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ERYSS

T he water is a beast, its claws sinking into my flesh, dragging me down, down, down.

The impact had stolen the breath from my lungs, left me weightless, suspended in the abyss, caught between life and death. Cold lashes at me, an unforgiving bite seeping into my bones, deeper than flesh, deeper than marrow. Deeper than fear.

I kick hard, but the current grips me tighter. The river is wild, ravenous, swallowing light, swallowing air. Swallowing me entirely.

Panic claws at my chest, sharp and ruthless. My limbs tangle in the churning blackness, my lungs screaming for breath I cannot find. The world above is lost. There is only the endless, crushing dark.

Suddenly, there are hands.

Huge, unrelenting hands, strong as stone, unyielding as fate. They clamp onto my waist, my ribs, locking me against a chest that feels as unmovable as the mountains. The current fights to steal me away, but the grip tightens, pulling me against an immovable force.

Naranus.

His body is fire against the consuming cold, but I can’t react before we are torn through the depths together.

He moves with brutal efficiency, each kick, each thrust of his massive legs cutting through the water, fighting against the current with inhuman strength. I cling to him, but my body is numb, weakening, slipping further into the dark.

The river does not let us go easily. It rips and tears, drags and suffocates. My fingers dig into his arm, barely able to feel the scorching heat of his skin, but I hold on. If I let go, I die.

I barely register the moment he surges upwards.

Light bursts through the suffocating dark, blinding me. Air. A desperate, choking gasp tears from my throat, but it is not enough.

Not enough.

The river crashes into us again, pulling us under, tumbling our bodies through the chaos of thrashing currents. My head smashes into something, a rock? Pain explodes, but there’s no time, no air, no breath.

The surface explodes around us.

Naranus roars, his voice ripping through the night as he drags me from the river’s jaws. He fights the current, forces his way toward the banks, his wings limp, useless in the water, but his strength is inhuman.

I cough violently, choking, my body convulsing against him. He holds me tighter.

“Breathe,” he snarls, voice dark and guttural, raw with command. “Damn you, Eryss, breathe.”

My body obeys. A ragged, gasping inhale. Then another.

The second we break onto the shallows, he hauls me into his arms. My vision is blurred, my body weak, but I am aware of every place our skin touches. The burning heat of him, the tremor in his grip.

He is shaking.

Naranus. The unbreakable.

He trembles.

He collapses onto the damp stones of the riverbank, cradling me in his lap, his hands gripping me too tightly. His breath isn’t steady, isn’t calm. It’s ragged, wild. Like a beast on the edge of losing control.

I force my eyes open, my body still too weak, but I need to see him.

Golden eyes burn into me.

There is fury in them.

Fury like an inferno, searing and scorching, all-consuming. But beneath it, deeper, buried under layers of rage and control, is something else. Something we don’t want to delve into.

His fingers tighten on my skin, claws pricking, but I don’t flinch. I can’t. I feel everything. The raw power of him, the sheer dominance of his presence. And the way his grip does not waver.

I swallow, my throat raw. “You?—”

“Never do that again.” His voice is low, dark, vibrating with something primal. “Never. If you fall, you scream for me. Do you understand, Eryss?”

I shake my head, my voice hoarse. “You can’t always?—”

He growls.

Deep, guttural.

The sound reverberates through my bones, into my chest, down into my stomach. His grip on me shifts, tightens, possessive.

"You think I can't?" His golden eyes gleam, predatory, molten. His wings twitch, useless and broken, but he cages me against him with just his body. "You think I won't? If you die, it will be by my hands. Not theirs."

The words shouldn’t send heat curling low in my belly. They shouldn’t make my chest tighten, my breath falter.

But his voice is like gravel and fire, rough with unspoken things. Things I do not want to think.

I glare at him, swallowing down the madness twisting in my chest. “Let go.”

He doesn’t.

Instead, his fingers trace my throat.

Slow. Deliberate.

I shudder. It’s not gentle. Not soft. There is nothing soft about him. The touch is a warning.

"You almost died." His voice is gravel, deep enough to shake the ground. "You would have been torn apart. Your body crushed. You think I would let that happen?"

A chill races down my spine, but it isn’t fear.

I should push him away. I should fight.

His fingers brush lower, over my collarbone, down my arm, tracing the bruises forming from his grip.

"No one can you away from me, Eryss," he murmurs, a whisper of something feral. "They’ll have to break me to pieces first, destroy my body, and even then, I’ll haunt them every moment of their life and the lifetimes to come."

My heart pounds, my pulse hammering beneath his fingers.

I have spent my entire life fearing him. Hating him.

But this?

This is not hate.

This is not fear.

This is beyond anything I thought I will ever feel.