Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

“It’s all right Raven. It’s going to be fine.”

Charles whispered softly to the young blonde beside him, who in turn leaned more into his chest, trying to make herself appear smaller.

“I swear, if it wasn’t for that teleporter,” Raven muttered, eyeing the men around them warily, “and your stupid rules, you would have gotten us out of this already.”

Of course. Charles had no doubt that there was an easy way to get them free from this current scene they were in, but there was a reason for as why he’d rather have them pretend to be as defenceless as possible. Also, it would be unwise to do something that would provoke their captors, as it appeared that they were being trapped on a strange ship in the middle of the ocean, surrounded by ferocious looking pirates with nowhere to run to.

Only a while ago, he and Raven were enjoying their trip to their long-awaited summer vacation in France, completely unaware of their fate as they were walking around the sunny deck and relaxing in the cool breezes from the sea, occasionally making small talk with the other passengers on the luxurious ship. Just being social like anyone of their status.

Then out of nowhere, a frightened scream broke the air, drawing everyone’s attention to the source of it.

And that was when they first encountered the teleporter. A dark haired, red skinned man with long tail appeared from thick clouds of dark red smoke, standing in the middle of the deck observing around calmly, seemingly oblivious to the fact that people were either screaming in horror or fainting around him. As soon as his eyes landed on them, he marched towards with quick strides.

Despite his better knowledge of what the red man actually was, Charles had thought for a second that he was faced with a demon for the man’s devilish appearance, paired with those icy blue eyes that petrified them both with just a stare, making them stay at their spots, unable to escape.

Before Charles could begin to react, the man had had his grips on his shirt’s collars and Raven’s wrist, then quickly—just as he had come—disappeared with them onto this strange huge ship they were on now, so far away from their own that they couldn’t even see a sign of it anywhere within their line of vision.

The teleporter had left them here and disappeared elsewhere without saying anything. For a moment, it looked like they were only being watched, no one seemed eager to do anything, or even talk to them. But Charles simply couldn’t trust that they were safe at all, he wrapped his arms around Raven, instinctively shielding her as best as he could, even though he knew that she didn’t really need it.

When finally, the pirates slowly parted away themselves, making way for two men to walk forward, one of them were the one who had kidnapped them earlier.

“Sorry for the inconvenient, my Lord and Lady. But I believe we have a negotiation to make,” said a smooth, accented voice that came from the man in the front, standing tall and intimidating among his fellow pirates.

Judging by the man’s appearance, looked like he was around Charles’ age, but there was something about him that made him seem much older and sophisticated. His dark auburn hair gently swayed in the wind, shining a subtle red hue under the harsh sunlight. A thin scar marred along his left cheekbone, and several more could be seen from his open collars. But the most impressive about this man was those green-grey eyes; it felt as though he had some sort of telepathic power, and could actually read Charles’ mind rather than the other way around…

And as honest as he would allow himself to be, the man was someone Charles would secretly admire any other day, easily became the subject for his fantasy, if it was in a situation other than this.

When neither of Charles nor Raven uttered a word, the man snorted amusingly. “Please. Don’t be so afraid. We’re not going to do anything to you, unless needed.”

‘Right, you just want the ransom money,’ Charles thought silently to himself, carefully double checked his mental shield—It would be too dangerous if these pirates found out that he was also gifted like all of them.

A telepath.

Ever since he had learned that he was different, Charles knew himself possessed a powerful ability, a gift that many people desired but would afraid to be around someone who had it, and so it became the problem; he never had a further opportunity to either practice or explore his gift beside having telepathic conversations with Raven and listening to others’ surface thoughts, hence he didn’t know his actual limit. To accidentally hurt someone was something he wanted to avoid as best as he could. Even though the other parties are murderous looking gang of pirates, Charles couldn’t risk trying his gift on them, for feared that he would somehow hurt Raven too.

After he felt calmed enough, Charles asked carefully, “may I assume that after you have successfully gathered the ransom, you will let us go unharmed afterward?”

“Of course, Lord Xavier,” The man said, solemnly placing a hand over his heart, “I swear on my own life.”

Raven softly squeezed Charles’ arm and whispered, “are you sure about this, Charles?”

“Yes, I’m sure,” Charles reassured her, gently wrapped his hand over Raven’s. “Trust me on this, darling.”

Then to the pirate, he said, “fine. We promise we won’t do anything rash, you had better keep your words.”

“It’s a pleasure working with you, Lord and Lady Xavier.” The man saluted them with a satisfied smirk.

For a long, awkward pause, they all kept staring at each other. Just as Charles was starting to feel uncomfortable, hesitant about what to do next, the teleport broke the silence by clearing his throat, drawing everyone’s attentions towards himself. With a reminding tone, he muttered, “Captain...”

At that, the man turned his head slightly to stare at his shipmate, a confused look appeared on his face for a second before the realization hit. “Oh! Right—please, let me introduce myself: I’m the captain of this ship, my name is Erik Lehnsherr. And my first mate here is called Azazel.”

The red skinned man, who was silently standing behind Erik, inclined his head at them. “I apologize for making such a poor first impression, Lord and Lady Xavier. I hope there won’t be any hard feelings about that.”

“Ah, well I—”

“You’re not forgiven!” Raven glowered at the man, abruptly cutting in on whatever Charles was going to say, “not now, not ever! Don’t bother with that fake politeness.”

“Raven!” Charles quickly hushed, alarmed—from many things he had learned from experience, he knew that when Raven was being stubborn it was a hard job calming her down.

He glanced back at Azazel, about to thoroughly apologize for Raven’s behavior. But to his surprise, it didn’t appear she had angered the pirate any bit. If anything, Azazel’s already red face seemed to have become (impossibly) a few shades redder, while holding Raven’s gaze without blinking. He was practically radiating his fondness at her at full force. Inevitably, Charles could feel it very clearly even if he didn’t want to.

Charles sighed and mentally shook his head. Whatever was going to happen from this point on, he hoped that they could make it home safe and sound.

-*-

For the couple of days on this ship, Charles had learned a few things:

One: Lehnsherr was announced the successor by the late captain, who was unfortunately murdered by a traitor called Schmidt not even a year ago in a mutiny. After that, Schmidt disappeared without a trait, the pirates who were on his side were all punished by either death or being abandoned on a deserted island. That was Lehnsherr’s first order as captain. Even now, they were still on the hunt for Schmidt’s head, it didn’t matter if he was still alive or already dead in some corner of the earth.

Two: the whole crew were entirely made of gifted people, every single one of them possessed uncanny abilities like Charles and Raven, which amazed Charles to no end when he found out that there were plenty of people like them around.

He couldn’t believe that up until now, Raven was the only gifted person he knew and were close to, there wasn’t even a chance for him to actively go out and seek for others, especially after Kurt married his mother. Still, Charles always believed that there were more people like him and Raven existed, and meeting these men had proved it, although the prefered circumstances could have been better in his mind.

And three: as much as Charles had learned from the men he had talked with; Lehnsherr was perhaps the most powerful gifted individual that Charles had ever met. Even though he hadn’t seen it with his own eyes, but according to stray thoughts that Charles caught from the pirates, his gift was control metal, he could alter and manipulate metallic objects as he wished.

It was no wonder that none of Lehnsherr’s men even had a slight thought of ever betraying him, for they had witnessed him being invincible in battles: calling metal to him and sending them flying at enemies like bullets and daggers was easy to Lehnsherr with just a flick of finger, he barely needed to swing his own sword at all to guarantee victory in every fight.

