Lonesome and Mad

Harper

I see what lies heavy on your heart

Exactly as his letter had promised, Harper is found sitting on one of many benches overlooking Mourn, lantern flames flickering in the comfortably warm breeze as the sun slowly descends and forsakes its duties of lighting the way to the tiny wicks burning away behind glass panes. 

To one side of him lies a small package wrapped in sturdy but otherwise unremarkable brown paper. To the other is an empty space adequate for a man of Hadama’s size, whether he chooses to take the silent offering or not. 

Harper’s expression is difficult to parse even for his good friend - if he can call the Tidebreaker that anymore. Far-away, at the very least. A state of being that only breaks and clears when the King joins him. “Thanks for coming. I wasn’t sure if it was too late.” He has resigned himself to the bridges he’s burned to the point it comes out neutrally. Hadama owes him next to nothing, but he’s glad his friend’s good heart is still constant enough to be relied upon. “I think I owe you a better explanation that what I wrote to you. But if you want to ask anything first, please do.” He gestures slightly with an open palm, blue eyes dark oceans that reveal little more than an echo of resignation and exhaustion as they focus - patient and unwavering - on Hadama.

and the strength you still keep inside

When Harper had said that he was ready, Hadama had come.

The paths of Mourn were new to him, and he had spent the day walking slowly amidst the monuments to memories. There was peace to be found in such a place, and a strange sort of comfort as the fresh blooms of Flowerbirth grew amidst the offerings of grief and young wild creatures frolicked, heedless of the solemnity of their surroundings. It had been time spent considering the meeting to come; what he hoped would come from it, and what he needed to learn from it.

And in the end his feet had brought him to the appointed place where a ghost waited as promised.

There was no hesitation in his step, but emerald eyes drank in Harper's appearance and the changes the years had wrought since they'd last seen each other. Hadama had outwardly changed little, aside from the leather-clad legs below his waist, and he used them to settle into the seat left vacant at the Stalwart's side. He tilted his head in silent invitation and the other man spoke, but soon enough the Tidebreaker was shaking his head in a single, slow negation. "It has never been too late," he rumbled quietly. There had been confusion and pain, yes, but he would not have asked his friend to stay in a position that had become so burdensome had he known.

But he had not.

"I do have questions," he acceded slowly. "But... they will wait. I would rather know how you have been. And listen to what you wish to say." Perhaps his questions would be answered by what Harper already wanted to tell him. And if not, then he could ask them after. For a short time, at least, he simply wanted to sit with his old friend again.

Harper

I see what lies heavy on your heart

Word travels fast about demigods, but it’s still strange to see Hadama approach on human legs while the sun is still in the sky. Admittedly it’s the only change he can truly note in the man despite the years that have passed. In contrast, Harper’s tan skin has gone pale and his hair is longer than he would normally allow it to get. The only promising sign of health is his continued musculature, but the new lines in his face take away from that hope just as swiftly. 

The immediate denial has Harper smiling wistfully. Not unexpected, but in his eyes undeserved. Hadama’s understanding is not something he’s managed to replicate in himself for his own behavior.

“Not as well as I had hoped. For a time, I thought I was finally living for myself and figuring out who I was without expectations or duties to shape my identity around. It was the only kind of life I’d ever lived before.” Looking out at the sun as it creeps slowly through the sky, turning red as it threatens a sunset within the hour, Harper smiles without feeling behind it. “Swore off love and tried to find comfort in physicality. I missed being touched in any and every way.” The firm grip of a friendly hand or a brusque hug, gentle fingers through hair from a mentor or parent, idle kisses from a lover, all of it had been lost. “The only good that really came was reconnecting with Maea. But I don’t think either of us can fix the other. Or ourselves.” He’d hoped, of course. Against all logic, history, and better sense. Harper’s heart has never known how to stop piecing itself back together to try and beat for someone else just one more time. 

“I tried to mend things with Jude after he got hurt during the impact and I wasn’t there. It wasn’t enough - but it wasn’t nothing.” He writes his son every season, but there’s more empty space on the page than words most times. At least he never forgets to say I love you. “I lost my faith in Safrin. I lost sight of myself when I thought I was finding it. And what was a rebellion of indulgence is now the only comfort I wake up for, same as any other crutch.” His downfall had not been so grand as others, far more private and uninteresting, but in his own eyes there is nothing left but ashes. 

