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Fine. You better keep them closed.With a snorted huff, Nathair sunk once more.

He made an incision in his palm. Pressing it against a large and smooth edge in the ground, he waited for his magic to come to life. The moment it did, he shot to the surface to make sure Linh had kept her promise.

His heart sped up in excitement, and he softly poked her cheek.

She opened her eyes, only for them to immediately widen as she took in all the white quartz crystals glowing around her. Her lips parted as she gasped, and she turned, seeing that every part of the wall, the ceiling, and even the floor had crystal jutting from everywhere.

She looked down to where it was brightest in the water. It also had an orange glow due to his magic circle having the strongest reflection in the quartz shards.

“Oh my god, Nathair,” she muttered quietly, as she sightlessly reached for him while gawking at every surface. “This is breathtaking.”

He didn’t drown his purr this time. Instead, he took her forearm and pulled her towards him until she crashed against his torso. It vibrated into her very hands, her arms, and her chest, and he nuzzled the end of his snout against her neck.

Lying back, he propped her against his chest, and she subconsciously mounted his waist as she looked up at the ceiling. Flaring both his forearm fins, he stopped them from moving too far as he used his tail to keep them buoyant.

“I can’t believe something like this exists,” she continued, and her surprise evolved into pure adoration.

Nathair observed the glow mirrored in her pretty brown eyes, and his chest swelled at the way they glittered.

The red jewels dangling from her lobes glinted, only adding to the treasure before him. Her pink lips were parted in awe as she relaxed with him in a magical place so deep beneath the ground. Her long hair seemed darker while wet, and clung to her chest on one side to curl against a breast and highlight its fullness. Her dark lashes sparkled from the water, and the many droplets covering her reflected the light,hislight, as much as everything around them.

When he removed one arm from the water, they slowly spun in a circle, and that seemed to please her more. Cupping the side of her head, he brushed his thumb back and forth beneath one of her eyes to touch her captivating face, and she didn’t even seem to notice. He liked that she didn’t; it meant his touch felt so natural to her that it didn’t steal her attention from the mesmerising beauty surrounding them.

This cave, this place... he’d lingered here for a long time when he first found it. There was evidence of his violence if she searched for it; places he’d broken as he tore at himself when the voices were loud and refused to leave him be. Times when he tried to sleep, only to wake up writhing and in pain.

Every time he’d slipped back into lucidity, he allowed this place to fill him with hope and enthral him into a peaceful stupor.

There was even a large and flat prism in which four of himself could curl up to rest upon right near the ledge. Water trickled throughout the cave, and all of it led to the lake they floated in. The sound was soothing for an aquatic being such as himself.

It was one of the few reasons he’d been hesitant about leaving this continent before he met her. He didn’t know if he’d find a place – untouched and not ruined by Demons – like this again.

I’ll always remember her face in this moment,he thought, as he continued to caress it.How I was allowed to come back here, and finally appreciate it in the quiet she gifts me.

Even just her echoing breaths seemed to lull him, and his orbs bled with bright pink for the first time as he gazed upon her against his chest.

Part of him wished his magic would reflect the colour of his emotions, so she could see it in everything around them. So she could see... the way he adored her, as if this very cave was the inside of his heart and they lay within it.

I want it to glow in her eyes, like she feels it with me.

She did eventually turn her smiling gaze to him, and the tiniest dots of his pink orbs merged in with the mess of lights in her brown eyes.

“Even the cracks in your skull glitter,” she stated softly, cupping the sides of his head. “You look really beautiful right now, Nathair.”

A tremor racked his spine, and they sunk a little as it disturbed his swim. To keep them afloat, he flailed his tail faster, and they shot through the water. She giggled, and the sound had him sinking his head beneath the surface to escape the way it ripped at his heart with elation.

Resurfacing until only the back of his skull and horns were submerged, he kept his humanoid torso flat and moved them through the water. He directed with his arm fins, while using them to keep his dense and heavy torso from sinking as she partially knelt upon him.

He moved close enough to a jutting quartz, and she did exactly what he thought she might. She touched it.

“It’s warm.” She smiled down at him. “Can we take some of it home?”

Home?Nathair slowed.Did she just call my nest, my cave, home?

His heart doubled in its pace, and he nodded.

She could take whatever she wanted. If need be, he’d fucking claw through the very earth to bring her the biggest damn shard so long as it kept her content. So long as it kept her with him.

Because, with every waking moment in her presence, Nathair knew he was losing his will. If she kept stealing all the pieces of his battered heart, she’d find herself trapped in it like this cave – without his aid in escaping.