Having heard that piece of information, Charles made a mental note to never upset the pirate captain, although somehow he was more convinced that Lehnsherr wasn’t the type who would snap someone’s fingers for petty reasons. But better be safe than sorry, he would play the part of a well-behaved prisoner for as long as it required, until he and Raven were truly safe.

-*-

Since the day they had made the deal with these pirates, they weren’t treated as badly as Charles had thought; however, they had to take turn and do chores around the ship like every crew member. From cleaning, mopping the decks to cooking, and washing clothes, works that both him and Raven had never had to mind themselves, considering their status, everything was done for them back home. But they tried their best and never uttered a complain while doing these kinds of work, which seemed to surprise the men a little.

Among the pirates, Alex was the one who approached them first, showing them how to do the work and where to go or was off limit was the duty assigned to him. Though Alex was still a young boy himself, he seemed to have much more experience with life than either of Charles and Raven had, even his younger brother Scott was better than them in handling tough jobs and other stuff. All four of them quickly became friends since they were the most closer in age, it was a good thing a companionship could be found in this kind of situation.

From what Charles had noticed after befriending the brothers, Alex wasn’t much of a chatter, but Scott was always eager for a conversation whenever they were available. He told Charles about himself and his brother, that they both possessed quite similar abilities; while Alex could generate some sort of energy blasts from his body if he concentrated enough, Scott could emit it from his eyes. However, unlike Alex, Scott was unable to control his gift, the only way to shut it down was if he kept his eyes closed all the time, that was why he always wore a special pair of goggles with some kind of red glass as lenses in order for him to be able to see and function normally.

The nights here on the ship were a bit of a struggle, Raven was fortunate enough to be given her own cabin to reside to, whereas Charles was made to sleep among the men in a spare hammock, or sometimes in a corner with just thin blankets to keep himself warm each night. But he wasn’t going to make a fuss about it, simply looking around confirmed that many were in the same situation that he was. The one simple rule applied here was ‘first come, first served’, even the trusted vice captain Azazel was also sharing the sleeping quarter with them. And of course, no surprise about Lehnsherr having his own cabin.

Speaking of the captain, besides seeing him during day time, minding his own business and giving orders to the crew, Charles barely saw Lehnsherr joining the pirates for night time activities like card games and such, or making appearance at all anywhere on the ship. So it was an unexpected sight when Charles was mopping the front deck before calling it a night, Lehnsherr was watching him from his spot under the foremast, casually leaned on it with arms crossed in front of his chest. Charles couldn’t hear any surface thoughts, even for a little, but he could feel the other’s gaze on himself, on his every movement.

After a while, Charles just couldn’t take it anymore. “Is there something you need, Lehnsherr?” Charles asked dryly, taking the chance to have a break from the chore as well, straightening his back to hear the satisfying pop before turning to face the other.

Lehnsherr chuckled softly, but immediately schooled his expression back to being serious when he saw that Charles was squinting at him. Then he said, “we just sent out the ransom letter to your family. If it goes well, you two will be free by the end of this month.”

“Oh…, I see,” Charles said, silently calculating the time in his head.

That would be three more weeks from now, and then they would be back to their previous lives. But for some reason, the thought wasn’t as exciting as he expected. “Well, let’s hope my mother can actually convince Kurt to prepare the money on time. But until then,” Charles sighed, “we’ll be bothering you a bit longer, captain.”

“Correct me if I’m wrong, but that doesn’t sound like you have a great relationship with your parents,” Lehnsherr wondered aloud, just as Charles suddenly felt a gentle tap against his mental shield, startling him a little before he instantly realised what it was.

“You could say that,” Charles breathed, amazement in his voice. Now it was his turn to feel oddly amused, mainly by the fact that this was the first time he caught a genuine emotion from the other—curiosity, to be more clear. He couldn’t help openly staring at Lehnsherr’s face and completely disregarded how rude that was. When he realized the pause was getting uncomfortably long, Charles huffed and quickly added, “ah—at least they dote on Raven, and that’s enough for me. I’m fine with however they want to treat me, really.”

Charles threw Lehnsherr a nonchalant glance before returning to his work, hoping that was the end of their small talk, just a bit more and he would have carelessly exposed himself.

Yet, it looked like Lehnsherr wasn’t done with their conversation. Charles sighed and stopped again to get it over with.

“Is there anything else?”

For a few seconds, Lehnsherr only stared at him with his usual expressionless face, his mind had abruptly become quiet again, much to Charles’ disappointment. Though he wasn’t left in silence for too long this time.

After pushing himself up and stretching his limbs, Lehnsherr simply said, “just call me Erik,” before turning and walking back to his cabin without waiting for a response, leaving Charles standing there with an obvious dumbfounded look on his face.

Afterward, Charles had to mentally shook himself off, he doubted that he could ever get used to talking with this man, considering that his mind was abnormally quiet compared to all the people Charles had encountered before. Plus, he always tended to tense up whenever he felt like Lehnsher—ah...Erik and him were being too friendly, considering their positions to each other, making it even more difficult to hold a conversation for too long.

By the time he had finished mopping, it was well late in the night that when he returned to the quarter, a corner was what left for him. But then there was an extra fur blanket today, which was strange, since while he and Raven weren’t treated badly, the pirates would not show them any kindness either.

...Didn’t matter. Charles silently thanked whoever was it that left it here. That night, he fell asleep all warm and felt much better than ever since he and Raven stepped on this ship.

-*-

Soon came the second week, the siblings were getting on a better term with the everyone on the ship, no more not-so-discreet glares and sneers whenever they walked by the men.

Raven had even gained a lot of admirers, though they didn’t do anything more than helping her out with chores and entertaining her whenever they got the chances, but tough luck if she cared for any of their attempts at all. And to Charles, these men had become comfortable enough to open up more to him about their personal lives, showing him their surprisingly better side and telling him why they chose to become pirates.

What Charles could get out of their stories was that they all came from pretty similar backgrounds: shunned by their loved ones and others because they were different, it was either became an outlaw or received punishments that they didn’t deserve. And then they all ended up here, building their own family on this ship and swearing their loyalty to the captain.

Charles also learned a few things about Erik as well, but only in vague little details, it seemed that no one here knew much about Erik’s life before he joined the crew. All they remembered that it was about a decade ago when they first saw a seventeen year old Erik, looking like any ordinary village boy, appearing while they were docking at a rural place trading their goods and loading the supplies on to the ship. He had begged the late captain to let him on board, and to all of the sea men’s astonishment, their late captain—who usually would have laughed at such a naive request from a young boy—didn’t say no. Since then, Erik had always been a quiet man, he kept to himself and didn’t really talk much, but he had proved himself to be reliable and trustworthy, that was why he was respected by his men, both for his leadership and his gift.

The more Charles thought about it the more curious he became, he tried to asked the older men but met with the same answer. His only solution was to talk with Azazel, but since he was always either right next to Erik or busy competing with others to chase after Raven like an over-sized puppy, Charles couldn’t find a good time to ask.

That was it, until it was Charles’ turn to prepare the ingredients in the kitchen for next day’s meals. He was hunching on a low stool peeling potatoes and other vegetables, dropping them in a large tub filled with water. And then there was Erik, unexpectedly strolling into the dining quarter, with his eyes already on Charles the moment he walked in.

