“Are you kidding me right now?” I scream at the water, shaking my fist at the fins. “That was my fish! You goddamned thieves!”
Vael is staring at me with something like shock.
Yeah, I’m not a pillow princess out of the bedroom, my friend. Whatever.
The adrenaline drains out of me.
I slump against the vine-covered wall, my own uselessness hitting me all over again. I am exhausted, covered in bug paste, and completely failing at this.
“Great. Perfect. Now we don’t have dinner.”
Vael frowns, his forehead wrinkling as he tries to translate my pity party. "Perfect?"
"Yes, Vael. I am perfectly awful at this. I lose the food, I get kidnapped by a giant centipede?—"
"No," he interrupts, stepping right into me. His hands hit my hips and squeeze, and I suck in a surprised breath. "This is incorrect. You are perfect, not perfectly awful." He stops, looking like he’s thinking hard.
“No, I suck.” My lower lip wobbles. “I messed it all up.”
"The other night. You sucked my?—"
My jaw hits the floor. I completely freeze.
"—you sucked my cock with great skill," he finishes, looking intensely proud of his little linguistic breakthrough. "It was an excellent suck."
A choked wheeze of a laugh escapes my throat, then turns into hysterical laughter.
Vael just stares at me, looking totally baffled. One second I'm waging war on mutant fish, the next I'm cackling like a super villain.
The giggles slowly fade into something real. I look up at his handsome, serious face.
“Thank you,” I whisper. “For tracking me down. And… I’m sorry. For getting snatched. For tricking my friends. For making our lives a dumpster fire.”
Vael looks at me for a long moment. He doesn't say anything, but he picks up my awful excuse of a fishing rod, uses a razor-sharp talon to slice a fresh chunk of green eye-gummy off the dead bug carcass, and hooks it.
"Let us see what else we can catch for dinner," he says. “As a team.” He looks a little proud of that word, and it eases something in me.
I perk up a little, watching him test the tension of the tendon. He looks back over his shoulder, his eyes unblinking. "You are beautiful, Poppy. And you are clever. We will survive this place together." He pauses, his red tail giving a slow, calculated thud against the rock. "We are a team. But do I trust you yet? I do not know. I think you will show me, though."
CHAPTER 14
POPPY
“Make the fire,”he roars, waking me from where I’m half dozing after a few hours of taking turns fishing. “We will feast tonight!”
“Make the fire?” I ask blearily. “I don’t know how to do that. Do you have matches in your pack? I think it’s too wet in here. We could do sushi.”
Vael-Torin walks past the shark he finally successfully caught, staring at me as if I have just confessed to not knowing how to breathe.
“Oh, good job,” I tell him, beaming at the shark. “I can’t believe I made a fishing rod. Or harpoon. Or whatever.” I don’t think it’ good enough to be called either of those things, but it worked, and that’s all that matters.
"You do not know the spark?" His eyebrows rise toward his horns.
"I am a lawyer, Vael," I mutter. "We have appliances. Gas stoves. We don't strike rocks together in my neighborhood." I look sidelong at the vines. “Though the stove does make a clicky noise when it’s lighting.”
He lets out a rumbling noise of disbelief. My lack of basic survival skills is clearly highly amusing.
“I will show you,” he tells me.
