Chapter 5 Safe with Me
SAFE WITH ME
Lumi-
I thought when I screamed into the forest, daring whatever’s out there to come get me, that I meant it.
But now, standing in the unnerving silence that has swallowed my words whole, I’m not so sure.
My body’s finally catching up to what my mind already knew: there’s nothing left to fight for.
I wrap my arms around myself, as if that could hold the ache in.
What was I thinking? That killing Mark would bring Anna back? That revenge could sew the gaping wounds in my soul shut and make me whole again?
I blink hard, forcing my tears back. I didn’t come here to fall apart, but some part of me has already shattered somewhere between the scream and the silence—between what I wanted and what I got.
The adrenaline drains out of me all at once, and suddenly I feel everything.
My boots are soaked through, snow melting into my socks.
My fingers have gone numb, and the cold sinks deeper with every labored breath.
I’ve been out here too long. The forest no longer looks like a battlefield; it looks like a graveyard.
I need to get back to the car before I become just another body this forest claims.
Move, Lumi. Just move.
But the questions ring louder than my survival instinct.
Why Anna and not me?
Why didn’t I wake up that night?
Why Mark? Why tonight?
Who got to him first?
The thoughts spiral faster than I can shove them down.
My chest constricts painfully. It feels like something is crawling down my throat, squeezing my ribs, until the air is too thick to breathe.
I press a hand to my sternum, trying to force out a full breath, but my heart is pounding too fast, or maybe too slow.
I can’t tell anymore. The rhythm is erratic, like it’s forgotten how to beat properly.
What is happening to me?
I’ve had anxiety before. I’m no stranger to sleepless nights, racing thoughts, or the overwhelming sense of dread that never quite goes away. But this feels different. This isn’t worry—this is my body giving up.
The trees blur at the edge of my vision, and the ground tilts beneath my feet. I stumble forward, boots catching on a root I didn’t see. I barely catch myself against a tree.
Get to the car. You have to get to the car.
I push off the tree and force myself further, but my legs are shaking now.
My hands won’t stop trembling. The cold isn’t just outside anymore; it's spreading rapidly inside of me like a disease.
My vision narrows—the world shrinks to a tunnel, and I feel like I'm falling backward through my own skull.
My heartbeat thumps loudly in my ears. Thump-thump. Thump-thump.
Why can’t I breathe? I feel so woozy—
My knees buckle, and I hit the ground hard. My hands shoot out to brace my fall. The impact jars my wrists, but even while lightning races up to my elbow, the questions won’t stop.
What if justice isn’t what I wanted?
What if I just wanted pain?
What if I’m the monster?
The thought cracks something in my chest, and suddenly I’m drowning in it—the unbearable fucking emptiness of surviving when she didn’t.
I claw at the zipper of my coat, yanking it open. The cold air hits my chest, but it doesn’t help. My head swims, and my eyelids fall shut.
No. Not here. Not like this.
I try to stand, but my body won’t listen anymore. Maybe if I just close my eyes for a few seconds—
Andrik-
I’m running before I register the movement, my lungs burning with panic I’ve never known.
“Nai’thar veskae,” I snarl under my breath.
She drops to her knees first, catching herself at the last possible second. Her chest heaves as she fights for air that won’t come. I can hear her gasping from here. She claws at her coat like she’s trying to tear her way out of her own skin.
She’s breaking, and I’m not close enough yet.
Her arms give out, and her body tips sideways, teetering like a marionette with its strings cut.
I catch her before her head hits the ground—one arm beneath her shoulders, the other sweeping beneath her knees as her weight falls into me.
She’s unconscious. Her head falls against my chest, and my heart stutters. “Veyr’khal?n…kae veyr,” I whisper into her hair. (Sacred heart keep beating.)
I should have stepped in sooner and stopped this spiral before it shattered her.
I look down at her, taking in her face for the first time up close, and my breath catches.
She’s more beautiful than anything this forest has ever held.
Her lashes are rimmed with frost—little shards of silver curled like they were carved from ice.
Her pale cheeks are flushed from the cold and streaked with the remnants of tears the snow tried to erase.
There's a smear of dirt across her jaw and a single feather caught in the dark strands of her hair—an iridescent blue-green that shimmers faintly even in the moonlight.