“I’m hoping you’ll give this to Jude for me. That’s why I called you here.” One scarred hand settles on top of the box, but his eyes are pained and distant on the horizon. “I need to pursue an impossibly small chance at the only thing I think can help. But if it doesn’t work…one way or another I’m not going to be around, and he deserves as much closure as I can give him.” Something clearer than the one-sided awareness earlier in the week when he’d shown up only to hug his boy tight and tell him he loved him. A goodbye only Harper had heard.

- - -

Harper gives all items in his profile to Hadama, to be given (or not!) to Jude.

and the strength you still keep inside

The careworn lines in Harper's face did nothing to reassure Hadama that the Stalwart had found his peace away from the burdens of duty. He listened quietly to the tale of a man adrift, having lost his north star and out of sight of land. The mention of Maea softened the former-Mer's gaze, but the hopelessness in Harper's conclusion - when once he had been so staunchly optimistic - tightened the skin around Hadama's eyes in silent pain.

He considered his words carefully, but by the time he was ready to speak them Harper had moved on. Jude's name did nothing to soothe the ache in his chest, not when it seemed to bring his friend no solace. More loss followed; more confusion and unhealing wounds that lingered in the heart of a man who had once been a hero and a leader.

"Harper." A name spoken softly, even as Hadama's large hand came to rest gently atop the scarred one on the box between them. "You still have a home in Torchline. A family. Allow us to help you. Please." He gave the fingers beneath his a careful squeeze. "You are not alone."

Harper

I see what lies heavy on your heart

Hadama is a man of subtlety, like the shadows that persist in the depths of the ocean no matter how bright or long the efforts of the sun. To see him so dismayed - even peripherally, for Harper can't bear anything more direct - is both an honor and a painful burden to bear. To think he'd considered never meeting Hadama this way if only to spare his own heart. Harper needs no further proof to know that, for that alone, he is a selfish man. Or perhaps a man who cannot see what could have possibly drawn the Tidebreaker to him that could have masqueraded as any kind of worth without collapsing under the King's scrutiny.

The mer's hand is large and encompassing over his own, drawing eyes like blue shadows at twilight back to where their skin tones stand in contrast over plain packaging too pitiful to be worthy of its recipient. Harper slowly turns his hand over, and - as has always been his way - does not think a moment of the strangeness of this physicality to some as he silently holds onto Hadama's fingers.

It takes strength he didn't think he had anymore to lift his eyes to meet Hadama's head on. The smile comes easier given it appears almost peaceful. "No, I'm not alone. I have you." But only now. Only for this moment, where hues of red sunset turn Hadama's hair to fire. It will be enough for Harper, but it's an ephemeral thing that can't be lengthened even by the might of Hadama's faith. "But there's no home to go back to. And Jude - well, there are some bridges that can't be rebuilt." Wounds far deeper than the ones he'd caused in his friend, whose ceaseless understanding is the reason Harper has anyone here at the close.

Fingers squeezing around Hadama's, Harper lifts his other hand to envelop the man's hand entirely as his bared heart shines through his eyes. "I've guaranteed myself an unobtrusive exit this time, to make up for the last. No matter what sort of exit it comes to be." To give more information is to arm Hadama with opportunity to stop him, and Harper - for all he loves the Tidebreaker - cannot allow that to happen. "But I couldn't leave you in the dark a second time." Smiling like a pickpocket flashing a watch to distract their target from the creep of fingers into their pocket, Harper squeezes Hadama's hand and jokes, "Poor timing with the sunset, but we've already watched plenty of sunrises together. I thought we should mix it up."

and the strength you still keep inside

It was common for people to mistake his gravitas for aloofness, or assume that because he had no interest in sexual contact that he shied away from physical touch. But though he did not often initiate touch, Hadama still accepted it willingly, even gladly, from his friends. His fingers curled around Harper's in response, a grip as firm and gentle as the Tidebreaker's heart, and the worry in his emerald eyes eased at his friend's smile and the assurance that the Stalwart recognized him still, even after all the time that had flowed past, never to be recaptured.

It was a bittersweet moment of deja vu, hearing the father speak of bridges as the son once had. A man wounded and hurting, the shape of his nose and the curve of a jawline; for a moment his vision blurred from the sunset of Mourn to the moonlight of Torchline and bridges of ice in the sand.

