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blueaugustcries · 29 days ago

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𝔇𝔬 𝔜𝔬𝔲 ℌ𝔢𝔞𝔯 𝔦𝔱𝔰 𝔖𝔢𝔭𝔲𝔩𝔠𝔥𝔯𝔞𝔩 𝔗𝔬𝔫𝔢?

siren furina au

warnings: none really (maybe some mild gore? but thats it)

word count: 3.8k

a/n: this is part of @edgeray 's halloween event. i hope everyone enjoys!

The waves crashed against the hull of the Alcor, a sea of obsidian in the dark night. Nothing could be seen except the massive ship cutting through the waves. Beidou stood at the helm, navigating through the choppy waters and narrowly dodging jagged rocks that threatened to sink the ship and its crew and drag them to the bottom of the sea. You stood at the starboard side of the ship, tightly gripping at the railing as a few other pirates tried to calm you down. Your face was somehow both pale with fear and green with nausea as your eyes surveyed the water’s surface, looking for any sign of the missing woman that Fontaine turned itself upside down to look for.

Furina had gone missing months ago without any trace. All of a sudden, nobody saw her out and about in the streets of Fontaine. Nobody had seen her ordering a slice of her favorite cake at the Hotel Debord, nobody had seen her at the Opera Epiclese watching the newest drama, and nobody had seen her taking a stroll with her theatre troupe while discussing plans for their newest show.

All the fingers pointed to the Fatui Harbinger Arlecchino. The second word got out about Furina’s disappearance, Monsieur Neuvillette had ordered that the Harbinger be captured and put on trial. The air in the courtroom was stifling. Nearly the entire city crowded into the courtroom to witness the trial, with some people sitting in the middle of the floor and some people even hanging off of the pillars lining the walls to get a better view.

The Harbinger kept a level head, clearly recounting the days leading up to Furina’s disappearance. Most of it was her day-to-day business dealings and duties as a father to many children, but one piece of evidence caught the Iudex’s attention:

“Where were you on the Night of Miss Furina’s disappearance?” Neuvillette questioned, his voice booming throughout the opera house.

“I was right here in this building. My children, Lyney and Lynette, had a rather important magic show. Freminet even joined as a prop holder. A past associate of one of their childhood idols was in town, and they wanted to put on their best performance, so naturally, as their father, I chose to support their endeavour.”

“And how long did you remain at the Epiclese for?”

“Until my children’s performance was through. Afterwards, we stopped by the Cafe Lucine and picked up a few sweets to bring back to the House of the Hearth.”

Neuvillette hit his cane against the ground like a gavel. “May the witness please come to the stand?”

A man of about 40 years stepped up to the witness seat opposite to Arlecchino with a rather accusatory look on his face.

“Your Honor, I saw this Harbinger wait around until the night’s performances were over, hours past what she states, and on my way out, I saw her walk backstage after most of the performers and actors had either left or gone out into the main seating area. I’ve prepared evidence for my case. If you look at the pictures I’ve taken,” he paused, allowing an officer to hand Neuvillette an envelope filled with about ten different pictures, “you will see signs of a struggle, or a confrontation. Observe the scratch marks on the chair that perfectly match this Harbinger’s wretched talons. Look at the broken glass across the floor, undoubtedly used to knock Lady Furina unconscious. There were remains of a liquid on the floor, and after testing, it was determined that it was Sinthe.” He paused to let a shocked gasp emanate from the audience before continuing. “Therefore, I conclude that The Knave snuck backstage and attempted to drug Lady Furina with a bottle of Sinthe. Lady Furina, of course, put up a valiant effort, and The Knave resorted to crude acts of violence, shattering the bottle over her head and rendering her unconscious. From there, she took Furina’s body and disappeared back to her Fatui Headquarters. We know from several sources that the House of the Hearth has had long business dealings with child experimenters and murderers. I fear deeply for what has befallen our beloved actress, Your Honor, and I want nothing more than to bring her back safely, out of the clutches of this wretch.”

From that point, time became a blur. Arlecchino was sent to the Fortress of Meropide for two months while the overworld scrambled to find any leads. A few frantic sailors came back one night clamoring about the voice of a siren that bore a striking resemblance to Furina, falling on top of each other on their way to Neuvillette’s office to recount their tale.

