Chapter Text
Riddle Rosehearts was born a mistake.
"Mama?"
"Do not talk to me half breed, you have ruined my life and reputation!"
His mother wanted an heir, a boy, a human.
Instead she got a half-fae little girl that she hadn't named. What was worse to Lady Rosehearts was the soulmate mark. A blue moray eel tail sat on the little girl's back, tracing her spine.
A disgusting thing.
Lady Rosehearts had wanted normal son she could parade around and eventually arrange a marriage to raise her status. What she got was and abnormal daughter with an abnormal soulmate mark. What was she to do now?
Riddle remembered it quite clearly what she did about it.
She had sought out an unconventional and fairly illegal method, her disgust and anger over riding the absolute rule abiding woman that she was. She had found a witch who was a descendant of a soldier that died in the Human-Fae war. The woman despised fae even though the war had ended a few hundred years ago, and insisted on calling herself a witch despite mages becoming the general term for anyone with magical abilities.
That night was one of the worst nights in Riddle's life, though it was somewhat hazy.
"Mama, where are we going?" The little girl asked wondering why her mother would take her from her studies this late, it didn't seem like something her mother would do. Where the girl walked, a trail of forever burning roses emerged.
Her mother did not say a word
They reached a dusty cottage deep into the forests of Briar Valley, yet not close enough to hurt non-fae. The woman inside was old and scary to the little girl. She used extremely old ways of using magic and had ventured far too deep in to works of illegal magic.
"You have come here for a reason yes, but must you bring the girl so close?"
"I was unaware that you could use magic on her without being near her."
The girl stayed silent, instead feeling for the bioluminescent mark on her back. It seemed happy that she acknowledged it and moved around, tickling her. Her giggles only made the two women annoyed.
"Ah, fae magic, she has such an abundance, the things I could do if I had that much magic."
"Just get on with it, the abomination still has a chapter of the potionology book and assignments to finish before bed."
The old woman looked suprised at that, "You treat the fae as if she were human."
Lady Rosehearts sent a glare her way and the od woman started immediately added many rare ingredients to the cauldron and muttered a spell. She then picked up a pen and used the mysterious liquid as ink.
She then drew old and unused symbols on a large sheet of paper and started the incantation.
The girl felt that something was wrong, the light in her eyes that made her able to see perfectly in the dark dimmed. The forever burning roses turned to ash, and the moving of her soulmate mark stopped, and the bioluminescence dimmed till the glow was jus a faint light.
Lady Rosehearts was very pleased, finally, she could fix the mistake that had been burdened her.
"Your daughter is quite the riddle, unsolvable in the textbook ways. Only someone that thinks outside the box could have a chance of solving her."
"Don't speak nonsense."
Lady Rosehearts took the less of an abomination outside the cottage, and they walked back home. The place where the little girl died and the strict and rule abiding riddle was born.
Riddle had always knew he was different, that he was something inhuman, but his mother never mentioned it. His ears were just a little bit more pointed then his mother, and he felt the formation of sharpy pointy fangs. He wouldn't ever tell his mother though.
It was just about time for independent study, a time where he gets ahead on assignments while his mother gets work done in her study. He was studying advanced potionology and its effects on people, one chapter mentioned memory erasing potions. It felt strangely familiar to Riddle but he dismissed it.
The two boys that would play near the Rosehearts manor were back, they were playing ball when one of them noticed him. They had never noticed him before.
"Hello, my name is Trey, I'm nine." The boy with green hair said, his glasses a bit too big, his shirt had the name of the bakery in town, the one that sold the strawberry tarts.
That reminded Riddle too much of the subtle disappointment he felt at the cake mother made him for his birthday a few days ago, why was he so ungreatful?.
"My name is Artemiy Artemiyevich Pinker, and I'm also nine!" A colorful head of purple suddenly appeared in front of him. Riddle yelped in shock, when he tried to repeat the name, he failed, he's never failed before.
"Call him Chenya, he's just trying to mess with you." Trey said, rolling his eyes.
"Ruining mya fun again, Hey do you wanna play with us, it'd be totally meow." Chenya said, grinning, the rest of his body was shown and Riddle felt a bit more calm.
"I can't, right now is my independent study time, I can't leave."
"Eh? but play is a form of study, mya grandpa said so!"
Riddle had never heard of play being a form of study, it wasn't in any books he had read. His mother had told him to respect his elders, so he couldn't refuse.
