My thoughts were interrupted by a gasp behind me. My head whipped over my shoulder, and the faintest orange gleam of light dipped over the ledge. Ten fingers sank into the dirt of the cliff, struggling to gain traction.
I whimpered, my lower lip trembling, “Graysen?”
“Help,” he gasped back, one hand slapping around the grass to find a better hold to pull against.
My palms and knees slipped in the mud beneath me as I frantically scrambled on all fours to his hands, squeezing them with all my might. I fell back onto my ass as a counterweight to his body, pushing my heels into the earth. One forearm was able to grasp mine, then the other, then the top of his bowed head rose over the edge, quickly followed by the rest of him. He collapsed onto his side, coughing, his face twisted in pain. Faint illumination came from his emblem, like a dying ember against his throbbing pulse.
“I’m so sorry!” I wept, throwing myself over his torso. I buried my face in his neck and was unable to stop my uneven sobs. My tears mixed with the water droplets on his throat. Its warmth was so comforting, I wanted to press every inch of myself into it. Heat meant my only friend was alive. No thanks to my help.
“Don’t fucking apologize,” he snarled between his teeth, pulling himself up into an upright position and dragging me between his knees to his chest. “I’m sorry, Faeryn. I am.So.Fucking. Sorry.” His fingers weaved into my stringy hair and pressed into my scalp. His other hand rubbed my exposed arm up and down to generate friction.
My eyes opened just enough to catch a ripple of water bubbles nearby. The bastards had followed him the entire way out. If I hadn’t still been here to help him find his way up quickly…
“That wasn’t supposed to happen,” he hissed. I felt a singe of fear in my stomach as he looked at me silently from under his wet bangs, his pupils a dull bronze. His chest heaved, and his body shook. He looked less beastly than I remembered from the water, but not quite human. That wouldn’t have bothered me at all, if he weren’t clearly so pissed. “The males aren’t supposed to leave the bottom of the lake until the end of fall. We should have had plenty of time. I’m so sorry. Are you hurt badly?” He continued to hold onto me for dear life.
That’s why he was mad? BecauseIwas at risk? I wouldn’t blame him one bit if he screamed at me for leaving him for dead. A part of me wanted him to.
“I’m okay. Are you okay?”
His arms squeezed around my shoulders, and his cheek rested against my head. “I’m okay as long as you’re with me and breathing,” he murmured against my temple. The intensity of the words was lost to my conflicting guilt and relief.
We sat silently in mutual appreciation that we were both alive. A morbid air filled the space around us—we knew how close we had cut it. His breaths were like gospel, and I listened to their promise, reassuring me that I wasn’t alone in this world. The words he had first said to me echoed in my mind: “You’re safe now. I’ve got you.”I absorbed his warmth, hidden between his collapsed shoulders, and allowed myself to be lulled by his heartbeat. He had committed to that vow.
“Can we go back to our tree?” I sniffled, figuring I could be self-conscious about the snot I had running down his bare chest later.
“Of course we can.”
His arms hesitated several seconds before they released me. He rose to his feet. The emblem on his neck was barely visible, and his eyes had disappeared into the night. I felt his hand rest on my shoulder, which I used as leverage to pull myself up.
Splatting footsteps trudged a few steps forward, and I followed them cautiously. I wasn’t sure if Graysen could see, but I certainly couldn’t. That brief period of his emblem’s light had made the darkness that much harder to adjust to as it dimmed. My palms rubbed up and down my arms, trying to reignite the heat that he had left behind on my skin. Friction would hardly compare, but it was something.
I jumped at a large cracking noise, quickly soothed by light spilling across the surrounding forest. Graysen held a large branch in one hand, its tip now lit with a flame from his palm.
I got a good look at my rescuer and friend. His shoulders hunched over his heaving chest—exhausted. His tired eyes were hooded. What grays peered out from under his lashes reflected the licks of flame in his grasp. He was covered in many moderate cuts, as well as banners of red swelling into fresh bruises. The worst of the various marks was already purpling around his throat. His dark hair hung in strands against his cheekbones, sticking to the fresh blood dripping across his skin that I had to assume was his. When I blinked, I imagined flashes of his more demonic features, finding them somehow more comforting than his current state. With his rage in the past, he looked utterly extinguished.
“We came from that way.” He nodded his head to the side and drew a thick inhale to straighten his back. “Shall we?’
I stayed as close to the torched branch as I could for warmth. As we walked, yellow eyes turned in our direction.It was disconcerting, but at least they blinked. Thosethingsunderwater hadn’t blinked. Logically, I knew that the tree-obscured eyes that sent chills up my spine were the same dragons I had admired earlier in the day, but everything seemed sinister now. I yearned for the comfort of daylight, when everything would morph back into a fairytale, far from this never-ending nightmare.
The unfortunate trade-off of having such an intense light with us was that everything in the distance seemed that much darker. It felt like a constant state of walking into the same abyss we had just escaped. Anything could be lurking in the night. Dread crept up in me again, remembering my sheer panic while swimming desperately for the shore.
“They stay in the deeper waters except for the last day of fall,” he began to grumble after an extended silence. “I’ve swum in that lake my entire adult life and haveneverseen one leave the floor of the lake on any other day.”
We were clearly having very different ruminating thoughts. I was just happy to be alive and on my way to camp. Was he still fucking blaming himself?
“Have you ever touched a female water dragon?” My teeth chattered.
He was silent.That’s right, Graysen. It was my fault. If we had to blame somebody, it was me. I had no doubt in my mind that myinsistenceon entering the open for an up-close encounter with a female and touching her were the triggering factors. I couldn’t rid my head of the strange facial structure of the creatures; their jaws couldn’t unhinge enough to bite anything. They certainly hadn’t been attempting to eat us, we weren’t their standard diet. Creatures that mindless do three things to survive: reproduce, sleep, and feed. We had to have triggered one of those instincts to elicit such a violent attack.Like bees from a hive, they had swarmed when their queen was threatened.
“It’s killing me how cold you are. You could’ve had my dry shirt if it wasn’t on the opposite side of the damn pond.” He changed the subject, refusing to entertain my self-blame.
“Oh no, I’m okay, really,” I insisted with a humorless chuckle.
Stiffness from the swim was setting into my thighs, making every step effortful. Not to mention my damp skin beginning to chafe under my dress. Our trek needed to pass quickly. I was on route to the best sleep of my life. Odd, considering I was someone who genuinely had a “coma” theory as a potential backstory.
Periodically, Graysen picked up a new branch off the ground, letting it catch flame from the other before stomping the old stump out into the earth. I was grateful that this ritual meant we were never without light. He was on top of it. He would have made a great caveman with his ability to provide consistent fire.
“I’ll make us a big campfire when we’re back,” he promised factually. “We’re going to get you into some dry clothing and wrap you in a warm blanket.”