Except for the two of them, the area was pretty much empty. Being alone in the room hadn’t bothered Charles much, up to the moment he felt Erik’s presence, it made his focusing on the chore a bit more difficult and he couldn’t help feeling strained again.

Even so, Charles gave him a quick glance to acknowledge Erik’s presence, trying his best to stay composed.

“Come for a little chat again, captain Lehnsherr?” Charles asked, hands continued working on the vegetables steadily.

Erik didn’t answer at first, he just walked closer, quietly pulling out another stool from the side to sit down on the opposite side of Charles. The only thing in between them was the bucket of waste—too small to be a barrier, yet enough for Charles use it as one, knowing there was something to keep Erik a tiny bit away from being too close made him feel more at ease.

“You have been asking around about me,” Erik finally asked, “why?”

Oh… did Erik not like that he was being nosy?

Shite…

Well, the truth might be the better choice at this moment. Then, trying his best to be unfazed about Erik’s question, Charles said, “oh, that? Nothing, I’m just curious.”

Charles suddenly felt more interested in his chore, eyes didn’t dare look away or at Erik, he was afraid that he might have overstepped a line that he wasn’t supposed to after all. His mind was filled with various scenarios of how the pirate captain would have him disciplined for being an unwanted busybody. Charles held in a shudder at all that thoughts.

But before the fear completely settled in, there was a hand in front of Charles’ vision startling him out of his self-torturing thoughts. Erik gently cupped his chin and turned him to face the other. Seeing his face this close, Erik’s expression was hard to read as usual, but for some reason Charles immediately felt more relaxed and calmed looking into his eyes, maybe he wasn’t angry after all?

When he could tell that Charles finally paid some attention to their conversation, Erik asked, “anything you want to know in particular?”

Too surprised at what he just heard, Charles didn’t even feel it when Erik’s hand left his face. He could only react with the cliché response ‘wait, what?’ before leaning backward a bit, this was too easy to be true...

Erik chuckled at his reaction, but simply repeated the permission again. “Ask away, Charles.”

Squinting at Erik with suspicious eyes, Charles debated with himself whether he should take the chance or be careful on where he stepped, but at the same time it didn’t feel like Erik was messing with him at all, so Charles inhaled deeply and decided to go with it.

He thought for a moment while Erik patiently waited. There was a lot of things he wanted to know, but didn’t want to sound like a curious child asking too many questions. Even after years of being rebellious over all of the nannies and tutors with Raven in their younger years, his manners were very well taught.

After a while of unable to settle for anything to ask, Charles sighed, “you know what, I don’t know what to ask first. I’m happy to hear whichever details you’re willing to share.”

“All right,” Erik began, folding elbows on his knees and knitting his fingers together, taking a brief moment, seemingly trying to remember his past. “I actually lived a pretty good life before this. My father is a skilled blacksmith, so was my grandfather, and also my Great grandfather. For all three generations, it was a tradition for the eldest son to take over the family’s business, and obviously it would guarantee me a peaceful life for the rest of my life if I had made the choice to follow the path, but living a life like that was too dull for me. That’s why I decided to pack my things on my fifteenth birthday, announcing to my parents that I was leaving, and just like that, I left.”

“Wow Erik, I have no idea how much rebellious a boy you were, leaving your own family behind like that,” Charles remarked, clicking his tongue jokingly, making Erik roll his eyes with a huff. “But wait. I heard that you joined the crew when you were seventeen, what were you doing in the time in between?”

“Got quite a good memory there, aren’t you?” One of Erik’s eyebrows raised up amusingly. His smirk, instead of making Charles feel uneasy like before, was making him blush now. “You would be amazed at how much a person could learn in just two years. I wandered from places to places, using my gift to earn myself food and temporary beds to sleep on, I have seen things and heard stories. But then I wanted more, something beyond the land I was far too familiar with, hence I ended up on this ship.”

“I see.” Charles nodded his head softly, taking in all the things Erik just told him, then silently comparing that with his own life. While he very much admired Erik’s choice, it was a thing that he couldn’t do himself, if he just disappeared one day he doubt his mother and Kurt wouldn’t be worried much, but there was Raven, Charles wouldn’t leave her alone in that house no matter what.

“So, Lord Xavier. Have I shattered your‘mysterious pirate captain’  image that you have of me?” Erik asked, waggling his eyebrows at him, giving Charles the best teasing smile he had, “disappointed?”

Now it was Charles’ turn to roll his eyes hard, trying his best not to fling both the knife and the potato he was holding at the other’s annoying smug face. “Please. I’m not that much of a romantic, thank you.”

Eventually, they fell into a pleasant silence, Charles kept working on his tasks, while Erik patiently watched. It felt good like this somehow. When Charles was done, Erik helped him putting away the ingredients and tools. He invited Charles to his cabin for a few chess games after Charles had told him about how free he was and wished if there was some kind of board games to play. And conveniently, Erik was also a very good player, as he claimed himself. After that, a few matches of chess were included in their routines whenever Charles could find time after work.

At first, he didn’t give it any thought much, but Charles noticed Erik’s behaviour changed whenever they were around each other. Even when Raven was the only girl on the ship, his attitude towards her didn’t change compared to when they first met, Erik treated her with as much courtesy a gentleman should a woman, but no teasing like he did to Charles.

Which was perfectly fine with Raven, she had complained to Charles how much of a hassle it was dealing with all of these unwanted attentions she had been having lately; however, she could tolerate Azazel since the man was a convenient swatter to keep the other flies away. Charles couldn’t help feeling sympathy for the teleporter, but thanks to him he didn’t have to keep being an overprotective brother, Raven hated it whenever he became one.

The more closer they got, the more Charles was beginning to be more sensitive to feeling Erik’s emotions leaking through and into his mind, it was mildly a rush, but at least Charles was getting somewhere. It gave him a great sense of achievement even with such a tiny improvement with his gift.

But on the third week, Erik spontaneously decided to do something, that despite all of the progress he had had feeling Erik’s thoughts recently, Charles couldn’t even see coming.

As Charles was making his sleeping corner a bit more comfortable while chatting excitedly with Scott about theories on how his goggles worked, then suddenly, Erik appeared at their quarter’s entrance, his presence was enough to quiet down the talking in a second without having to announced anything. All eyes turned to him, awaiting.

“Charles,” he called.

“Y-yes, captain?” Charles stood up immediately from his spot, addressing Erik’s position like other pirates would.

“Grab all of your belongings and follow me,” Erik said, then walked out without further explanation.

Charles turned around and started packing his few pieces of borrowed clothing inside the fur blanket, from the corners of his eyes, Charles saw Alex and Scott watching him struggling to catch up with Erik, they both looked very concerned so he smiled at them reassuringly before climbing up to the open air on the main deck, making for the stairs to Erik’s… cabin?

“Wait! Erik Wait!” Charles shouted, feeling very confused. “What is this all about?”

Erik still wouldn’t answer him, he opened the door and walked inside, Charles reluctantly followed him in.

Once they were in the room and the door was closed, Erik took Charles’ little package and started unpacking for him. “You will stay and sleep in this room with me for these last few days, until we meet up with your step-father’s ship at our agreed destination for the trade. Can’t have you continue sleeping among the pirates and looking drained when that time comes, your stepfather might not like how we treated you after all.”

...Oh, so that was it. looked like it was almost time to go home already.

'How time passed so rapidly,'  He thought.

Charles had been visiting this cabin a lot of time, but all of it was for their usual chess matches, he hadn’t really paid much attention to Erik’s room before.