"I'm Riddle, I turned eight a few days ago."
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Riddle spent an entire week sneaking out during his independent study time to play with Chenya and Trey, they had even let him eat a strawberry tart.
He was truly happy for the first time in a while.
He noticed that the hazy things started coming back, that his magic grew stronger. He felt his soulmate mark begin to glow, it moved and tickled him. The forever burning roses came back.
Trey and Chenya looked at him with a shine in their eyes. Chenya burned himself trying to pick up one of the roses, so Riddle covered it with his magic. He turned Trey's rose into a hair clip, and turned Chenya's into a bracelet.
They had so much fun that Riddle forgot to watch the time. How could he forget?
When the three of them got back, they saw Riddle's mother in varying degrees of anger, she had lectured Trey for five hours after sending Riddle to his room.
Riddle was grounded for two months and got a severe punishment. (The marks were still there but he would deny it for as long as he was alive.)
He wasn't allowed alone time lest he was sleeping or using the bathroom, he had betrayed his mother's trust.
Riddle's mind was hazy after the two months was over, he vaguely remembered going back to the cottage in the woods. He decided to ignore it, what good would it do him to doubt his mother?
Over the next few years, Riddle would perfect his unique magic and study harder, even if only to avoid punishment. When Riddle was selected as a first year for Night Raven college, he almost cried with joy.
It would be his first time in years leaving the house. Riddle promised his mother that he'd be nothing less of perfect just to shut down her idea of continuing the homeschooling.
Riddle Rosehearts was maybe, just a little bit free. (But why would he need to be free when everything was fine?)
Floyd was neither elder nor younger then Jade.
They hatched at the same time as many of their other siblings. They were the only ones that survive long enough to become merfolk.
It was so boring getting that question all the time.
"Who's older? You or Jade?"
"I'm neither older or younger, we hatched at the same time."
"Sure but one of you had to have hatched a few minutes before the other."
"If you keep talking about it, I'll squeeze you."
Floyd had noticed his soulmate mark at five years old, it shone and glowed a bright and odd color. It wasn't like he saw many colors anyway.
His soulmate mark was fun though. It made him happy, swirling around and tickling him. At night, it attracted prey with it's brightness, so it helped a bit.
Jade told him that the mark was of a goldfish. He told him that goldfish were tiny and red, though to him, goldfish were too dull to be such a bright color, or so he's heard.
Jade was the one that was interested about things above the coral sea. Floyd didn't care as long as it was fun. They had stopped hunting for larger prey a while ago and Floyd was filled with restless energy.
When they turned six, their mother came back for them, it was pretty unusual for moray eels to come back for their children. She must be very family orientated.
They started elementary soon after, a school full of different merfolk. A boy with bright dull hair was being crowded by people, if Floyd didn't know better, he would've thought that the popular mer was his soulmate.
He knew that his soulmate was human. He didn't know what happened to them, a year ago, just randomly the glow of his soulmate mark dimmed, it stopped moving. Things got boring quickly after it was gone.
Jade found someone interesting though, an octo-mer that didn't have the bright colors as the other did.
At first they merely watched the boy, even as he got bullied. Floyd found it so boring that they just watched and did nothing, he wanted to squeeze the bullies like he squeezed the prey when the hunted. Jade insisted, it was their first time seeing an octopus.
After a year of the most boring thing ever, Jade finally let it go that beyond being an octo-mer, the boy wasn't that much interesting. Until some of the mers at the school started looking different. Once Jade found out that the octo-mer, Azul was the cause of it, Jade would not let the interest go away. Even Floyd found Azul interesting.
They soon became friends after some pestering from Jade. They did have lots of fun together, even when they had to tell Azul that he wasn't bullied for his weight and that they wouldn't leave him.
Floyd and Jade's mother adored Azul, she would always make sure he would eat when he wasn't listening to him nor Jade.
When they turned eight, Floyd's mark started glowing again, this time, with Azul there they found out that Floyd's soulmate carried a lot of magic, and that was powering the mark to glow and move. It didn't last for very long though, but it made Floyd feel warm, so warm. To know that his soulmate was so strong made him excided.
When Jade and Floyd turned ten, their mother finally told them about the truth of the business. They were in some kind of fish mafia or somethin', Floyd found it dumb, if ya wanna squeeze someone just do it. He didn't understand why they needed an entire organization just to do it.
