"You have a name for what you are afraid of," he says, his voice low. "What is it?"
My chest tightens. The Predators. The Monsters. The Deep-Stalkers. None of those feel true now, in this quiet pocket where he kept me alive.
"I don't want to say," I admit.
He studies me for a long moment, then nods once. "Good."
"Good?" I repeat.
"It means you are not repeating what you were taught," he says. "It means you are seeing what is in front of you. It means your instincts are louder than your lessons."
My pulse thuds hard.Louder than your lessons.The words resonate through me, a vibration that settles deep in my bones.
Thalos Reedwake surfaces uninvited in my mind. The boy who looked too long at the Tide. The warnings wrapped in shame. The implication hangs between us, heavy as the water itself. My curiosity is not innocent. It's a kind of hunger.
I force a slow breath through my gills. "What were you doing this close to the reef?" I ask, needing to turn the lens back on him. "Clearly you are not hunting."
His eyes narrow slightly. He knows what I'm doing. Still, he answers.
"Mourning Tide bends the water for days," he says. "It makes the reef unstable. It pulls prey into places they shouldn't be."
"And you follow," I say.
"Yes." His mouth curves faintly. "I was hunting."
I glance at his empty hands, then back to his face, finding a sudden, reckless bravery. "You sure? You're not very good at it. You haven't caught a single thing."
A smile cuts across his face. A real one.
It reveals teeth of serrated white, sharp enough to snap bone.
It should be terrifying. Itisterrifying. It's also oddly magnetic, a violent beauty that makes the water around us feel thinner.
"I wouldn't say that," he murmurs, his eyes dropping to where my hand grips the shelf.
Heat floods my face, a warmth that feels alien in the cold of the deep.
I shift against the stone, fighting the pull of his proximity. His heavy mass acts like a gravity I can't resist, a force that makes me want to get closer despite every warning screaming in my blood.
I lean my head back against the stone and close my eyes, exhaustion finally catching up to me. The fear, the adrenaline, the impossible closeness, it all settles into a quiet ache in my muscles.
The stranger remains where he is. Close enough to radiate heat in the cold water. Far enough that the choice to close the distance is mine.
The sea moves around us, patient and watchful.
"Vaelis," I say.
The word softly breaks the silence.
He looks at me, tilting his head slightly, a gesture that somehow feels less predatory and more curious.
"My name," I say, meeting his black eyes. "If I'm staying here to wait this out, I'm not going to be just another terrified thing you pulled out of the current. I'm Vaelis."
He studies me for a heartbeat, his expression unreadable. Then, he dips his chin in a single, sharp nod.
"Kael."
The name is like him. Short. Rough. Heavier than it looks.