She's all fury and fire and earth-stained wildness when she's awake. But when she’s still like this—soft, and utterly unguarded—she glows. My very own beam of luminance wrapped in flesh.
She smells like a field full of honeysuckles, though his blood still clings to her skin, tainting the sweetness with something darker. I shift my hold, lifting her closer to my face. My hand rises without permission, brushing the hair from her cheek, just once.
My knuckle barely grazes her skin. She nestles closer to my chest, and a single word falls from her lips.
“Velorin,” she whispers. (I am safe with you.)
I hold my breath, terrified that even the rise and fall of my chest might shatter this impossible hallucination.
How? How can she feel safe in the arms of a nightmare that just ended a life?
I glance at the blood on her skin, and then at the soft parting of her lips.
She is a riddle written in my own blood—one I don’t have the answer for.
“Thaev’ra sael?n…” I whisper. (Please don’t take her from me. Souldbond.)
In this moment, with her cradled in my arms, she is by far the most dangerous thing I’ve ever held, because I’m not sure if I’m meant to protect her, or be undone by her.
My hooves twitch nervously, digging accidental furrows into the ground. No one has ever said anything like that to me before. She doesn't say another word, just exhales, and curls even deeper into my chest, like she's always belonged there.
I don’t know what she’ll think of me when she wakes up and sees what I am. But here, now, wrapped in her warmth, her trust, her undivided surrender—I am hers.
I dip my head and press my mouth to the crown of her damp, snow-covered hair and whisper—so softly even the forest leans in to hear. “Velorin… etra’kai l?n.” (You are safe with me. Even if it kills me.) I would burn down this entire forest to keep her warm for a single night.
She remains still even as I rise to my full height. The way she whispered Velorin replays in my mind like a broken record, and I ache like a creature who’s finally been named.
She's kaemorin. Not because I claimed her—though I do. But because she called for me. Something ancient heard her grief and thought I was the answer.
The woods part for me as I walk, branches bending away without sound; they know where I’m taking her. “Skarae’n ves l?r… kaemorin,” I murmur as I adjust her in my arms. (The forest knows you’re mine.)
I carry her over ravines and frozen thickets. Through moss-blanketed caves and bone-cold shadow paths, until the woods begin to thin and the world grows quiet. I slow my pace as my home comes into view, carved into the cliffside like it grew there—built with hands that had no one to build for.
The logs have been blackened with age, and the curved roof is half-buried in snow. Smoke drifts from the chimney in soft ribbons, fading into the hush of the sky.
I step onto the stone threshold, and golden runes carved into the rock flare brightly under the snow as they recognize my soul signature. They pulse brighter… warmer as they accept hers.
The door swings open before I reach for it, the wind curling through like an old friend welcoming me back. Warmth hits me first; the hearth is lit low and smoldering, kept alive by instinct more than intention. The coals never die here; they wait for me to return.
I kneel down and stoke the fire back to life, watching the orange flames lick up the soot-stained chimney. Without thinking, my hand seeks out the hearthstone carved with my lineage mark. My fingers find the familiar grooves, and I turn it clockwise a single time. For her.
Veyr’haelin. It’s a custom as old as this forest, a silent vow that the fire will not burn her, the shadows will not take her, and the walls will recognize her as their own.
To turn the stone is to weave a circle of protection around the guest, welcoming them not just into the house, but into the soul of the home.
As the stone clicks into place, the room feels…
different. For three thousand years, this stone has remained cold and stationary.
Now, it pulses with the warmth of the woman snuggled in my arms.
I move through the living area, where the walls rise like forest giants, logs curving inward protectively like the ribs of a shield. Lining the walls are shelves, carved from the stone of the mountain, cradling dried herbs, relics, and other things I've collected over lifetimes of solitude.
I lower her carefully onto one of the oversized couches, its surface worn soft with age, and drape the softest pelt I own over her small form. She curls into the warmth immediately.
I kneel beside her, unable to look away. She’s still sound asleep, breathing deep and even now, the panic that has seized her in the woods finally smoothed away by exhaustion.
“Velorin… velorin…” I breathe again. “Etra’ven…Sael?n.”
I should get up and prepare a healing tincture or find more blankets. At the very least, remove her boots before the cold seeps any deeper into her bones.
