Chapter 7
EVERYTHING IS TRYING TO KILL US, INCLUDING MY SELF-CONTROL
SARVEN
The water at the high tunnel smells wrong.
In the way of new stone. Stone that has been broken recently. It is sharp. Uneasy.
I do not like it.
Mih-kay-lah walks close at my side, the handle of her basket gripped in one hand. Every time the tunnel narrows, her arm brushes my hip.
My dra-kir stutters every time.
Ahead of us, Haroth and Kelvan lead the way, their glows bright enough to paint the walls in soft gold. Haroth uses his spear like a probing claw, tapping at the floor, as if he can irritate danger into showing itself. Kelvan’s gaze keeps going up, not down, tracking fine cracks across the ceiling.
Behind, Zan takes the rear position. That is fitting. He trusts nothing. Not stone, not air, not his own shadow. It is good to have his suspicious ears back there.
“The tunnel is old,” Zan projects, dragging his claws along a veined section of wall. Stone flakes away under his touch in a way I do not like, and I suddenly realize there are a lot of things I do not like.
The mountain’s deep groan echoing ahead? Threat.
Dry pebbles crumbling from a ledge? Threat.
The white puff of cold from Mih-kay-lah’s mouth, condensing in the chill as we ascend? Threat.
Before, these were just… sounds. Textures. The normal language of stone.
Now that she is here, everything is a potential enemy.
I am becoming more suspicious than Zan.
Zan, who once spent an entire sol watching a single boulder because he did not “trust the way it sat.”
“The tunnel is old,” Haroth answers, his mind-tone calmer, “but not so old it should be falling on our heads. Maybe it is only testing us. To see if we are worthy of clean water.”
“Stone does not test,” I snap. I nudge a loose pebble with the side of my foot, sending it skittering into the dark ahead. “It only waits for fools to step wrong.”
The thought comes with a growl slipping out of my throat before I can catch it.
Mih-kay-lah glances up at me at the sound.
Dust.
This is not how I imagined my first real time alone with her.
In my mind, she would be by the central fire, doing her coo-keen, face warm from the heat.
My skin would be glowing with a steady, impressive light: healthy, calm, strong.
I would walk over slowly, not lurking in shadows like a cave-creature.
I would offer her the gift I have been carving.
It would be perfectly smooth, each curve just right for her hand.
She would see it and make that soft inhaling sound.
She would press it to her chest, look at me, and understand that I am the only male worthy of her fire-broth.
Instead, I am here in a half-collapsing tunnel, skulking in the dark, growling at rocks.
I force my face to soften. The humans bare their teeth to show friendliness, so I do the same, pulling my lips back from my fangs in what I hope is a reassuring display.
Mih-kay-lah’s brows come together in a strange upside-down way.
“All right, don’t go all Cheshire on me, Stabby,” she mutters.
I only catch two words there: Stah-bee—mine—and don’t. But I get the sense I have not succeeded in reassuring her.
The moment she uses the name, she freezes slightly, as if surprised she let it slip. Her eyes flick away.
Stah-bee.
Stah-bee. Yes, that is me. And I am here to guard.
The mindspace thins as we go deeper. It always does in the old tunnels, but now the distance feels more obvious. Thoughts from the main cavern reach us dulled, as if too much stone has been piled on top of them.
Mih-kay-lah has no such thread to anyone. Her mind is entirely her own, closed to us unless she pushes sound through her soft throat.
It is both frustrating and… precious.
Part of me wants to press my brow to hers, to open a channel and let understanding pour between us with no clumsy mouth-words. To feel her thoughts the way I feel my brothers’ in battle.
Another part of me is glad she cannot look inside and see the things that move there. The glow I can never quite coax into a full blaze. The stab of jealousy when I see Rok with Jus-teen, or Jah-kee with Tharn. The cold fear that the dust will choose everyone else and leave me with nothing.
So, I keep my brow to myself.
Not yet.
The tunnel hooks sharply left, then right. The sound of water grows louder ahead, but not like the gentle seep of the lower spring. This is a constant, thinner trickle, bouncing around in a tight space.
“Close,” Haroth projects, excitement brightening his tone. His glow tries to flare in answer.
“Dim,” Kelvan sends at once, shooting him a look. “If the tunnel is weak, too much light-heat will make it angry.”
Haroth pulls his light back under his skin, chastened.
I adjust mine as well, keeping it low and steady. Bright enough that Mih-kay-lah will not catch her foot or misjudge a step. Not so bright that we heat the stone more than we must.
If this stone so much as scratches her, I will grind it to dust.
“The air’s colder,” Mih-kay-lah vocalizes. Her breath smokes faintly in front of her face.
