A/N: Not exactly how events worked out when the barrier was taken down. But close enough…
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Soulmates were a tragic myth as far as the Isle was concerned. Over in Auradon it was fundamentally a law to seek out your soulmate. Young girls would spend hours talking at sleepovers about finding their true love. How they were going to be swept off their feet and have lots of children, when they were just as little as eight. Not even old enough to grasp the true concept of love.
Teenage boys would gather with friends running around the kingdom, following the direction the compass on their wrist would point. Most of the time it didn’t work, sometimes it did. Love was a funny thing like that.
On the Isle things were different. Uma had learned to stop questioning the tattoo of a frozen compass needle on her wrist pretty quickly. Her mother would only tell her that no matter who it pointed to; they would break her heart. Love was only meant to hurt you.
Harry had never questioned his tattoo. He’d heard his father angrily lecture Harriet when she was younger, telling her that love was a child’s game. It was pointless to run around trying to find something you could never reach. Love didn’t exist.
Everyone on the Isle knew that whether love existed or not, they could never find their soulmate. Even true love didn’t work under the barrier, so their compasses stayed frozen in place on their skin. Love would get you killed anyway. It was just another leverage for people to use against each other.
Yet, despite this. Uma and Harry still stared at the unmoving compasses on their wrists, far more often than they would ever admit to.
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Feet shuffled and quiet voices murmured nervously before the barrier as they waited for it to be opened. In the distance they could see the palace of Auradon, its people gathering bellow it. Either to welcome them into their new home or to kill them, no one was quite sure yet.
Uma stood at the front and centre of the crowd both her boys standing beside her. While everyone moved with nervous energy around her, she remained still, her eyes fixed on a spot of purple in the distance up on the castle balcony. Faintly she could make out a sliver of silver held in its grasp, the one object that could grant their freedom.
All of a sudden, the voices quietened down and the shuffling stopped as the wand was raised. Collectively the people of the Isle held their breath as in the distance a spell was said.
Gold shimmers rained down as the barrier was broken, leaving a glittering line where seconds ago they would not have been able to cross. It was if the world slowed down and no one was willing to move. All that they could do was stare at the line left by the broken barrier, slowly processing that their lifelong quest for freedom was no more.
Ever so slowly people began to break out of their daze. Some running over the line, leaping and cheering with glee. Others stepped over it with beaming smiles on their faces, their arms stretched out as if they would grow wings. A few others held onto each other as the stepped over, tears spilling out of their eyes.
But Uma and her boys stood frozen watching on as others experienced their first taste of freedom. Gil was the first to move, kicking up sparkles from the barrier as he past through it, laughing as they shimmered in the sunlight. It was only when he turned back around to gesture for his friends to come through, did they finally find it in them to move their feet.
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Uma felt a pulse jolt within her body as she stepped over the line, she had never experienced it but she knew it was from the presence of magic. She felt electric as it coursed through her veins filling her with new life. As the tingling in her limbs faded away and she became accustomed to the magic which was her birth right, she took a deep breath of the new air. It felt cleaner, lighter, as it filled her lungs. The space around her seemed to open up like stepping out of an enclosed space. On the Isle she had never felt suffocated in her captivity but now that she was free, she knew that she had been.
Around her she saw people beginning to look around at their surroundings. Up at the sky where the white clouds were no longer grey and parted so the sun could shine through. Looking off the edge of the new bridge watching the clear blue water rippling peacefully bellow. But Uma found herself looking back to the Isle, a place which she could now leave behind.
Distantly she became aware of excited voices as groups formed together looking at the tattoos on their wrists. People pulling up their sleeves and taking off their gloves, their eyes following where the needle pointed. She hadn’t thought about the tattoo on her wrist for so long that she’d forgotten it was there.
Without even knowing it she reached for her sleeve and pulled it back. Although it had been a while since she’d looked at her tattoo, she swore that it was darker than before, as if the barrier had dulled its colour. Curiously she ran her opposite thumb over it. She made to turn around back to the groups ahead of her still looking at her tattoo, but stopped in her tracks.
Her heart fluttered and a laugh escaped her when she found that it moved. It moved! All of her mother’s words about love only existing to hurt, faded at the sight of the needle pointing to her left instead of to the tips of her fingers where it had otherwise pointed to all her life.
For a little while she let herself sway on the spot watching as the needle moved from left to right. Unbeknownst to her, Harry stood next to her doing the same thing.
It wasn’t until they turned to face each other in synchrony that they both stopped, as if fate had told them to. For the second time that day it was like time slowed down as they looked up from their wrists and over to each other.
When their eyes connected, it was like all the memories they had shared together crashed into them all at once.
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When they were kids and Harry had found her crying under the wharf after the shrimp incident. He had been so small back then, and had let her hold the hook he was carrying which was far too big for his hand.
Then they were older at the Chip Shop, where he had helped her do the dishes one night when she was tired after her mother had given her an extra shift. Smiles lit up their faces as they threw bubbles from the sink at each other before Ursula yelled at them to keep it down. But they had continued laughing quietly to themselves after she had gone.
The memories shifted to them both up in Uma’s room, Harry stitching up her hand from breaking a bottle in a fit of rage after Mal had been accepted into Auradon. Afterward he had stayed with her all night, letting her cry into his shoulder until she fell asleep. He had never brought it up.
It showed them on Lost Revenge after Uma had won the ship, Harry instructing the newfound crew on how to fix things. Only just starting to grow into his lanky build.
Next, they were sword fighting on the beach, taking time away from the crew and the stresses of the Isle. Afterward they would sometimes race into the water to cool off before wading back to dry off on the sandy shore, side by side.
Suddenly, Uma was in Harry’s arms as he carried her back from the beach after her defeat at the Cotillion, her being too tired and weak to walk.
They were shown all their adventures together: the search for the Triton’s trident, the duels with Mal and the other gangs of the Isle, their quest to save Auradon. All leading up to the point where they are now. Looking into each other’s eyes.
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Uma felt so small looking up at him, so vulnerable under the piercing gaze of his icy blue eyes, and yet so safe. Before she knew it, their lips were against each other, their bodies fitting together so perfectly like they were built out of the same stone. She melted into his touch as his hand cupped around the back of her head, pulling her closer to him. Her own arms slunk around his waist, not wanting to let him go.
When he pulled away her neck reached up, her lips wanting more. They stared at each other, their eyes saying a million things that they would have never been able to say on the Isle. It was only when Harry reached back down to her lips, did she relax again.
Cheers sounded from around them as their crew saw them together. Their lips broke away from each other, but they did not release their hold. Uma couldn’t help but let out a laugh, seeing her crew so happy for them as she held her soulmate in her arms.
janainaart
jacobvanloon
germansingergirl
2087
origamiaround
theartofmadeline