One sailor, the taller one out of the two, spoke up first. “We- we were sailing down to

Bayda Harbor down in Sumeru to trade spices and sugar, and,” he stopped to catch his breath, his hands on his knees, “we were about halfway there when suddenly, these clouds covered all the stars and the moon, and this fog came over the water, about as thick as a stew. We had to light all of the lanterns on our ship, and we still couldn’t see anything. Then, a couple of our men – there were seven of us to begin with – started complaining of this high-pitched ringing sort of noise. A couple of them started leaning over the edge of the boat as we kept making our way to the harbor, but more slowly this time, on account of the fog. As we got closer, we heard a woman’s voice in the distance. It was- it was piercing, and-” The man’s eyes went wide and he stumbled backwards. Neuvillette jumped up to get him a chair and a glass of water while the other sailor continued the story.

“So, we heard this voice singing this tune. Alphonse here started shouting at everyone to put wax in their ears. He dragged me below the deck to get sponges, wax, anything to block the sound out of our ears, but it was too late once we got back up. Nobody was at the helm. Our captain jumped into the water. We saw two other men jump into the water despite our attempts to drag them back. The last thing we saw was this…I don’t know how to describe her…phantom looking creature, I suppose, jump up the side of the ship. She had these claws and fangs, the whole deal. She latched onto our last man and ripped his arm off, then dragged his body underwater. The only thing I could hear was his screams, and archons, it was awful. Our ship hit some rocks and started sinking right as the lights of Bayda Harbor came into view. The vessel was ruined, and Alphonse and I had to cling to the rock in hopes that whatever creature attacked us wouldn’t come kill us. I feel like I nearly died out there, shivering in the cold. Thankfully someone heard us shouting and came to rescue us on a raft.”

Neuvillette narrowed his eyes as he listened to the tale. “Could you further describe the creature that attacked you? I believe this may be a lead to our missing person case.”

“I don’t think it was Lady Furina, Monsieur, but I’ll try my best,” Alphonse said, taking a deep breath, “Long white hair, a gaunt face, bony hands…I didn’t get a good look at her eyes, but I think they were either blue or white. Just a very skinny thing. I didn’t see her lower half because she was just hanging off the side of the boat, but from what I could see, her frame was pretty small.”

“I think we have a lead.”

The Iudex then scrambled to find somebody, anybody to sail out into the sea that separated Fontaine and Sumeru to find this murderous creature that had a slight chance of being Lady Furina. Every sailor that he asked nearly immediately shut down any offer of Mora, even when offered billions, enough to support their families down to the seventh generation. By some stroke of luck, Captain Beidou of Liyue was on a voyage that crossed paths with Fontaine. When the Alcor sailed into Lumidouce Harbor, Beidou was bombarded by several officers of the Court of Fontaine, all begging her to bring the mystery to a close.

“Captain Beidou! Thank the archons you’re here!”

“Beidou! Captain! We have a commission for you!”

“We’ll compensate you accordingly! Billions of Mora!”

“Please, Captain! We’ve nobody else on the case!”

The four officers nearly tripped over their own feet the moment Beidou stepped foot onto land for the first time in days. She stumbled back slightly before squaring her shoulders and steadying herself.

“Woah, woah, calm down everyone. I know I’m popular, but you’re gonna have to slow down so I can listen to all of what you have to say,” the captain said as her crew exited the ship, not so nonchalantly listening in to the conversation happening at the docks.

“Captain,” a man with auburn hair and a mustache said, stepping forward, “we’ve had a strange case around Fontaine lately, pertaining to the seas. You see, our former archon, Lady Furina, went missing two months ago. We’ve exhausted all of our leads on land since then, even locked up one of those Fatui Harbingers on account of the evidence stacked against her. A few weeks ago, Monsieur Neuvillette received news of a group of sailors getting dragged to the bottom of the sea by a monster, leaving only two survivors. Based on the survivors’ description, it seems like this ‘monster’ was actually Furina herself. We don’t know what the truth is at this point, but we’ve been trying to get somebody to sail into those waters, hunt down that monster, and bring her back alive to figure out what really happened. We’ll offer you five billion Mora for her capture. Nobody has accepted any other offer, and frankly, we’re running out of options at this point. What do you say?”

Beidou’s working eye widened as she processed all of the information. “Well, I’ve dealt with a god of the sea before, so I think I’ll be fine. I’ll drop the voyage I’m on right now and pass it onto one of my Fontaine contacts. I’m sure it’ll go smoothly. I’ll do it.”

The officers heaved a sigh of relief, profusely thanking the pirate before sending her to Neuvillette’s office for more information.

That’s when you, a member of Beidou’s crew, caught wind of everything. She trusted you the most to escape from this voyage unscathed, so you were going to keep watch on the deck for Lady Furina while Beidou stayed up at the helm.

