gift.
Because it was a gift. It had to be. And he had to be thankful for it.
Because if he couldn't feel that much.
If he couldn't appreciate that little blessing.
Finn feared he'd break away entirely.
Still. He knew he wasn't strong enough for this. The sight of the woman laid before him, the ghost that looked and sounded like his mother.
She was the sands of the hourglass and his fingers were not enough to contain the dwindling grains of time.
He hated Goodbyes.
H A T E D them.
And yet here another was, thrust into his face and forced down his throat.
His body was shaking, stuck between the desire to break something or simply, just, break.

    Aurelius was the thing keeping his head above water. A task he'd never once struggled with before and now, his so beloved tide was doing everything in its power to drag him beneath the surf. If not for Aur. If not for his rock keeping him afloat. He might've let that tide steal him.
Those twitching fingers of his, trembling inside Aurelius's when the King spoke.
He approached and behaved towards Finn's mother as if she were royalty above even his own station.
A king kneeling before a commoner?
Some might even say less than a commoner. An outcast with a bastard Pirate son. Finn and his mother had lived together, here, in Ziorang, knowing only the gracelessness of picking up the scraps left at society's bottom rung.
The living quarters spoke volumes to that. Small, cramped, Finn feared his friend might slam his head into the ceiling at any moment. How there had ever been two beds shoved into this tiny space, once, even Finn couldn't recall. A life that defined poverty with private dwellings privy to the onslaught of banter and drunken shanties just a narrow hallway down.
Finn's life had never been glamorous growing up, but he'd remembered loving and cherishing every moment. You could insult Ziorang all you wanted, bypass and ignore it and every action would be well within your right, but Finn had loved this place, once.
It was home.
Most that lived here for long enough, became like pieces of a gigantic, and highly dysfunctional, family, but it had been Finn's family.
For all the flaws, the many, many flaws.
Still his family.

    It felt like an echo of all that now, his brow furrowing when Aur made pressing claims of his love toward's Brigid's son and Finn still found he had no words to say. How seldom he'd heard that word since leaving home. How foreign it had become for him to hear aloud, for the sentiment to be placed upon him, and his tears flowed openly.
Like a hole had been punctured the armored hull of the Pirate's mind and the vessel, that was him, had simply sprung a leak.
His eyes were certainly taking on water.
He didn't cry like this. He'd learned to handle letting loose the odd tear, but this?
Finn was struggling to clench his throat to stop any strangled noises from giving away his current state entirely.
Dammit all.

    Both the boys were crying and all Bri could offer was a sorrowful smile, a touch, like only a mother could have, resting against each damp cheek of the tearful men before her.
The poor boys.
She could see it in each of their eyes, a pain only life's tragedy could hurl upon you. Eyes that tried so hard to be hopeful and clear, but there was an intense sadness lurking inside each man. The gentle souls who knew far too much about Death.
Aur, she could see war was his life. Battlefields were ablaze in that crystal blue gaze, but immeasurable loss, too.
And Finn. Her boy.
She could see turmoil and self-hatred warring with ambition.
If Aur's eyes held battles and wars, Finn's eyes were one.
She felt so bad for all the pair before her had seen and been through, but there was a bond between them, gold like the King's hair, but glowing with a bright, almost blinding light.
Whatever separate worlds these two lived in, there was a shimmering bond that held fast between the two.
Bri could see that much, and it made her very happy for the two.
Bonds like that were hard to come by.

    Brigid may be ill, but she had not lost any of that motherly sharpness that let you know when your son had their hand in the cookie jar without even having to look, or, in her own Son's case, the times she'd caught him trying to pick customer's pockets while they were sloshed into a drunken stupor.
She'd never even figured out what ruffian had been the bad influence on her son that he'd learned how to pick a pocket, even using the two finger method to keep the touch light.
If she'd had to peg a guess though, she would've bet anything Frederic had explicitly taught her son as much.
Now though, that same sharpness had not missed another thing.
Pup.
This foreign man at her side had certainly called her son 'pup'.
She was certain of it. This man knew what Finn was, and still he stayed at her son's side?
That had been Brigid's worst fear when Finn had left. That he'd never find someone who did not fear his curse.
She loved her son, loved him so much, but that wolf scared her.
She'd spent so long dealing with the aftermath of it all. The guilt thrown her way for her 'murderous son'. She knew it wasn't true though. Her son was no cold blooded killer.
It was his twat of a breeder that was to blame.
The silver-tongued devil whose blood had cursed her baby boy.

"I can tell," she spoke suddenly, her thumb stroking Aurelius's cheek, fondly.
That's why she'd thanked him, after all.
For loving her son. For protecting him.
There was no mistaking the guardian angel stance he'd been holding before. He'd not allow anyone to hurt her son, not as long as he could help it.
He could not know how thankful she was for that.
"Finn, love," she turned to her son now, "Ye've got a special connection with that'n," gesturing her chin towards Aur, "Stop running, okay? It's time t'stop runnin'."

    The Captain drew his hat from his head, setting it aside as a matter of respect. One hand still held to Aur's, the vibration of the appendage settling to small twitches as he placed his free hand to his mother's, still resting against his cheek.
"Okay, mum...okay. I'll try."
He promised, moving forward in his seat to press his lips to the woman's forehead, smoothing her mess of curls aside with a hollow smile that tried its best to be reassuring.
He still, could not find it in himself to return the words to his Protector.
His brother.
His friend.
His saviour.
He felt it though, if the words would not leave his lips, they shone like a beacon in his stare now leveled on Aurelius.