At first glance, it was quite messy, but he could tell it was an organized mess, just like his own room back in London, everything was in convenient reach for Erik whenever he needed. The most tidied were Erik’s soft looking bed at one side of the room, and his loaded bookshelves on the opposite side. His black oak desk near the windows was a chaos with rolls of papers, maps, and navigating tools all over, as well as on the floor and the coffee table in the middle of the room, where they would always have have their games on. The wooden board was still opened, ready for them anytime they wanted to.

When Charles looked up, Erik was staring at him again, but there was something more in that gaze, something Charles couldn’t quite put his finger on.

“Are you fine with sharing a bed?” Erik asked softly, “it won’t be good for you to keep sleeping on the floor.”

“That’s fine with me.” Charles shrugged and offered a smile, even though there was a strange feeling of nervousness that made him feel skittish all of a sudden.

“Good,” Erik said, hanging up Charles’ borrowed clothes in the closet next to the bed. “Your formal attires are in here as well. You will need them back don’t you? We can’t have your stepfather be furious when he sees you dressing up like us pirates as well.”

Charles could see that Erik was attempting to humour him to change the mood, he appreciated the gesture and was more than glad to play along.

“Oh believe me, even if I am dressed like a beggar Kurt won’t even bat an eyelash.” Charles walked up to Erik’s work desk, leaning back on its elegant curve, one of his hands tracing the carved patterns on the sides. “The only thing that man cares about is his noble reputation among his circle of aristocratic friends. Gossips can destroy a man like him.”

“Indeed, words are like double edged knives. But thankfully, I’m not one who would mind having a bad reputation,” Erik said as he closed the closet before spreading out the fur blanket over the bed, patting it down neatly like he had done this million times before. “You can go ahead and sleep if you’d like, I need to sort out something first.”

Charles watched while Erik headed to the desk, making a quick work of rolling out papers, his navigating tools, ink and feather pens, and a couple of maps. Then Charles idly looked around the room, his eyes landed on the bookshelves once more.

“I don’t think I can fall asleep just yet, can I borrow some of your books?” Charles asked.

“Sure. I don’t have that many interesting ones though, but feel free to read them,” Erik said without looking up, his mind already focused on the papers and maps in front of him.

Charles pushed all of his weight back onto his feet, walking towards the shelves. When he took a closer look at those rows and rows of books, he saw that Erik was right, most of the books on the shelves were actually his handwritten notes and journals, there were just a few books which turned out to be some classic literature that Charles had read so many times already.

Even so, Charles randomly picked one then sat himself down in one of the wingback chairs at the coffee table; however, he realised that the lighting from here was too poor for him to be able to make out words, he should ask Erik to light more candles otherwise. But before Charles could utter a word, a metal lamp floated over, quietly hovering above his head and brightening up his vision. Charles plucked the lamp out of the air, then tilted his head to the side as he smiled appreciatively at Erik, who in turn offered Charles a slight nod before continuing to work in silence.

One book became two, then three. The weariness of the day finally caught up with him, Charles slowly drifted off and fell asleep in the middle of reading. He was so exhausted that he didn’t even realise it when Erik gently carried him to bed. Only when Charles came to, he had already been tucked in with several layers of blankets and that familiar soft fur material.

The room had drown in almost pitch black darkness, save for the shy gleams of moonlight leaking through the spaces between the window curtains behind Erik’s desk, just bright enough to illuminate the silhouette of the pirate captain’s sleeping form right next to him.

Charles lazily blinked several times, his vision adjusted to the darkness of the room, but he was unable to stay awake for too long, simply too tired, Charles nodded off again with the image of Erik’s face and his scars so close to his face, the pleasant hum of Erik’s mind lulled him back to sleep.

-*-

“Charles, wake up!”

Charles woke with a start, a pair of hands grabbing his shoulders and shaking him off his drowsiness.

“Ugh…,” Charles groaned grumpily, squinting at the blurry form of a blonde hovering above his face, “Raven? What are you doing?”

“Lehnsherr told me to come and get you, he needs us both up the main deck right now. Come on.” She helped him sit up by forcefully yanking his arms, then she quickly searched and fetched him a warm vest to put on.

“What’s going on?” Charles stifled a yawn into his palm, slowly putting on the vest when handed to, putting his feet into the shoes was a difficult task when he wasn’t quite awake yet. Though hearing Raven’s frantic mind helped wake him up a little.

“We might have a trouble,” Raven explained in a rush, kneeling down to help Charles with his shoe laces, “Lehnsherr—well, we bumped into some of his acquaintances earlier, and the situation doesn’t look very good for us right now.”

“Oh dear, at this hour?” Charles looked out at the dark sky that wasn’t even close to dawn through the open door. “Is the other ship that intimidating?”

“No, no ship. They are not pirates.”

“What?” he turned his confused look back to Raven, who could be in the middle of the ocean without a ship? “Then... who are these people?”

Taking firm grabs of his arms, slowly, carefully, she said, “Charles, they are… merpeople.”

Chapter Text

“What?” Charles gasped, both in shocked and amazed at what he just heard. “Did you just said… merpeople?”

“Trust me, I know how that sounds like. But they are real!” Raven said, she couldn’t help raising her voice in frustration, and a little, but obvious, excitement. “Go see for yourself, right now, if you don’t believe me.”

“Erik knew that mermaids and mermen exist,” he said, looking at Raven with a deep frown as if he was accusing her of the secret, “and he never told me!”

“Charles…”

“Sorry, sorry. Right.” Charles shook his head, willing himself to focus more on the task at hand instead. “Erik needs us out there.”

Charles swiftly brushed down his shirt, an unshaken habit whenever he finished dressing, then quickly rushed them out of the room. Raven looped her arm around his tightly and they managed to sprint down the stairs, side by side, to the main deck without tripping. And it looked like whatever was happening was drawing the attention of the whole ship, they had to move past quite a crowd of pirates before Erik came to view; the pirate captain was standing by the railing with his back towards them, arguing loudly with someone on the other side, down below the ocean, to be more exact…

“I told you, I will pay off whatever the damn damages that Schmidt caused, just give me more time,” Erik yelled, leaning over almost a bit too far for his safety, he could have fallen off if he wasn’t gripping so hard at the railing that his knuckles were all white with tension.

“Sorry bub. His Majesty’s order. You know I can’t do anything about that, right?” said an equally loud voice of another man.

Erik clicked his tongue in frustration. But when he saw that Charles and Raven finally showed up, Erik signaled for them to come forward and stand beside him. A broad hand quickly clapped onto his shoulder when he came close enough to hear the other’s breath of relief. Charles wasn’t sure if it was just him mirroring Erik’s mood, but the warm contact made him feel more relax almost instantly.

“See! I’m not lying, I have got these two as hostages for a trade, the ransom will surely be more than enough to pay the debt.”

With Erik’s hand on his shoulder as an anchor, Charles dared to lean on the railing a bit further than he normally would, eyes strained to look into the dark ocean that was reflecting the light from the few torches and lamps on the ship. It took him awhile to adjust to the darkness to really see the figures in the water.

He tried not to gasp out loud, but his eyes widened at what he saw at last: floating above the dark waves were indeed human-like torsos of men and women, of various skin complexions, wearing things that resembled Roman armours that looked like they made out of bone-ish and organic materials. Some of them carried weapons in hands; spears and tritons made of the same components as their armours. And then the below parts—from what Charles could make out with the limit of the light’s range—were fish-like long tails with thick fins, their iridescent scales glittering under the water as they trod back and forth to keep their heads and shoulders above the surface.

