Chapter 11
Now that he had her, he had no idea what to do with her.
Daios had known it would be difficult to get to her. He’d been watching the city for some time, and he could see that there was significant movement within. All the pillars that shot those horrible, painful lasers were fired up and at the ready. He’d had to be quicker than he’d ever been before he reached the pipe.
But he had. And then he’d expected her to have moved until he heard the grating sounds of the crabs talking. So they’d found her, at least, even if that meant he had to go deeper inside the city than he wanted.
What he hadn’t expected was to find her halfway there. She’d gone down three tunnels, following the crabs like a madwoman before she came upon him. Immediately, anger had flared so hot and powerful that he hadn’t been able to control the lights of his body.
What if she had died? Drowned? What if he was just a few moments late, and he’d found her dead body? She would have ruined the entire mission. Again, the anger pressed against his throat and he wanted to hurt something. He wanted to grab onto the nearest deep sea squid and fight until there were little sucker marks all over his body and he couldn’t see through the cloud of ink.
But he didn’t want to hurt her. And that was curious enough on its own.
He didn’t mind that she was pressed up against him, nor did he mind that her tiny little fingers gripped his shoulders. Even the one that was close to his missing arm. He wouldn’t mind all that much unless she moved it lower. Which she didn’t. He wasn’t sure if that was because she was disgusted by the missing limb, or if she was just terrified.
He didn’t think she was terrified, though. Her legs looped around his hips, right where his lower fins grew. Her tiny feet, as Mira called them, were covered in some kind of strange material, but they kicked against the back of his tail whenever he changed directions. The box she’d brought was between them, or he would have focused on her heartbeat.
Instead, all he could think about was that she was wrapped around him. Her warmth pressed against him as he swam, and—for fuck’s sake—was that his fins fluttering against her thighs?
He tamped down on the movement immediately, a low growl starting in his chest with disgust at himself. He could not, would not, flutter for an achromo. Daios was not trying to impress her, and he did not want a mate.
Or perhaps, something deep inside him whispered, he did not think a mate would want him.
He started toward the achromos old lair, and then he realized she was talking. The mouthpiece makes it so quiet that he couldn’t hear her, and she already spoke so softly.
He leaned down to hear what she was saying. “One, two, three, four, five. One, two, three, four, five.”
Rhythmically, she counted. Over and over again. He tilted his head, apparently seeing better in the dark than she did. Her eyes were squeezed shut underneath the goggles attached to the mouthpiece. Her lips moved, and as he watched, her pulse sped up. The rapid beat in her neck was concerning enough without her ribs moving like that, almost as though she were hyperventilating.
Was she afraid? Had he done something? Daios didn’t know what would make her afraid if she hadn’t minded fleeing the city. She’d already been in the pipes when he found her! Clearly, she wanted to leave.
He wasn’t so much a monster that she would fear him as they fled. Was he? Was the sight of him the problem?
She must have felt him straining to see her, because she opened her eyes. But she didn’t look at him. Not exactly. More like over his shoulder.
“I’m sorry. I don’t like the dark,” she whispered. “Counting helps keep the panic attacks away. I’m sorry.”
“Why are you apologizing for something you cannot control?” he grumbled, but then realized that his low tones and raspy voice were more likely to add to her fears than assuage them.
Sighing, he shifted his grip to palm the back of her head. Carefully, he turned her skull, so she was looking at the part of his neck and shoulder that weren’t damaged.
It took a lot to control the colors individually on his body. When he was younger, he’d been obsessed with trying. Their mother had always laughed at his antics. She’d claimed only octopi were so talented, and no undine were good enough with their colors to do what he was attempting.
He’d mastered it, though. So, in the same rhythm she’d been counting, he focused on the lights while they swam. One, two, three, four, five. All the way down his neck. Then again, to the peak of his shoulder. More down his bicep. Then he made the lights turn and go back up the same way.
She couldn’t see him very well, although likely better than she had before, but he could see her. The trembling that he’d noticed almost disappeared entirely. Her eyes followed the lights up and down. Over the repeating pattern until he felt her tension ease. It just melted away until she was pliable in his arms once more.