The night you disembarked on your voyage, the officers dragged Arlecchino up from the Fortress of Meropide and let Beidou lock her up in the brig below deck in hopes that the Harbinger would be of some use regarding information related to the disappearance of Lady Furina. Unfortunately for everyone, the Harbinger did nothing except scratch sigils into the wood planks of the ship and say she didn’t know anything.

“I honestly do not know why they’ve kept me locked up for so long after I’ve gone through several rounds of interrogation and told them everything I know,” the Harbinger said whenever you passed by the cell she was held in.

“Well, all I know is that you’re rather close with Furina, and you may be of some use to our case, so that’s why you’re here.”

“Close with her, absolutely,” Arlecchino muttered in a snide tone, “Useful to your case, absolutely not. The only thing I can think of is to lure her in with a slice of that limited 16 slices a day cake. She goes wild for that.” The Harbinger sighed and went back to scratching her mysterious sigils into the wood.

You shrugged and went up above deck, greeted by the stars and moonlight guiding the Alcor through the surprisingly calm waters.

“For everything those sailors said, it’s pretty calm right now,” you said to Beidou.

“I think it’s more like the calm before the storm, sweetheart. Look up there.” You followed where she was pointing, up towards the horizon, where the starlight suddenly died out, not due to the presence of any clouds. There was simply a solid line where the stars went black, and the moonlight did not reflect off of the water underneath that portion of the sky. You couldn’t tell if it was the gust of chilly wind or the eeriness of the dark sky that sent a shiver through your body and made you want to turn the ship around and never come back. But of course, you knew better as a sailor, as a pirate, and you bit your tongue. “I know. It makes me uneasy too,” Beidou said, as if reading your mind.

The Alcor kept cutting through the water effortlessly. The sound of the waves began to dull, becoming a mere echo, similarly to how the world begins to grow dark when one is about to pass out. You kept turning back to look at the stark contrast between the horizon ahead of and behind you, and the sickening feeling that grew inside you each time you looked at the cold void ahead of you.

“I’m getting a bad feeling about this,” Beidou muttered under her breath. As if on cue, one of the lanterns on the edge of the ship went out with a whisper of the wind. Several men on the deck scrambled to relight it, shouting and falling over each other. One man stood with his hands around the lantern, as if trying to shield it from the wind, and others did the same for the other sources of light around the ship. Beidou cursed under her breath, tightening her grip around the wheel and rolling her shoulders back.

“Should we turn back now?” you asked, growing more sick and more faint with each passing second.

“No,” Beidou answered after a moment, “I think we’re getting closer to finding our lady. Go get that Harbinger from below the deck. See if you can get anything out of her.”

You nodded, eager to get away from the eerie atmosphere for even a moment. You took your time descending the stairs to the lower levels of the ship, where Arlecchino was being held. She languidly looked up at you, her red eyes flickering in the low lighting of the ship.

“The captain wants you above deck now,” you said, taking out the key to unlock the cell door, as well as the rather comically large chains that bound her wrists.

“Thank the archons,” Arlecchino hummed, rubbing her wrists, “The air was getting rather stuffy down here.” You led her up the stairs and out onto the deck, and saw her eyes widen at the blank night sky. “Wow,” she drawled, “Oh, you’re all fucked.”

A crew member walked up to the Harbinger, about a head taller than her. “Give us information on where Lady Furina is.”

“You know, after all this trouble, you’d think that if I knew anything about our Lady’s whereabouts, I’d tell you, right?” she scoffed, “There’s really no need to keep accusing me of such things.”

“Tell us where she is!”

“For the love of Celestia, I don’t know,” Arlecchino sneered, “And if you keep insisting that I do, maybe I’ll just damn you all to a fate far worse than that of the sailors a few weeks ago.” Her eyes flickered like embers at the end of the sentence, causing the man to back away and slink back over to his previous spot near the ship’s lamps.

Little by little, the waves grew larger, rocking the ship back and forth like a ragdoll. Beidou’s expression darkened in determination, squinting to just barely see the jagged rocks jutting up above the waves, eager to pierce the hull of the ship and bring it down to the Primordial Sea.

Despite the efforts of the crew, a lantern went out with another near-silent whisper of the wind. Then another. Then another, until all of the lanterns were out, leaving nothing but the smell of smoke on the deck. There was a faint sound of the crew scrambling to relight them once again before the sharp cry of a woman, then the nauseating sound of flesh tearing and bones snapping, before the lanterns suddenly relit themselves.

You stumbled back in horror to see nothing but the woman’s head lying on the deck, frozen in an expression of sheer terror. A pool of blood surrounded it, the dark liquid trailing over the side of the deck and into the black water below. You felt a faint tapping on the starboard side of the ship when you leaned over it, trying to see anything in the water that could’ve killed that woman so quickly, but you saw nothing.