“This is… extraordinary,” Charles said, a bit breathily, then he turned to look at Raven like he needed her to confirm this wasn’t just a dream, she gave him an ‘I told you’ look with a nod in return.

“You can try and explain all you want, Lehnsherr,” continued the merman, who were bickering with Erik earlier, “but I’m saying this for the last time: either you give up your ship in exchange for the one that your ex-shipmate had stolen from the King, or pay the value of what His Majesty’s lost ship worth.”

Charles was failing at trying not to stare too hard at the merpeople (he ought to not making this a habit), his eyes flickering between the merman and Erik, who were both currently looking very annoyed, as if they had had this conversation for the hundred times already and still hadn’t reached the end of it.

After an intense silent stare-down for a minute or two, the merman gave up and sighed.

“You know what? Screw this, I’m taking your little boat with me.”

“Logan! Don’t you dare, you scally ape!”

The merman turned away, blatantly ignoring Erik’s and his crew’s creative insults to signal tiredly at his mer-soldiers. “Spread out! Surround the ship.”

At this chaotic scene, Charles’ his mind went through miles and miles of thoughts, but before he could think of a stalling tactic, his lips already parted, and his voice carried out clearly through the screaming around him.

“Wait!”

Everyone went silent at that, even the mer-soldiers had stopped in their track of carrying out their order to look. The merman leader, whom Erik had called Logan earlier, slowly turned his head to look up at him, one eyebrow raised questioning.

“Um...I—I...” Charles stuttered, cold sweats started to form around his forehead as he met the intimidating glare of the merman.

A sudden touch on his skin startled Charles, he looked down and saw that Raven had slid her small hand in his and gave him a gentle squeeze, a gesture of reassurance and her firm believe in him whenever he felt nervous, she had done this before when Charles first heard about their father’s death, or when they stood in front of Kurt listening to his accusations for things he didn’t do, or being blamed for Cain’s (their step brother) mischief, she had always known what to do in the right moments. And even though on the outside, she appeared as strong now as she always did, but when Charles stared into her her eyes that he realized, the look in them betrayed her emotions; she was just as nervous as him.

Nonetheless, Charles was thankful that Raven was around to be his support, when the one who probably needed it more was her.

He inhaled deeply and started one more time. “I’m sorry to cutting in your business like this,” he said, “but is there possibly a way for you to give us more time? If you don’t trust Erik, could you at least trust me and my sister, please? We just want to go home, and we promise everything Erik said is true.”

Logan rubbed the bridge of his nose with an audible sigh. “Look here, boy, I’m just following orders, and time is what we cannot give you… anymore. There will be shit storm to deal with our King’s wrath if we returned empty-handed. ”

“But…”

“Logan, may I have a word,” interrupted another voice. From the group behind, a merman with darker skin tone swam up to put a hand on Logan’s shoulder as he nodded at his mer-soldier, granting him permission to speak.

From his higher distance, Charles couldn’t hear what they were whispering about, but it didn’t matter since the discussion ended shortly, and the other merman was looking at him with a very friendly smile.

“Hey there. Sorry that you and your sibling got caught up in this, obviously, not your problem. I’m Armando Muñoz,” the dark skinned merman introduced himself, then added, “you see, this is not the first time we have confronted Lehnsherr like this. One of his men stole the war token from our King and disappeared with it. And every time we met with Lehnsherr he always promised us the same excuse. This is pretty much a last straw for us,”

“And I said: we are very close to the goal this time!” Erik spat.

“I understand,” Charles said, pushing Erik back gently by his shoulder and cutting him off, “but please, if you sink us right here we will all die, and there are people on this ship who don’t deserve this punishment.”

“We will spare you two, we can get you a boat and let you sail away from this mess, don’t worry,” Armando said.

“Don’t just decide it yourself,” Erik growled, banging his fist on the railing. “You can’t leave my men here to die.”

“Tell that red minion of yours to teleport you to somewhere, I don’t care,” Logan spat back, “your ship will become our King’s token’s replacement.”

“Not my ship!” Erik bellowed angrily.

“Now listen here, Lehnsherr—”

“Enough!”

Charles and Raven screamed in unison, they looked at each other while breathing sharply, momentarily surprised by each other’s action, but when the same idea popped up in their minds there was no way they would play their obedient captive roles any longer, especially when there were people’s lives involved. Charles thought he should let Raven be the one to do the talking this time, it was her turn to take the lead.

Putting his utter trust in her, he stepped back and gave her a mental nudge, repeating the encouragements she had sent him earlier, and that seemed to be exactly what he needed to do. With strong determination, Raven walked forward and made her suggestion clear.

“All right, if you all care for one, here is a plan,” she said directly to Erik’s face, but turned to the merpeople when she added, “why don’t you just let us all sail to a nearby land or something, instead of barking at each other until noon like this? I’m sure it won’t kill you to at least have a discussion with your mer-King, tell him that he’d better provide us another mean for the trade if he’s planning to keep Lehnsherr’s ship as pawn. Meanwhile, we will be where you can reach, safely on an island. And in the end, if everything works out, he will have his debt paid, and Lehnsherr gets his ship back. Fair enough?”

Both Logan and Armando were staring at Raven like she was the most sane human they had met so far (maybe she was), they wordlessly nodded their heads, agreed with her plan without a single word of rejection. And before Erik could even try to utter a thing on this logical decision, Charles had placed both of his palms onto the other’s chest, surprising Erik enough to have his complete attention to him. “Erik, just think about it, your ship and crew will be safe. people’s lives matter more.”

“But then we’ll miss the trade, and you will be stuck with me—us— for who knows how much longer. Are you fine with that, Charles?”

Charles glanced at Raven, silently asking her the same question, and it felt like a knot was untied when he received her nod of understanding. With his decision made, he turned back to Erik. “We’ll think of something. And frankly, that doesn’t sound so bad.”

Erik kept staring at him like there were only two of them existed at that very moment, Charles found himself staring back just as blatantly, ignoring the people around them, who were watching and waiting without making any noise.

“Stop goggling at each other so passionately and tell us are you in or not?” Logan yelled from below the ship, impatient filled in his question.

Charles was startled quickly enough to tear his gaze away, along with his hands, which were on Erik’s chest for quite awhile. He heard the other muttered something under his breath like ‘fucking hairy fish’, before Erik moved past him, making a beeline towards the railing.

“Fine, you keep this ship and talk to your fish king about it, he should understand that I need it in order to collect the treasure for him,” Erik said, “but right now we still need to sail to a nearby land first.”

“Deal.”

The conversation ended with Erik grabbing Charles’ arm and taking him straight to the quarterdeck with him, then Erik steered the wheel himself. When Charles looked back Raven was being escorted back to her cabin by Azazel, or more like he was only following after her, she sent Charles a reassuring thought before disappearing through the deck’s threshold.

Then he looked over the railing to see that the merpeople were following them closely, swimming in horizontal formations; the most spectacular sight Charles had ever seen.

Erik clearly looked angry, considering he was about to be parted from his beloved ship in a moment. But he still kept his gaze straight ahead without looking at the compass, as he had the way figured out like an experienced sailor.