He kept the lights going as they moved through the water, although Arges’s concerns were suddenly blasting in his head. Achromos got cold, his brother had claimed. Often. So he needed to keep her warmer. That would be easier with two arms, but she was so small compared to him. It was fairly easy to do with one as well. He tucked her closer to him, shifting his grip to fit her feet into the fins at his hips.
He was grateful she couldn’t see his face. The grimace he couldn’t control at the soft touch of her feet sliding against the sensitive fins would have scared her even more.
They were making good progress, at least. He didn’t want to stop swimming at this speed until he found the facility. Her father had seen them leave. He was certain of it. Which meant there would be ships coming after them soon enough, likely there already were.
Then he was faced with a new obstacle. He paused in the water, more upright than he had been before. Her legs curled a little tighter around him, and she craned her neck to look at where they were. Not that she could see much.
There were lights in the distance. He had really hoped they would avoid being followed. He was a small speck in the ocean compared to the massive ships her father had, but unfortunately, it appeared the General had more resources at his disposal. That made it difficult for Daios, even more than the obstacle that now laid out before them.
The red coral bed was famed for its danger. When he was nothing more than a pup, he and his friends used to see if they could swim through it. His first jagged scars were from this place. They looked like fingers reaching out toward him. Fingers dipped in red blood, begging to drink more from their flesh.
He found himself flaring brighter for her to see what he was looking at. Maketes had thought that they would go right over this deadly coral bed, but he had forgotten that there would be people chasing them. Which meant, unfortunately, he had a choice. He could go through the jagged, spindly red coral that would slice through his scales if he made a mistake, or he could swim above them and chance her father’s ships seeing the direction he swam in.
He tensed as she reached out, running her finger along one of the nearest coral pieces. Daios hadn’t realized they were quite so close to them.
“These are sharp,” she said, her voice muffled and low.
Releasing his hold on her waist, he trusted her to hold on to him as he grabbed her hand. Gently, he forced her to let him look at the tiny finger that had been in so much danger. No wound, at least.
He pressed her hand between them, tucking her arms against his chest. “You stay very still,” he said, trying to keep his voice low, so she knew how important this was. “I fear there are achromos following us.”
The words were probably ridiculous to say to her. She was an achromo, and of course she knew her people were going to follow them. Not to mention she had no idea what he was saying.
So he gestured toward the lights, moving his hand as though it were a ship through the water. Then he reached for one of the corals, flaring red even brighter so she could see the plume of blood that immediately erupted from his skin at the barest touch.
He would keep her safe, he tried to mime to her. He would take the wounds for her.
Daios didn’t like the thought of her bleeding. He didn’t want to see those red ribbons stretch from her skin as they moved through the sharp red coral bed. Her blood would likely taste sweet, and he didn’t know how he would react to that. Not when all he could think about was a sea turning black with blood and all the people he had lost. All those souls that blamed him for their deaths.
Cool fingers touched his face. The strange texture of her gloves didn’t change the calm that descended upon him as she ghosted those fingers over his forehead. She smoothed the creases there, her touch lingering a little longer than it needed to.
And then his little witch of a woman whispered, “We can go through the coral. I’ll keep my arms tucked in tight.”
He could almost hear the ships now. The strange metallic hum of their movements through the water and he could certainly smell the oil in his gills that only those machines put out into the ocean.
With a sharp nod, he descended into the madness with her. The sharp spines cut into his back, slicing through his arms and shoulders as he pushed them into the only opening he could find. All he had to do was get to the bottom of this coral and then there should be space for them to swim.
All throughout the struggle, she remained still as stone in his arms. He gripped her around the waist, holding her spine in his one arm as he used his entire body to break through the coral. He would be her shield if that kept her safe.
Finally, he broke through to the bottom. There was enough space here for him to swim, and for him to keep her away from those sharp pieces. If anything stretched too close to the silty sand below, it would cut only him.
Until he smelled her blood.
