Chapter 12 #3
My hands fly up, making jagged, panicked gestures. Sharp, broken movements. I point to the heavy kelp door. I point to him. I mimic the menacing shape of a swimming shark with my flat hand, then mimic a guard throwing a spear.
I need to tell him a complex story. I need him to know the truth about why I left him after the fruit. I need him to understand the reasons we are running into the abyss.
But my gestures are clumsy. They lack structure and logic. Pathetic charades.
My hands fall to my sides. I look at him in pure agony.
Vaelis studies my face, a deep confusion building in his expression. "The shark? Are you trying to say you killed the Great White?"
I shake my heavy head, the movement sharp and violent. No.
I try another path. I point a heavy finger to the distant Reef. I point to him. I use both hands to trace the shape of a high crown resting on a head.
"The ruling Council?" Vaelis guesses.
I let out a silent growl, a frustrated vibration locked deep in my chest. I hit my own forehead with the heel of my palm, the impact sending a dull thud through the water.
I can't explain the truth to him.
The complexity of my racing thoughts remains trapped behind the impenetrable barrier of my silence.
I turn away. I lean my head against the wall, defeated. My shoulders hunch forward under the suffocating, crushing weight of my isolation.
Vaelis remains in place, staring at my back. He understands the toll this takes on my soul. I'm an instinctual creature of the dark trench. My kind navigates the world by producing vibration. Without my resonant voice, I'm blind. I'm lost in the dark without a map.
I stare at my hands resting on the wall.
The vibration of his shifting weight travels through the sand floor again. I feel his gentle fingers press against my tense arm.
I refuse to turn around. I can't bear his pity.
His grip tightens, a physical plea that vibrates through my skin, into my bones.
I turn to face him. I know I look exhausted and broken.
Vaelis lifts his fine hands into the space between us. My gaze, previously fixed on the white sand floor, shifts upward, drawn to the soft shape of his mouth. His lips form the words with deliberate precision.
"Please look at me."
My heavy head rises slowly, my dark eyes finding his golden ones. The warmth in them seems to push back the suffocating darkness of my silent prison.
"Your beautiful voice is gone," his lips shape the words, a truth that lands like a stone in my chest. "But your strong hands remain."
I look down to his hands, then lower to my own. Skepticism courses through me. My hands are scarred monuments to violence, built for crushing and tearing, not for the delicate art of communication.
"Watch my hands," he mouths the command, his expression earnest.
His right index finger taps against his left thumb. One.
He taps it twice in rapid succession. Two.
He makes a flat, horizontal shape with his open right hand, mimicking the calm horizon line of the ocean.
"Safe," his lips shape the word, matching the silent motion to the hand sign.
I watch his hands with desperate focus, my mind racing to catch the meaning.
He repeats the exact movement. Safe.
I hesitate, then lift my own right hand into the space between us. I mimic the flat shape. My fingers are clumsy and stiff, but the resulting shape holds meaning.
Safe.
"Yes," I read the praise on his mouth as a brilliant smile breaks across his pale face. "Safe."
He points a fine finger at my chest. He makes a tight fist with his right hand, then opens the fist over his own heart.
"Brave," his lips whisper in the quiet space.
I stare at my own hand. I form a fist. I open the heavy fingers over my own heart.
Brave.
My eyes widen in the dim blue glow of Bolt's cage.
It's a small thing. But the impenetrable stone wall of my isolation cracks down the middle.
"We can build this together," Vaelis mouths, the words forming silently in the water. "A language that is ours. You're not broken, Kael. You're learning how to speak a new language."
I stare into his golden eyes, the fierce devotion in their depths cracking the stone wall around my heart.
My hands abandon the clumsy signs. I lift both of my hands and frame his beautiful face, my thumbs brushing the delicate line of his jaw.
Vaelis gasps, the sound a soft rush of bubbles. He doesn't flinch away from my rough skin. He leans into my touch, his golden eyes fluttering shut, his soft lips parting in silent invitation.
I lean down, closing the agonizing distance between us.
Our lips meet. Two worlds colliding in the dim blue light of Bolt's cage.
I am hesitant at first, my lips gentle against his. I remember the sharp, serrated teeth hidden behind them, terrified of cutting his fine skin. It is a tentative, desperate question offered in the dark.
Vaelis answers with fearless demand.
He wraps his good right arm around my neck, pulling his body up to deepen the angle. His lips part, inviting me inside.
The sensory overload hits me like a crashing thermal wave. He tastes of the bright, beautiful light I craved in the dark.
A heavy, guttural groan rips through my chest in absolute silence.
I surrender to the overwhelming hunger. My hands slide into his long, tangled red hair. I pull his lean body flush against my broad chest, mindful of his injured left shoulder. I slant my mouth over his, my sharp teeth gently grazing his soft lower lip, sending shivers down his spine.
We kiss until the freezing ocean disappears. We kiss until there is no war, no treacherous Council, and no agonizing silence. There is only the scorching heat of his mouth and the frantic beating of our hearts.
We break apart, starved for air.
Vaelis presses his warm forehead against the rough skin of my collarbone.
The frantic rhythm of his breathing gradually slows, the ragged gasps steadying into a deep, resonant pulse against my chest. A brilliant flush has returned to his pale cheeks, a vibrant crimson that matches the wild tangle of his hair.
He lifts his head, his golden eyes burning with an intensity that eclipses even the electric glow surrounding us.
He points a trembling finger toward the rusted stove where the forgotten pot of sea-slugs simmers. He brings his thumb and forefinger together, making a rhythmic pinching motion near his swollen lips.
Food.
"Food," Vaelis whispers, the word barely disturbing the warm water.
A sharp blue spark pops against the rusted iron. "Oh, thank the currents," Bolt groans from the copper cage. "You remembered the slime. I assumed you two planned to eat each other for dinner."
Heat floods my face. I let out a silent huff of breath.
Vaelis glances at the glowing eel. His golden eyes shift back to mine. A coy, knowing smile curves his swollen lips.
I meet his golden eyes and smile back.
My smile lacks all polite beauty. It's jagged, menacing, and silent.
But in the absolute dark of the Gray Wastes, it speaks volumes.