The sun had begun to peek from the horizon on their right, shining the early rays of sunlight onto the ocean, slowly brightened the lingering greyish-blue of the night, Charles darted his eyes from the rising sun to the path ahead, now that he could make out the view more clearly.

“Land, ho!”

The pirate up on the crow’s nest signaled at the line of tiny dots in front of them. Erik waited until they had come to a closer distance to see that it was in fact a chain of large and small islands that they saw, he left the wheel and walked towards the railing again, informing the merpeople about his decision. “We’ll need a moment to unload our supplies into the boats.”

“No time for that, just throw your stuff and yourselves into the water and swim over there,” Logan told them, already turned away without further argument.

“Fuck!” Erik hissed but started to quickly direct everyone to grab whatever they could and leave the ship, no one even hesitated to question, they followed his order perfectly.

Charles could only have a moment to stay stunned before he saw the columns of water shooting up from the ocean all around the ship, they were about half taller than the ship’s height, water spinning around and up as though twisting around their invisible cores, splashing droplets of water and making loud sound as they appeared. Breaking his gaze away from the tops to look down, he saw that circling at the base of every water column was a small group of five mer-soldiers with their weapons raised, as though commanding and keeping the sea water to stay up straight.

Around him, people had already cleaned up and started jumping off the ship and into the sea, Charles suddenly remembered Raven, but as he was about to run off to find her, Erik appeared and wrapped a strong arm around his waist.

“Wait! I have to find Raven!” Charles struggled frantically, trying to get out of Erik’s hold.

“She’ll be fine, Azazel will take care of her. We need to leave now,” Erik answered shortly and dragged Charles with him over to the railing without hesitating, stepping on it with Charles following suit. “Ready? On the count of three; one, two,”

Charles grabbed Erik’s shirt with firm grips; one hand on his chest, the other on the fabric of Erik’s back, sucking a deep breath into his lung.

“Three.”

They stepped into the air then fell into the cold water with a loud splash, even though Charles knew how to swim, it was quite a challenge to stay focus at this moment. He tried to open his eyes and saw Armando swimming among other merpeople to gently help pushing the other pirates up to the surface one by one, getting them as far away from the ship as possible. Another mer-soldier helped them half way, until Erik finally got his rhythm and kicked the rest of the way up. Charles knew Erik was physically strong, as of his gift, but feeling it was entirely a different matter, Erik’s arm didn’t leave his waist as he trod for both of them, while holding a damp, heavy sack of supply in the other arm, until Charles was calm enough to help treading too.

“Can you swim to the shore on your own?” Erik asked, worry leaking off him, surrounding Charles like the waves around them.

“Yes, can you?” Charles couldn’t help but lightly mock him, despite the situation.

“Go ahead, Charles.” Erik gave him a push, turning around to make sure no one of his crew got left behind.

Charles noticed on his side that Raven was also near by, swimming towards Azazel and tugged on his shirt before she spotted Charles. He gave a signal to say he was going for the shore, which she understood immediately.

Even when Charles thought he was well at swimming, the path to the white beach was further than he thought, he realised he was going to be out of breath and strength, but Charles still tried his best, he only prayed to not get a cramp in the middle, it had been so long since he last participated in any swimming contest. Charles suddenly felt the need to check on Raven, he turned his head searching for her, and he was relieved to see Azazel had caught up to them and was helping her to stay afloat.

Then behind them followed Erik, who was swimming without slowing his speed, Charles barely had time to be impressed when Erik closed the distance quickly and snaked an arm around Charles’ torso again, smiling as though he hadn’t just lost his ship to the merpeople.

“Tired already, Lord Xavier?”

“Shut up, I’m just out of practice lately,” Charles retorted.

Erik just grinned before dragging both of them forward, until they could feel the sand under their feet, they faltered a bit when they tried to find their balance between the rolling waves, walking the rest of the way to the shore.

When there was a loud noise like something was being sucked into the ocean, they both turned to see that Erik’s ship was indeed being dragged down by the columns of water that they saw earlier, the end of the ship went down first, then the tip slowly followed. If they were still on it, Charles thought, that would have been way more terrifying than watching it went down like this.

“I swear, if those bastards snapped or broke even a single mast, I’d had their tails cut and sold at fish market,” Erik grumbled, watching his ship slowly disappeared into the water with a frown.

Raven and Azazel finally made it after them, with the teleport smugly carried her in both of his arms easily, walking carefully into the land, Charles was surprised a bit when Raven even allowed him to do that, maybe she was tired as well. But as soon as they got out of the water, she abruptly jumped off his arms, leaving Azazel with a kicked-puppy expression trailing behind.

One by one, Erik’s men slowly dragged themselves and whatever supplies they could get their hands on onto the beach, Charles and Raven took turns to help them as much as they could, it was late noon when they finally gathered most of their things.

A few bonfires were lit and they divided into groups of five or six to surround their fires and get warmed up, drying off their clothes as they rested after the course of non-stop swimming. Charles sat with Erik and Azazel, Raven was next to him with her head slumped onto Charles’ shoulder, her eyes glued to the sparkling fire in the middle of their group.

“We should build up a temporary camp or something for now,” Azazel suggested, “then let’s think further later.”

“Yeah, we are undoubtedly gonna miss the trade too,” Erik agreed, looking at Charles when he mentioned it.

Charles looked back at him with understanding, he bit his lip and turned his gaze to his bare feet, where he was digging them into the soft sand unconsciously. All they could do now was stay alive and well until the merpeople came back and gave them some good news, otherwise they were going to be stuck here and would have to find another way to leave the island.

“First thing first, we need to find some sort of drinkable water. There have to be a few streams or a river in the jungle,” Erik said, looking behind his back at the green and chaos of trees that screamed dangerous. “We lost most of our water barrels earlier, I think there is only enough for at most a week.”

Azazel twisted his head around and followed his gaze at the direction of the jungle. “Sure, we will go tomorrow morning.”

“Can I come with you?” Charles asked, making both Azazel and Erik whirl their heads at him.

“Charles, it’s safer here,” Erik reminded him, “besides, you have never stepped foot into anywhere like this, have you?”

“Not really, but I’m all for learning some useful survival skills,” Charles grinned, “and you will teach me, won’t you, Erik?”

Charles could tell he was making quite an impact on the pirate captain with his plead, judging by the look he was giving Charles and the strains of emotion that he could only call ‘smitten’, if he could find another word for it.

“Then I’m going too,” Raven cut in, rubbing her forehead at Charles’ shoulder tiredly, “and don’t try to talk me out, I’d rather be anywhere else than staying here and being annoyingly surrounded by not-so-secret admirers.”

Her last sentences made Azazel stop in his track of trying to do exactly that, he shut his mouth and slowly put his hand down without saying anything, Charles could hear his mind loudly planning on doing something about his annoying rivals later.

The entire morning spent with them helping the others collecting woods and set up tents from the stuff they took from the ship, luckily it seemed like everyone would have their secured space to sleep and rest. Lunch and dinner were taken care of with a little portion from their food supply and a lot of fish that was caught by using a crew member’s gift.

After everyone was fed and their clothes were dried, Erik put them into groups to keep watch in turns before retreating to the tent he was sharing with Azazel, while the siblings were given their own tent also. Charles had thought that Erik would try to put them into the same tent for some reason, and felt strange when he was disappointed that his assumption didn’t happen. Raven fell asleep as soon as her head hit the make-shift pillow that was made out of a bag full of soft sand, Charles pulled the cover up and tugged it around her then sat cross legs in his own mattress, unable to feel sleepy just yet.