He dragged the scent deep into his gills, feeling it flutter so soft against the edges of his rib gills and then he could taste her on his tongue. Metallic and oh so sweet.
His first reaction wasn’t one he was proud of. He wanted more of it. He wanted to sink his teeth into the graceful column of her neck and make more of that sweet scent plume in the water so he could drag it into himself. But then he hated the thought of hurting her. He hated that she was hurting now.
Tugging her in front of him to unfurl her body, he started looking for the wound. There wasn’t anything on her arms and hands, but of course he knew that. She had her arms tucked in to him. So maybe it was on her back. He spun her around, ignoring that she had started speaking. He had to find the wound. He had to make sure she wasn’t going to bleed out on him.
He’d promised.
Daios had promised he would keep this one alive. But the luck that followed him was so evil that no matter what he did, it felt like he was killing everyone and anyone that meant...
She tapped her fingers against his shoulder as he turned her, looking again for the cut that would dare to mar her flesh. Then more tapping, rhythmic movements that brought his attention to her face.
“The lights,” she said, her voice little more than a whisper. “You have to turn off the lights.”
She’d been touching her fingers to every single light that was flashing on his skin. Like she was trying to cover them up with her fingers, or that perhaps she thought her touch had turned them off. And when he finally pulled himself out of that dark place and realized the risk he was taking, Daios allowed them to sink into darkness.
It didn’t matter where she was cut. Clearly she wasn’t so injured that she risked death, and the ships were bound to be close to them now. Too close.
He pulled her against him again, holding her tightly against his twin heart beats as the strange ships moved over their heads. The silver bellies glowed, and he could see their insides through the glass panels that separated the sea from the creatures inside. Giant beams of light moved in front of the ships. They were searching for the two of them, and if he wasn’t careful, they would find them.
Nearly vibrating with anger, he drew her closer to him yet again and tucked them flat against the ground. The red coral and dark earth would hide his body, but her silver wetsuit would stand out just as much as the ships did. So he had to cover her.
At least, that’s what he told himself. He said that he was only covering her so that he could keep her safe for a little longer. He refused to admit that her tiny hands pressed against his bare skin twisted something inside him.
Then she started tracing circles against his chest. The circles became patterns as they waited for the ships to stop their search. Patterns he had no idea how to decipher, but fuck.
It felt so good to have someone touch him.
He couldn’t remember the last time someone touched him just to touch him. He’d always spent such a large portion of his time alone, and when he wasn’t alone, he was fighting. That was it. He had nothing else in his life until this little beast was forced onto his path.
His tail shifted in a current that he had never felt before. It was like someone placed a cool blanket over his shoulders, wrapping him a little tighter, and he had to wonder if this was a goddess of the sea. If she was telling him, this was... right. That after all this time of fighting, he had finally been given something soft.
But she needed to stay alive for him to keep her.
So as the ships turned to go in another direction, he swam with her in his arms. Underneath the sharp spines that bit into his back and shoulders and tail. He would bleed for as long as it took to get them out of here.
It was a long time. But he finally broke free from the coral to a rare sight of the sun above them, a blessing so he did not have to suffer more wounds. Carefully, he took her to the abandoned facility that Maketes had spoken of. Though there were no lights to be seen, it looked like it was intact.
As he swam by a window, he peered into the shadows beyond and could see there was air in there. Hopefully breathable air for her, but at the very least, something had to be working.
Now he just had to find a way in and to force himself to let her go. Which, he was finding, would be harder than he anticipated.
How to get in? He wasn’t sure. There weren’t a lot of openings in the achromos builds, and he could only imagine it would be complicated.
A soft tap had him looking down at the little creature in his arms.
“Lights?” she asked. “Can you make the lights?”
“Are you afraid again?” he asked, his voice a low rumble in his chest.
At her shiver, he sighed. Of course, he had to be thrown in the direction of a creature who was terrified of the dark. She feared so many things, likely, that he would have to spend the rest of his obsession catering to her every whim. She was weak.
But he still started with the rhythm of lights that went up and down his shoulder, trying his best to ignore the way her fingers tapped each one out of existence before he let the next light illuminate.