A fic snippet that might go somewhere more interesting in future. Inspired by that meta that talked about Peter as a selkie or a siren.
Peter is finfolk, even on land with legs rather than a tail he has long silvery-iridescent fins running down his arms and legs, only half hidden by the loose grey cashmere he wears. This would be more impressive if he hadn’t decided to learn to talk to humans by reading every training manual in the Institute, which makes him decidedly wearing after a while.
“Look, why are you hanging around me?” Martin asks, aware that this is probably a stupid thing to say to a powerful magical being, especially a predatory one.
Peter blinks, lids flicking sideways over his eyes. “You are a magician,” he says. “Being a familiar has its advantages.”
“You already have a magician,” Martin says, exasperated. There’s no way Peter’s thinking of trading in the Head of the Institute for a half-trained magician who lied about his qualifications. Which means he’s just bugging Martin for unknown reasons, possibly because he’s bored.
“For now,” Peter says, cold voice surprisingly bitter. “If you haven’t noticed he’s courting a replacement, everyone else has.”
“He’s not really going after Jon is he?” Martin says. “I thought…”
“You thought you might stand a chance?”
“No, not really.” Martin sighs. Jon is a moroi, drawing what he wants from people in their dreams, he’s a bit out of Martin’s league. In more ways than one, to be honest.
Jon is maybe not to everyone’s taste, with short black fur and four extremely piercing amber eyes, but most people around the institute are used to fae kinds of beauty, even if he’s not the silvery, ethereal sort, and he’s really handsome. He also has a tendency to only use one pair of eyes at once because he wears reading glasses over the lower pair and shuts them when he looks up instead of taking his glasses off, and he bites his lip with one tiny fang when he’s concentrating, and wears plastic claw-sheaths so he doesn’t tear the books he’s always studying. It’s endearing, no matter how brusque he is or how much his stare can make magicians quail.
Martin sighs. “I thought maybe Tim, or Sasha. He respects them.”
Notes: The Entities don’t really exist in this. Most avatars and monsters are some sort of fae, but with the line between avatars and people who are just involved being very thin it’s often a matter of what I see them as.
Not all fae have magicians, not all magicians have familiars, but since their magic works in different ways they both get benefits when they do.
Jon was raised by humans, so he has some issues about fae instincts meeting human morals. His father was a demon but his mother was human, and he was raised by his grandmother.
Peter is very upset about Jonah’s attempt to trade up, and embarrassed that he still likes him too much to drown and eat him if he breaks the contract.