Charles scooted to the end of his bedding until he was sitting at their tent’s entrance, looking out into the black ocean that sparkled under moonlight, idly thinking about how his and Raven’s lives had changed in just a short amount of time, getting involved in unexpected adventure like this somehow felt unreal to him.

Alex and Scott were in the first guarding group tonight, the brothers waved at Charles when they saw him from their faraway spot, sitting on a large downward-growing coconut tree with another crewmate, a fire still burning keeping them warm. Charles didn’t want to join them at the moment nor bothering them while they kept watch, he simply waved back with a smile.

“Can’t sleep?”

Charles startled at the question being asked out of nowhere, he twisted his head around and met with a clear view of a tightly clothed crotch, then he looked up to see that Erik was standing very near to his side, wearing less than this morning, his collar was fully opened so Charles could see more of his scars. How did he always appear without a sound, Charles wondered, trying not to stare too hard at that bare chest or those well-toned arms on his sides. His mind was as quiet as always.

“I could ask the same to you,” Charles retorted, determine to not look at that crotch a second time.

“Then do you want to go for a walk?” Erik asked, “just along the beach.”

Charles pondered for a second then stood up, closing the tent as quiet as he could, briefly dusted the sand off his behind as he said, “sure, I can’t sleep anyway.”

Erik grinned at him and led the way, they passed through his and Azazel’s tent so Erik could grab a metal lamp to hover it in front of them, shining the path ahead.

They contently walked side by side in silence, not too far away from their camp, and it almost made Charles feel better just enjoying the night on the beach like this. But regardless of beautiful scenery around him, there was still some worrying about how to get home clung to his thoughts, he couldn’t cut this anxious feeling off anytime soon.

Erik led them towards the bumpy circles of rocks catering into the sea, he climbed up first onto the larger ones, thrusting a hand to Charles as an offer. Charles smiled and took his hand, taking two big steps to where Erik was standing, they gingerly walked to the largest rock that had part of it immersed into the water, soft waves repeatedly bumped into but weren’t tall enough to wet the surface, which made a great spot for them to sit and watch the night sky.

“If we were in a different scenarios, I would enjoy the night so much more,” Charles confessed, taking in a deep breath and sighing audibly.

Erik stole a glance at him quickly before focusing on the lamp at their feet. “I’d say sorry that I dragged you into this, but I knew what I have done and have to do in the first place.”

Charles snorted, genuinely amused rather than being anything else. “That’s very honest of you, mister Lehnsherr.”

“That’s just who I am.” Erik shrugged.

“Say, why are you and your crew so different than other pirates?” Charles asked, leaning the side of his face on his knees, looking at Erik.

“Different?”

“Well, I’m quite sure if we fell into another pirates’ hand we’d be treated worst than servants,” Charles said, “you, on the hand, have been very kind to us since the beginning. It is getting hard to believe you and your men are pirates at all.”

Erik thought for a moment before answered, “I have seen and learned how other pirates operate their routines and plans, it was pretty barbaric to me, to be honest. And since it was easier doing the jobs with our gifts, I see no point in carrying the traditional way of gaining our treasure. Killing is only necessary when we engage in unavoidable battles and conflicts between gangs or armies. Otherwise I have no interest in taking and degrading a human’s life for humorous purpose.”

And Charles knew that the pirate captain was telling the truth, the honesty could be heard from both his voice and his mind, a feeling that Charles was getting used to and he didn’t mind a bit. “But don’t you think you could use your gifts to do something better than being pirates? You’re going to be people’s enemy forever.”

“Ah, still a bit naive are we? What made you think people didn’t already dislike us since we were born? This is pretty much the only thing me and my crew could do to survive,” Erik said, but not in a lecturing tone like the one usually used for naive children, and that was what Charles appreciated.

“We could change their minds. I don’t believe that people like... you have to live like this forever,” Charles argued, keeping his voice event and equally reasonable.

“We could try,” Erik said, “but face it, Charles, can you change their thoughts about gifted people that easily? By simply talking to them? Not likely. All I’m doing is taking from the rich, at least we’re not robbing the poor like those despicable wrinkly farts.”

“Just like Robin Hood,” Charles laughed softly at his own comparison, it still feel somewhat unsettle for him when Erik determined to choose this life, but he could see some reasons to it as well. Charles was grateful that he was born in a much better life, he wondered if he would turn out the same if he wasn’t a Xavier. He appreciated a debate like this where he could discuss the problems that only people like them understood, and it was refreshing since he had never really engaged in such a conversation since Raven declared that it was getting frustrating to talk about this topic too often with him, Charles felt bad for her even though he had had only her to talk with. Until now.

The cold air of the night made Charles shudder, he coiled up with his arms circled around his legs tightly, trying to warm himself. That didn’t go unnoticed to Erik, just as expected, the man seemed to have a special attention to Charles’ smallest movements.

“Come here,” Erik said, already reaching an arm out and bringing Charles closer to him by the waist, making him momentarily lose his balance and lean on the other’s shoulder with a tiny yelp. “It’s warmer like this, don’t you think?”

Charles tried not to act on reflex and look up at Erik’s face, because he knew the pirate captain was smirking at him as he asked a question with an obvious answer to it.

“Fine, you can be my heat bottle,” Charles said instead, utterly defeated.

With the motion of Erik’s hand going up and down his side, instead of being comfortable, Charles was more awake than ever. He suddenly thought about how Erik was definitely the type of man he would fancy as a lover, he was sure that the heat he felt all over him wasn’t from Erik’s body warmth.

“Hey!”

Suddenly, a third voice called out to them, cutting through the atmosphere Charles was so deep into. He abruptly bowled up straight at the call, putting a little space between him and Erik and looking around to find the owner of the voice.

“Over here.”

Charles looked around at Erik’s other side and saw that was the merman who had helped them earlier.

“Oh! Armando, isn’t it?” Charles greeted.

“Yeah. I saw the light of your lamp and swam over,” Armando grinned, crossing his arms on the rock.

“You have any news for us?” Erik asked, getting straight to the point, all serious and business-like manners.

“Of course,” he said, “I have not-so-bad news and bad news, which one do you want to hear first?”

Erik sighed. “What is the not-so-bad news?”

“Logan is talking with the King about the matter,” Armando said.

“And the other?”

“It will be awhile until he can convince the King to let you have the ship back, which mean you’ll be stuck here for quite sometime,” he said with a sympathetic nod.

“How long is a ‘sometime’?” Erik growled lightly.

“I assume a month or so.”

Erik grunted curses in a language, that Charles guessed was German, under his breath, he placed a hand on Erik’s back and stroked him lightly to try and comfort the pirate captain, until Erik finally cooled down enough to stop his train of curses.

“If it’s any help, I could try and see what I can do with contacting your trader?” Armando said, “so maybe you can arrange another date afterward.”

Charles and Erik perked up at that, it wasn’t expected for a merman to offer to help them like this, sure, it would take at least a month, but there was hope.

“Are you sure, Armando? I don’t want you to get in trouble with Logan,” Charles said even though he really wanted this chance.

“Nah, don’t worry about that, we’re like buddies. Besides, I think he would say the same if he was here.” The merman smiled at Charles, the friendliness of his attitude was what made Charles feel like trusting him unconditionally.

“So what do you say, Lehnsherr?” Armando asked.

Erik wouldn’t have to think long before he took the chance as well. “Thanks, Munoz. You are really a great help this time.”