But in the damaged relationship between a father and a son Hadama could give little more than support to both men, and the hope that time would dull the sharp edges and let them find their way back together again. He had heard Jude's pain. He could see Harper's. But he could only bow his head in acknowledgment and acceptance of a divide that no span of magic ice could cross, and no outsider could hope to construct.

As his hand was covered completely Hadama shifted to face Harper more fully, the pain in his eyes at his own helplessness a raw and open wound that he would not hide from his old friend even as he lifted his free hand to gently brush a too-long tress back from the other man's face, tucking it with painstaking care behind an ear for however long it would stay there. He let the joke slide past, his gaze intense as he studied Harper's face and the sudden light of his smile, so at odds with the exhausted despair of mere moments before.

He knew goodbye when he heard it. But he was not willing to hear it this time.

"Do not leave me at all," he said quietly, a plea as selfish and self-aware as Harper's retreat to hedonism, undeterred by the glimpse of his old humor. His hand, caught between both of his friend's, tightened carefully to return the squeeze. The Attuned bond trembled and then cracked open beneath the weight of a heart that was breaking, unshed tears filling it as deep as the sea. "I do not want to lose you again."

Harper

I see what lies heavy on your heart

In another time, Hadama’s pain would be so moving that Harper would waver and abandon his path for the pursuit of mending that ache. It’s not that he cares less now - it’s that he cannot bear what caring means anymore. His shoulders cannot carry the burden of what the Tidebreaker asks of him. 

Harper has one last hope, one final effort remaining within him. An idyllic eternity of oblivion in animal skin is the only respite he can envision for himself if that attempt fails. 

The Stalwart tilts his face just enough to feel the brush of Hadama’s hand as it tucks his hair into place. Even now, tired and changed, Harper cannot stop craving this sort of connection. It’s a cruel constant. Nearly as cruel as the heartbreak that washes across the bond like a tide coming in too late. 

“My only regret is that I can’t leave without causing pain. No matter how few, somehow people remain who still care.” He prays his sons count among them, but even if Hadama is the sole survivor of hearts and minds that look fondly upon Harper Quinn, then there is enough left to regret. “Wherever I go or what shape I take, in Caido or Mort’s realm, I will always be your friend.” Harper can’t say he’s scared of death, but it’s not his first choice or intent. Still, he knows what he has planned if he fails is the equivalent of that, and the least he can do is provide a vessel for Hadama to pour his anguish into. 

“But if you have nothing to ask, I want to make use of our hours. I want to hear all you have to share - the little things, the happy things.” Like the updates on young whales Harper had named with gusto who must be grown and with pods of their own now, or the latest palace gossip far beneath the surface of the sea. Things that mean nothing and everything all at once.

and the strength you still keep inside

Touch connected their bodies yet could not bridge the gulf that yawned between their hearts. Hadama knew his selfishness was cruel, but no less so than Harper's farewell. On this last day together they could only wound each other with the love that remained even after the year and more apart. It should have been reason enough to let the Stalwart go, this mutual destruction they indulged in, but still the Tidebreaker held fast to the hand of a man who had once been his best friend and steadfast other half when they had ruled together.

"If you remain in Caido, I will find you," Hadama rumbled, his deep voice rough with the emotions that he fought to pull back from the Attuned bond, to give his friend what peace he could in the time remaining to them. "And if you go to Mort too soon, know that I can call on His champion to speak with you again." And that was as much threat as reassurance.

The questions he might have asked when he had hoped that they would rebuild their relationship meant nothing to him now. The past was passed and could not be changed, and all that mattered was to cherish the moments that remained to them before Harper left on his impossible quest. Hadama squeezed the hand he still held and took a deep breath to give his friend what was asked: a retreat from the world and from their pain; the names of sea creatures and the adventures of palace pages growing into their fins. The latest fashion craze beneath the waves that had the King bewildered (shirts, with and without sleeves, made entirely of nets), and the newest song Hadama's sister had composed. The last dish that Hadama had created in his endless pursuit of new land-and-sea fusion flavors...

The sun had long since relinquished the sky to the moon and stars before his voice grew hoarse and he finally bowed his head in defeat, unable to hold the Stalwart back from his future any longer. He rose alongside his old friend, pulling him into an embrace that felt all too final and ended far too soon.

He watched Harper go quietly into that good night, and he did not gather up the box and vanish from Mourn until long after the former King had passed from his sight.

~Fin