"You're both good boys," Finn's mother's words interrupted by a wince of pain in her abdomen, pulling her hands back to her person to clutch atop her failing liver that burned inside, sweat prickling across her skin.
"Mother!"
The screeching of the stool kicked out from behind the Pirate when he rose, the back of his hand pressing to his mom's forehead.
She was burning up.
"Just- hang on," Finn's words frantic, "I'll get you some water okay?"
A hand tugging at his sleeve when he tried to leave to locate a basin halting his erratic motions.
"It's alright, Storeen," she tried to calm her son's panic, "Jest pain. It'll pass."
Finn tried to calm himself, like she wanted, but it was so hard. So painful to watch.
His fingers digging into Aur's arm. He hadn't even noticed until his knuckles started to throb and he glanced at the vice like grip making depressions in his friend's muscles.
_"Sorry--" he choked out, dropping to his knees to lean against Aurelius.
How he would've managed any of this without his Bear to hold to?
He couldn't imagine it.
He needed Aur.
Needed his presence, his friendship, his strength, guidance and comfort.
^{He needed him.}

    Finn took his seat once more as Aurelius righted the stool for his friend. The Pirate fell into it, his head in his hand.
He didn't want Aur to go when the fingers that had taken his chin slid away from his reach and out of the room leaving the Wolf with a wide eyed stare after the door.
The gaping hole in the room made by the King's exit stole the strength Finn had been clinging to just to hold it together.
Tears like waterfalls fell from his eyes as he curled his fist, ready to shatter something, to break his knuckles, to feel any level of physical pain that might block out the emotional ripping through his core, tearing him apart inside.
A caring touch protested the raised fist, poised to strike the ground. Finn stared out at his mother through the water that hindered his sight.
"You 'ave t'stop doin' that," his mother chastised, "Ya always had t'punch a thing when you felt like y'd failed. Finneas."
His name a plead to refrain from hurting himself...or blaming himself.
It only placed a bandage on the gaping wound in Finn's chest, but he relented, dropping his curled fist to collapse over his mother's bed. His head resting in his arms as shoulders shook in silent sobs.
All she could do was stroke her son's hair.
Allow him to let it out.
The only way out of it, was through it.
She couldn't tell him it was 'alright'. It was. She knew it was alright, now that she'd seen the man he'd become. He was a Pirate, maybe that hadn't been the life she'd dreamed of for her son. She also knew he'd always wanted to be one, she was just pleased that whatever he was on the outside, he'd not lost that flicker of life and a love for it on the inside.

        Finn couldn't take it though.
    All at once it was like he couldn't breathe.
The room was swirling and closing in around him. In a moment, he felt the bars of his cage emerge and press in all around, from every side. Trapping him, caging him, bottling him up inside.
He couldn't breathe.
A hand clutched to his throat trying to pry the unseen hand that was crushing down around it away.
^{He couldn't breathe.}

"Finn...?"
The question of concern taking his attention as his mother made an in and out gesture to take a deep breath.
Finn complied, forcing his lungs to cooperate.
"Y'okay?"
Her son nodded, dragging his hand down his face to force the tears away.
He needed to pull it together. Falling apart like this was doing nothing to help his mother, the back of his fingers brushing along her cheek. Partially in a gesture of comfort and partly to feel how warm she was.


"It'sa 'ard thing t'see, ain' it?"
Freddy's voice emanating from the end of the hallway, where he'd been standing since he'd heard the door to the backroom open and shut.
He'd seen the way the Warrior had tried to hold himself together until he no longer could.
Freddy felt it too.
He'd felt it since the day Bri had started getting sick, watching over the woman who was like family to him. Like a sister.
His arms were folded over his chest as he watched the Bear, a sympathetic look passing through his undamaged eye.

    Frederic frowned at the sight of the man who looked so broken before him.
He was fretting over something and upset by his inability to shield his friend from this pain. Freddy could understand the desire.
His hand fell against the Bear King's shoulder giving it a firm squeeze. It was a wordless gesture that he was feeling the same feeling about Brigid. If he could take her sickness on for her he would. He'd go steal it from her right this second. That woman had been his dearest friend since they were both young tykes, themselves. They'd grown up in this very port, born and raised.
He'd wrestle the Kraken itself if it would make her feel better.
He understood all too well the helplessness Aurelius felt towards his friend's pain. The helplessness of a Son watching his mother on her death bed.
It was clouding the whole atmosphere of the tavern.

"Look- ah got th' water," Freddy assured the King, taking the basin from him with a little jerk of his head, "Y'take a minute. Wait here or get back t'the lad, either way. 'll make sure Bri gets'a water."
A small quirk of his lip, a sorrowful little smirk and a soft pat on the shoulder were his exiting words to the King of Yhavastus. Frederic rounded the corner to get the promised water for the boys and Bri.

    Finn had pulled himself together as well as any one could manage in such a situation, clutching to his mother's smaller hand with both of his own, doing is damnedest to try and will the sickness away. Or at the very least to make it a tangible foe he could beat the ever living shit out of. He wanted to rip it to shred, wanted to to bash its head against the wall until he heard the cracking of bone.
Damn that he could not fight this enemy in such a manner.
All he could do was his best to comfort his mother,stroking the back of her hand with his thumb and singing a shaky rendition of that song, the same one he'd belted out in a fit of sleep deprivation the night before. He didn't know what to do, but he knew when he was little and struggled to relax himself, or calm a fit from his accursed temper, the song had always made him feel better.
Perhaps it would bring his mother some comfort, now.