Azul looked horrified when he found out, but still though it was mega cool. They soon became apart of Leech Mafia Organization, of course they weren't sent on missions or anything, which Floyd found boring.
Their first mission happened at thirteen, it was a huge mission to eliminate a rival mafia. Azul even got to join as the negotiator, mostly due to his unique magic.
Before they got inside though, they were stopped by two archerfish-mer guards. "You three lost? Kids aren't s'posed to come around here."
Floyd already wanted to squeeze em.
"Remember, lady Georgina said to follow the plan, that means nothing has to change it." Azul stared into his skull as he said that.
"Just think that it'd be cool to break out fighting, like those human movies we watch." Floyd pouted, his mood souring. Azul and Jade looked at each other before sighing, even though the chance of someone in the rival mafia having magic was low it wasn't zero.
They needed Floyd to be in a good mood for his unique magic to work properly. They found that out the hard way when they maybe stole potion ingredients, and the stall owner was a mage and sent a fire spell their way. They told Floyd to use his unique magic, Floyd was feeling bored so it didn't work, one of Azul's tentacles got scorched while Floyd and Jade's weren't super severe.
"Here, I'll speed up my research in your soulmate mark and the transformation potion, just be in a good enough mood to be able to work your unique magic in chase anything goes wrong." Azul said, feeling a headache coming.
At least that sparked enough of an interest in Floyd for the boy to look determined for once.
They were only meant to serve as a distraction so the actual mission could start, unfortunately things did not end up as it was meant to. There was a big explosion at the top of the building, and the three boys got separated. There was a lot of fighting and screams to be heard. Floyd looked around, the water around he had already turned red. The merfolk of the rival mafia realized who he was and started attacking.
Floyd took one of them and squeezed their neck till their lips turned blue and they went limp. That wasn't enough to satisfy the hunger in him, it'd been so long since he and Jade hunted, he had forgotten how fun it was, how exhilarating it could be, and yet.
Floyd was getting bored by the second.
Squeezing wasn't enough, he wanted to tear something into pieces, so he grabbed someone near him and tore him apart. He could smell their fear, he finished them in little time and got bored again, just swimming about till he found a way out.
Floyd thought that Jade might want to study the internal organs of different merfolk, so he grabbed some of the whole organs he found and stuffed them into a bag. when he did find Azul and Jade, he found that they were both mildly hurt and decided to show them how nice of a brother he was.
Azul started throwing up into a separate bag and Jade put on a strained smile and reluctantly too took the bag for research. Georgina decided that it would be best for them to wait a while before getting another mission.
She assigned them as Azul's left hand and right hand as he made deals and alliances. Jade only got better at his smooth talk thing and politely pressuring other mer to answer his questions even without his unique magic.
When they turned fourteen, Azul was finally done with the transformation potion. Azul made so much of it that he could sell it, which he tried to do but their mother talked him out of it.
Azul had made adjustments to the potion to allow them to see colors, though it couldn't get rid of their bed eyesight. One of their mother's men with the best eyesight would accompany them to get contacts.
After they transformed, the first thing Floyd noticed was the light assaulting his eyes, everything was just too damn bright. the second thing was the fact that they had two strangely shaped tails, Jade explained that they were not tails but feet to Floyd like he was just a little hatchling. He knew that, he just didn't care about it.
It took them a week to learn how to stand on legs without wobbling, it took them even longer to learn to walk. When they were finally able to stand somewhat normally, they used the thaumarks to find a place in the nearest city they could find.
Jade ane Floyd went to get the clear contacts which made everything seem more brighter then it already was. Azul had chickened out and insisted on getting glasses. They spend an entire day outside in the city, they even walked to Crimson City. They stayed in the plaza, having street food and seeing so many colors, Floyd's interest grew when his soulmate mark glowed, telling him that his soulmate was nearby. After a while of searching, Floyd gave up looking.
They bought a beachside villa off the outskirts of the Queendom of Roses. Human things started to become somewhat normal, even with the bodyguards that the tweels mother hired for safety.
It had been a year and a few months since coming on land, Georgina wanted them to get human education for perspective. Luckily they soon got a letter from a magic academy called Night Raven College
"School here better not be boring." Floyd said, but he was a little excided. This was going to be fun, or at least it better be, or Floyd might just go back under the sea.