Cold.
I cannot understand her words, but I know Ain’s touch. I know what her night-breath feels like. This is the chill of places where light never goes. Where only water and time have power.
Some stubborn part of me wants to bare my teeth at it. To snarl at the air until it gives her back its warmth.
We round one last bend, and the stone opens up.
The chamber ahead is small but tall. The ceiling arches high above us into darkness. The drip and trickle of water is louder here, echoing from somewhere overhead.
“We are under the water-path,” Kelvan projects. He forces the Een-gleesh word “here” out for Mih-kay-lah’s benefit, then points to a dark seam high in the wall, where a thin, steady thread of water is seeping down toward us.
Mih-kay-lah steps closer, eyes narrowing as she studies it. “This is like… like being one floor below the pipes,” she says.
I do not know what a “floh-r” or “pai-eeps” are, but the awe on her face makes me tilt my head, looking at the seep. If Mih-kay-lah finds it bee-yoo-tee-ful enough to stare at it, then it must be bee-yoo-tee-ful indeed.
We continue for a little more before the ground falls away sharply, leaving a narrow ledge clinging to the wall. It follows the curve of the drop toward the sound of more trickling water. Past the ledge: nothing. Just black space and the upward pull of cold air.
“Path… thin,” Kelvan says in our own tongue for Mih-kay-lah’s benefit. He tests the edge with his foot, his brow tightening. In the mindspace, his words are more exact: “Only wide enough for one male to walk it. Two, if we press close.”
“I can go alone,” Mih-kay-lah says immediately.
She says many other things after that, too fast for me to catch. But I recognize the set of her shoulders, the tilt of her head.
She is about to do something stubborn.
She is preparing to walk into danger on purpose.
Dust, she is magnificent.
My insides turn to mush. I want to scoop her up, tuck her under my arm, and carry her back to the main cavern. I want to wrap her in soft furs and carry her everywhere so her feet never have to touch sharp stones again.
This female makes me weak.
A new kind of weakness. Hot, strange, and not entirely unpleasant.
But I am not that weak.
She steps forward, and I simply slide my body in front of hers, blocking the path completely.
“Noh,” I say, and this time I use her language. The word comes out rough but clear.
She stops, gaze snapping to mine.
I uncurl my claws and force my face to soften. When I speak again, I switch back to Drakavian, slowing the words the way Rok does when he practices mouth-speak with Jus-teen.
“You… small,” I say, and then grimace. “You… little. If stone… moves—”
I scoop a handful of loose grit and small stones from the path in front of us, and let them trickle over the edge. They vanish into the dark.
“I… catch easier… if I am there.” I tap my chest.
Her throat moves as she swallows. She glances at the ledge, the drop, the seeping line of water.
“Okay,” she says at last. This is one of the few words I know for certain in her language. A soft agreement. “We stay close.”
We.
I know that word too. It means “us”. Together.
Is it for all of us or only me?
My dra-kir decides it is for me only and kicks harder.
Haroth volunteers, as Haroth always does. “I’ll go first,” he projects, rolling his shoulders. “If the stone is angry, it will hit me, not the Daughter.”
Zan cuts across him. “Kelvan knows the stone better,” he sends, practical as always. “He should lead.”
Kelvan grunts, not displeased.
“No,” I send, surprising even myself. “I go first. Then Mih-kay-lah. Then Kelvan. Haroth next. If the path fails, you are the strongest to haul us back. You can lift three on a spear rope. I have seen it.”
Haroth’s chest puffs at that. “Four,” he corrects automatically.
“Then four,” I agree, letting him have the extra.
Zan huffs, but does not argue. He positions himself near Haroth instead, eyes on the ceiling where the cracks spider out.
Mih-kay-lah adjusts her grip on the basket. “Where do you want me?” she asks in her rapid tongue, then stops when she sees my confusion. She taps her chest, points to the ledge, then makes a small circling motion with her finger.
Order.
“With… me,” I say, tapping the air in front of my chest. “I go… front. You… behind.”
It is not perfect, but if the ledge goes, I will know first. I will be between her and the open air.
Heat rises along the back of her neck, blooming just beneath the tidy rows of her bound hair. Her scent shifts, sharpening with something that is not fear.
I tilt my head, curious.
She mutters something under her breath then. Quick. I catch only pieces.
“Okay… follow the giant glowing wall of muscle. Don’t look at the death drop. Just… eyes on the assets. No, not those assets. Shut up, Mikaela.”
She is chanting a nervous rhythm. I feel her eyes locked on my glow. She is using me as a beacon to keep from panicking.