But I am rooted to this spot.
My hands ache with a phantom hunger—thrae’nai. (Soft-clawing)
I press both palms flat against the aged wood of the cabin floor. I let the tips of my claws sink in, dragging them down the planks in slow, rhythmic strokes.
Each groove deepens. Each pull against the grain grounds me. Splinters catch beneath my nails, but I welcome the sting—it keeps me from reaching for her before she’s ready.
The firelight catches on the soft curve of her cheek, painting her in gold. The feather braided in her hair burrows a little deeper with each breath she takes.
Etra’kai l?n.
Lumi POV-
I'm not sure where I am, but I'm not cold anymore. Maybe I died.
I don't feel dead, though. I just feel... heavy. Like I’m underwater, suspended somewhere between waking and dreaming, tethered to my body by the thinnest thread.
I can't open my eyes yet. I'm so tired. I can hear something—a low rumbly sound. I try to focus, but the words are muffled, like I’m listening through a wall.
“Oou woo woe but boove bun, bopbop?” mumbles a growly voice.
I'm sorry, but what?
What language even is that? Whoever’s talking sounds like that purple alien from the movie my nephew made me watch six times. Home. That’s it.
Great. I've died, and Jim Parsons is narrating the afterlife.
Honestly, I wouldn’t even be surprised at this point.
I try to wiggle my fingers, and to my shock, they twitch. When they do, something soft brushes against my hand—it kind of feels like a stuffed animal.
Oh wait. I was in the woods. A wolf got me. The wolf has obviously eaten part of my head, which is why I can't hear properly anymore.
Do they even have wolves in death?
No, idiot. They don't.
There's something warm and heavy covering me—it smells like cinnamon and smoke. Oh my god, a whole pack of wolves is lying on top of me. I’ve been sent to some alternate hellscape where, instead of people using animal rugs, they use humans.
Oh my fucking God, Lumi. Human rugs? Really?
“Velorin.” It’s a sigh more than a word.
I don’t know what it means, but the sound of it slips into a part of me I thought died the same day Anna did. It fills a space I didn’t think anything would ever touch again.
I try to open my eyes, but they're still so heavy. My body refuses to cooperate.
It's so warm here, and whatever I'm lying on is ridiculously comfortable. I wiggle my fingers again and hear a soft sound, almost a growl, but not angry. Just... rumbly.
Where am I?
I manage to crack one eyelid open. Everything is bathed in flickering amber light. My eyelid falls shut again.
I rest for a moment, then try again. This time, I can keep my eye open a little longer. The room comes into focus slowly, wooden walls, firelight dancing across strange jars on shelves, bunches of dried herbs hanging from the ceiling, and... is that a bone knife?
Okay, so whoever took me definitely has a vibe. And that vibe is 60% off-grid hermit, 40% might-actually-murder-me-later.
My eye falls shut again, exhaustion pulling me back under. I can't see him, but I can feel his presence. Maybe if I stay still, he’ll think I’m still unconscious.
Too late. Floorboards creak and groan beneath his weight. Then a soft thwip right next to my face.
Did he just flick me?
I force my eyes open and see a huge, shimmering feather lying on the cushion beside my head. He plucked it from my hair. Is he collecting souvenirs? Am I a scrapbook project?
At this point, I don’t know if I’m being courted or prepared for dinner.
This is fine. Everything is fine. I'm just going to pretend I'm back in my apartment with the broken heater and the neighbor who blasts EDM until 2 a.m. Except the air out here smells pure and wild. Not frat-boy Chad, who lived across the hall and decided to switch to natural deodorant, wild. But something that can’t be tamed.
“Velorin,” he rasps.
It makes something in my chest tighten—something I don’t have a word for. I shift slightly, and my boots scrape against the couch.
The growl returns, and my boots are gently removed, then my socks. Whoever’s touching me is being so careful it almost makes me want to cry... nobody is ever careful with me.
Logically, I know I should be terrified. Some unknown person is undressing me while I’m half-conscious in the middle of nowhere.
But I’m not.
I have this overwhelming sense of peace when they touch me. Somehow, I know they’re trying to help, not take advantage of the situation.
I may not know who brought me here, but I’m suddenly sure of one thing:
I’m not about to die…
… Probably