“Oh no,” Arlecchino murmured. You looked at her with a raised eyebrow, and she grinned. “Be quiet. Listen.” You did, straining your ears to hear a high pitched note ringing out over the ocean, belonging to a soprano voice, one that was rather unmistakable amongst the people of Fontaine.

“Oh god,” you muttered.

In the faint lantern light, you saw one of the crew members begin to walk towards the edge of the ship. There was a glazed look in his eyes and a robotic nature to his movements, even as two men attempted to hold him back by the arms with all the strength they could muster. He broke free of their hold, stumbling over the side of the ship and crashing into the water below. One of the men tripped after him, accidentally going down right along with him. The second they both hit the water, the soprano voice grew louder, singing a song that sent chills through your body, as if each note pierced your soul to let your deepest fears seep in.

“I’m not staying here for this,” Arlecchino said as soon as the voice grew louder, “I’m locking myself in the brig this time.” With that, the Harbinger disappeared below the decks once again, chaining herself up and locking the door to the brig all over again.

“Everyone, find something to put in your ears! Block out the sound of that voice!” Beidou shouted, quickly turning around and searching the crate behind her for a container of wax. She put two pieces in her ears and urged for everyone to do the same.

The lanterns went out again. The same sounds of chaos ensued, but this time with more grotesque sounds of flesh rending and the pained screams of several men and women.

The lanterns relit themselves again. People scrambled over to the crates scattered across the deck, fighting each other over who could put the wax in their ears to block out the siren’s call first. All the while, the voice got louder, and her song more enticing, as if the temptress was watching the chaos unfold on the deck.

A few times, you felt something brush against your ankle, wet, slimy, grotesque, like a piece of seaweed winding around your leg when you go swimming in the ocean. But this was different. It was almost sentient. Each time you felt it, your eyes shot down to the planks below your feet, but you saw nothing, only the seemingly eternal flickering of the lamps disorienting you even more as you stumbled along the deck, heart beating angrily in your chest, threatening to jump out of your throat along with the bile that so badly wanted to come up. The sweet song of the siren veered you off course, made you dizzy with some strange, intoxicating desire.

The scene around you became a blur of panic, blood, and shouts of fear and anguish. You’re sure that somebody’s blood had been spattered across your shirt as they were dismembered and dragged to the eternally dark depths of the sea, but you couldn’t be fully aware of it. A sickening dizziness overtook you all of a sudden, and everything became suddenly unbearably overstimulating. The siren’s song pierced your ears as if it were trying to wedge its way through your skull and shatter the bone, a deep ache settling in between your ears as you almost drunkenly slumped over the hull. You could see your heartbeat at the edges of your vision, bright and blurry, as you looked out to the sea and its few waves illuminated by the faint flickering lights on the ship.

An abrupt movement caught your eye, shifting your gaze to a nearby rock up ahead. Through your blurred vision you could see a pale outline on rock’s otherwise black surface. The ship got closer, and the siren’s song grew louder. A sinking feeling settled in the pit of your stomach as the white figure grew clearer and clearer, but still, you tried to deny what you were seeing, chalking it up to insanity and delusions, but your eyes were not deceiving you.

On the rock sat a creature with a human head and torso, with pale blue hair and eyes of two different tones. Her skin was covered in an array of blood, seaweed, and cuts. Whether most of the blood belonged to herself or to others was a mystery, though. Her hands were long and sinewy, with claws replacing where a human’s nails would be. Blood covered her limbs up to her elbows. Her lower half was not human, though; rather, it was akin to the tail of a mermaid, dark blue in color, and glittering in the faint light.

“Furina.”

Your eyes met hers, and it felt as though a predator had just set a target upon you. Furina bared her teeth in one of the most disturbing smiles you had ever seen and pushed herself off the rock and into the choppy waves below.

You began to lose all hearing except for Furina’s song, the sounds of the crew around you fading to barely a muffled whisper. You thought that you felt them try to jostle you out of your stupor, but you weren’t sure.

The lanterns flickered out again.

You felt a sharp pain and pressure behind your shoulder blades as something dragged you over the edge of the ship. The cold ocean water enveloped you, and you opened your eyes, hardly able to see anything except the faint outline of Furina’s face right in front of you. Her serpentine pupils widened in a sick glee as she traced your jaw with a pointed claw and leaned in to press her lips against yours. As she pulled away, you saw a faint flicker of light in her two-toned eyes before the cold, dark waters overtook your senses, and your consciousness faded from your body. The siren had gotten the only thing that she desired at last.

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