Page 25 of Inferno

But to Yorin’s dismay, when he came back to Nerik, having dumped the wet blanket in the pile with the rest of Nerik’s wet things, Nerik was looking worse than he’d been before he was dried. His eyes were almost closed, his breathing shallow and strained, and he seemed completely oblivious to his own nudity.

“Nerik? Nerik, come here,” Yorin said, his voice more gentle now. He wasn’t a nurse, and out here in the forest, in the middle of a storm, there was absolutely no way to seek help from anyone else. He was Nerik’s best and only chance for recovery. Yorin swallowed hard, pressing down his rising panic and the idea that he was woefully unprepared to deal with this situation. All he had to do was get Nerik warmed up, right?

But what if he got pneumonia? What if he caught the flu? What if he couldn’t warm him up, even with blankets and fire and hot drinks?

He wrapped the second blanket around Nerik and led him back to the fire. He came slowly but willingly, taking short, halting steps. “Nerik, you have hypothermia,” Yorin explained to him. “You need to stay near the fire and try to warm up.”

“Fire,” Nerik whispered, his eyes drifting over to look at the flickering flames.

“Yes, there’s a fire here. Sit down. The fire will warm you up.”

◊ ◊ ◊

Nerik crumpled to the floor near the fire, grateful beyond measure that Yorin was here to drag him inside and warm him up.

And he’d made a fire! Nerik needed fire. He needed wood, and heat, and it was oh, so tempting to just rip the obsidian necklace off from around his throat and throw himself into the fire.

But no, he couldn’t do that. His mind was working just about well enough to remember that Yorin didn’t know what he was, that humans were not supposed to know, and to expose himself would end up with things going very, very badly.

But there was an irony there, one that Nerik was helpless to resolve. Without Yorin here, he would have died. His fire would have gone out, back there on the pathway, with Nerik unable to reach the beckoning safety of his house. If Yorin hadn’t dried him off, the lingering water would have continued to erode his fire, until he’d been nothing more than a damp pile of blackened coals.

And yet, now that he was dry and indoors, Yorin’s presence was ironically the thing that was most likely to kill him. He needed to absorb some of the fire that Yorin had so thoughtfully made. He needed to fuel himself with wood, to keep what little spark remained alight. And yet there was absolutely no way in the world that he would be able to do so with Yorin standing over him, watching every move he made. Even if Yorin retreated to the sofa or the bedroom, Nerik could hardly just take off his necklace and revert to his ‘demon’ form, right there in Yorin’s line of sight.

And so, if he didn’t think of something quickly, his new friend and potential love interest was going to be forced to stand there and watch Nerik die, right there on the kitchen floor, within arms reach of the one thing that could save his life.

He needed to get Yorin out of the room.

The only other alternative was to try to explain, in his exhausted state, what he actually was, and Nerik knew he wasn’t thinking anywhere near clearly enough to be able to explain it sufficiently, or to judge Yorin’s reaction to the news.

No, getting him out of the cabin was the only option.

But at the same time, sending Yorin back to Minia in this storm was just as likely to kill him as it was to kill Nerik. He’d end up with a fever at best, or pneumonia, perhaps, or maybe he’d be hit by a falling tree, or be struck by lightning.

Nerik forced himself to raise his head, looking around to see what was available, for any pretext, no matter how slight, to get Yorin out of the cabin.

His eyes landed on the rack of firewood – full when he’d left this morning, but half empty now. He twisted around, managing to focus his blurry vision on Yorin’s wavering form. “Can you get some more firewood?” he asked, aware that he was slurring the words slightly. “There’s a shed around to the right.”

“We’ve got plenty of wood for now,” Yorin told him, and Nerik cursed inwardly.

“Cold,” he said, as emphatically as he could manage. “Need more wood. More fire.”

Yorin hurried over to the fireplace, adding two more logs to the flames. The cabin was relatively warm, but the fire itself had died down a little – presumably Yorin had been here for a while, then?

The fresh wood caught quickly, but Yorin didn’t leave. Instead, he went over to stare out the window. It was still raining outside, though the torrent had lessened slightly. Nerik fumbled for the words to string together, to suggest that it might be worth getting more now, while the rain was a little lighter, but he failed to manage anything more than a vague, “Rain is… wasn’t too bad…”

Yorin sighed. “Well, since I’m already damp, I suppose I might as well get more now, then just dry off once.”

“Yes,” Nerik agreed eagerly. “Need more wood.”

“Keep the blanket over you,” Yorin scolded him, glancing back and seeing that it had slipped down Nerik’s shoulder. He managed to get his cold fingers around the edge and pull it back up, then nodded at Yorin.

“Right, then,” Yorin said, then he braced himself, flung the door open, and after only a moment’s hesitation, marched outside into the storm.

Knowing he only had one shot at this, Nerik waited until the split second after the door had closed, then he tossed the blanket off himself and fumbled for his obsidian necklace. Numb fingers made it difficult work, but after a few seconds of desperate fiddling, he felt the clasp open and the necklace tumbled to the floor. Instantly, his native form returned.

With no time to proceed with even the slightest finesse, Nerik grabbed one of the two fresh logs off the fire and shoved it in towards his abdomen. It took him a moment to open his body to the offering, but then the flaming wood slid through his layer of smoke and ash, settling into the nest of wood inside his body. Deep within the nest, a faint ember still smouldered. Thank Arix it hadn’t gone out completely. One large log was far from ideal – Nerik knew from long experience that he should be fuelling himself with smaller pieces of burning wood and dry twigs to coax the ember back into flame – but in this case, he had the choice between jamming enough heat inside himself to force a flame, or dying. It would be uncomfortable, the infernal version of indigestion, but it would keep him alive.

Panting for air – to keep the log burning, now that it was sitting on a bed of damp wood – Nerik forced himself to move slowly, to concentrate, as he picked up the necklace with barely functioning fingers and redid the clasp around his neck. Then he pressed the obsidian gem to his chest and recited the spell.