“Don’t mention it. I thought it was unfair for you too, carrying the debt of your captain’s murderer,” he said, tail splashing water a little harder as though reflected of his thought. “Now tell me how do I find this trader?”

They spent a quick few minutes for Erik to tell Armando the exact location, and as expected, the merman knew where to go immediately, he promised them another meeting at this spot in a couple of days then dived back into the dark ocean. Charles could finally feel relieved from the heavy thoughts he had had since the encounter with the merpeople, in fact, it made him so relax that he felt tired and sleepy just right after Armando left.

“Shall we go back?” Erik asked when he saw Charles hiding a yawn with his hand.

Charles nod softly, rubbing his eyes like a child who was too tired to give an audible answer. On the way back he wouldn’t protest or shy away when Erik had an arm around his shoulders to support him, Charles even leaned part of his weight on the other without feeling a bit worried about whether the pirates would take notice or not.

Only when Charles was buried in the warm layers of blankets, and the tent’s flap was secured enough that Erik was finally satisfied to leave and go back to his tent, Charles sighed contently and rolled over to his side facing Raven, she was so deep in her sleep that her mind was radiating colourful but disoriented thoughts; no mistake that she was definitely dreaming. It only took a few more seconds before Charles, too, fell asleep.

-*-

In the morning, Charles was the first to rise, it felt surprisingly refreshed though he wasn’t sleeping in a soft bed like he used to.

Charles looked to his side and saw that Raven was still sleeping comfortably, scanning a few awakened minds told him that it was still a little early, the sun had yet risen up from the horizon but the sky was bright enough to see. He crawled over to the tent’s flap to push it up and saw just exactly that. Scott and Alex were replaced by another bunch of men since their shift was long over, and among them was Azazel, sitting alone in front of the fire brewing something smell like tea, Charles leisurely put on his shoes—he would need to borrow a pair of boots or something more comfortable to walk on sand later— and stretched his body before making a beeline to Azazel.

“Good morning,” he said with a smile.

“‘Morning to you too, comrade,” Azazel greeted back, “would you like a cup of tea?”

“Yes, please. Just what I need to start the day.” Charles’ smile widened as he confirmed what he smelled was right.

Azazel took a tin cup from the wooden box nearby and carefully poured the tea from the metal pot into it, handing the handle first to Charles, which he took with a ‘thank you’.

“Is Erik still asleep?”

“Yep, still out cold,” Azazel said, “but he always wakes up on time.”

And just like the teleporter said, about an hour later, when the sun had finally showed up from the sea, Erik walked out from his tent and looked just as cool as always, something Charles didn’t realise he was absent-mindedly paying attention to, and the thought made him flush a little.

“You’re up early,” Erik said, already grinning his (by now) signature all teeth smile at Charles, taking a cup of hot tea from Azazel for himself.

“Yes, good morning to you,” Charles answered with a greeting, hiding his slightly blushing face behind his mug. “I’m afraid we’ll need to wait a little bit longer since Raven isn’t an early riser like all of us.”

“That’s fine, the lady needs her beauty sleep,” Azazel said, the level of his smitten attitude rose at the thought of Raven not being a morning person.

Charles actually found that cute, so much that he decided that he would secretly cheer for the red man’s attempt to woo his sister, for whatever the result might be.

They shared breakfast of grilled potatoes and fish together, Raven finally appeared after they almost finished their meals, saying she didn’t need food but wished for some coffee at the moment, but she settled for tea instead.

When the time was ideal enough, they packed little food and water before heading forward into the forest, Erik led first then Charles and Raven in the middle, Azazel followed close behind to make sure the way back to their camp was marked properly.

For about fifteen minute walk, they were barely out of the coconut jungle before they saw more variety of trees here and there. Charles wanted so much to stop and investigate all these amazing plants that he had not seen before in books or real life, the need to take notes on them distracted him a little, resulted in him bumping head first into Erik’s back, for a moment he had to flatten himself and cling to that broad back for balance before he pushed himself off and presumed his walk. Erik didn’t say a word, only turned his head around to smile at Charles then continue ahead, and that puzzled Charles’ feeling a little.

“Lehnsherr, do you even know which direction to take us to a nearest water source?” Raven said after a while, the heat was getting to her and she was getting irritated of the silence walking, Charles could tell.

“Listen closely, my Lady,” Azazel answered instead, “we’re not far from one, I say it might be a small stream ahead.”

They both stopped in their track to focus on hearing the stream, and to Charles’ and Raven’s surprise, they actually could hear the flowing sound of water.

“How do you know?” Raven looking at the teleport with something like admiration for the first time.

“The smell of fresh water is the same as the smell of treasure to us pirates, it’s something we learned from experience,” Azazel said, proudly puffing out his chest. Charles could see fireworks-like thoughts of celebration for finally getting Raven’s attention in his mind.

Erik kept on cutting down the bushes in their way to the source of the sound, smoothly sweeping out the obstacles, until he abruptly stopped in his track.

“What’s wr—!” Charles asked, but his unfinished question was muffled behind Erik’s palm, as he alerted the rest to find a hiding spot behind the trees and bushes with a nod of his head.

Charles could only followed and guessed that maybe something or an animal was in the way, he knelt behind a tall tree with Erik while Raven and Azazel were behind a lush berry bush. They all quietly watched for any movement, and then there was a thumping sound like footstep on broken branches and leaves, Charles’ heartbeat picked up a pace faster when the footstep got closer to their hiding spots, Erik and Azazel had already reached for their daggers and waited.

The figure had its back to them when stepping out into the clearing. The first thing Charles noticed was a pair of giant wings covering the shadowed figure of its owner, the feathers were snow white and it sparkled under the sunlight like an angel’s wings, and the base of them rooted into the back of whoever was standing there. But when it turned around Charles was almost convinced that angels did exist and were walking the earth among humans.

The man was as beautiful as a Greek marble statue, Blue eyes, shoulder length blond hair, the kind of beauty that would make both ladies and gentlemen swoon whenever he was in the room, and both Charles and Raven seemed to agree on this as they quietly exchanged a look.

A second later, a couple of people appeared from where the winged man came from, a greenish skinned girl with red hair and a man with spikes poking out of his body, they were all either carrying baskets of food or spears, wearing odd clothing that was a mixed of patterned fabric and fur or leather.

And then it hit Charles, they were also gifted! There might be a tribe of gifted people in this island, a society made of gifted people!

Before Charles got too excited about this new discovery, a spear head was thrust into his sight, he slowly turned his eyes up to see a dark skinned woman with flowing white hair looking down at him, Charles wondered why none of them even heard if someone was coming up behind them, he looked to his sides and see Erik and the others had frozen in their positions, eyes still on the group of people with the winged man. Charles started to panic.

“Easy, sugar. I’m only making them stay in their place, I’m not harming them, promise,” said a woman voice.

He looked behind the woman guarding him to see the person who was talking to him. The woman was as gorgeous as the winged man, but with lighter hair and pale skin, she was dressed in all white materials like a snow queen from the fairy tale. Charles didn’t really like the smile she was giving him.

“Relax, Ororo here won’t punish you if you are well behaved and answer our questions,” the blonde woman said sweetly. “We just want to have a civilized conversation, Charles.”

“How…”

“How do I know your name?” she asked, then chuckled, “oh darling, I’m just like you; I’m a telepath.”

Charles gasped aloud this time.