Page 23 of Hated By the Gargoyle

“I need to stretch my legs.” I stood up, working out the kinks in my body. My ribs still hurt, and I still felt bruised, but it wasn’t as bad as it had been before. I began walking through the space of the cave. It was enough to not make me feel cramped, like a large, open-concept loft. Even the bathing room was enormous.

My fingers itched to document this moment, and though I felt Qanek’s assessing gaze on me, I still reached for my camera. I waited a breath, like he would curse me out, roar, or stomp around in anger again. When he merely watched me, I brought the camera up to my face and clicked, snapping a picture of him.

When he didn’t retaliate, I got to work.

There was something beautiful about capturing the world through a different lens. About things you would otherwise overlook being held in a different lighting. The way one would simply swat at a spiderweb without a care, but through my camera, I captured every strand braided together. Every drop of dew. The innocent eyes of the creature that rested its head upon it.

I made the ugly pretty and made the pretty ugly.

Qanek left me to my exploration, often muttering to himself in his language, often searching me out with curiosity in his eyes. I snapped pictures of his expressions, so I noted when they changed. When bits of the hard angles smoothed over and became something… softer. Not soft, not quite that, but not as tightly wound. He looked at me differently with each second that passed, that anger making its way to something more.

I didn’t have a name for it. It couldn’t have been respect. Perhaps it was acceptance about our situation and things we couldn’t control.

I smiled at him, showing my full teeth, though the gap between the two front ones had always made me self-conscious.

Fire burned in Qanek’s chest when I smiled, like seeing flames through a glass pane. The reddish hue traveled up his neck and stained his cheeks. Was he blushing?

“What is it that you do with that device?” he asked.

“This is a camera.” I held it up and explained. “I capture pictures–images–of the world with it. Do you want to see?”

Before he even nodded, I was already making my way towards him, clicking through the settings so I could show him the photos I’d taken so far.

“See? It’s your den.” I scrolled through the images I’d just taken, stopping on one of Qanek.

I’d caught him at an intense angle, with the shadows hugging the panes of his sharp, wide face just right. He was in deep concentration, his stone brows pulled together above two different colored eyes, his lips turned into a pout. The scar was stark on his face, an angry line cutting across one side.

Anyone looking at him would see the danger but there was beauty to him as well, the same way snakes were deadly and beautiful, Qanek was as well.

Beside me, he sucked in a breath and lifted a black claw, as if he wanted to reach out and touch the portrait, but thought better of it, pulling back at the last second.

“You have a photogenic face.” I smiled, reaching a finger out and sliding it across the screen of my camera, right down his cheek. “Very beautiful.”

“Yes,” he agreed.

When I turned, he was staring at me, not at the picture anymore. Something in the depths of his eyes incinerated through the anger and fear that had seemed to be a pulsing, present thing between us.

My own cheeks began burning at the intensity with which he observed me, not once tearing eye contact. It was too much, to be trapped beneath that stare and a desperate part of me tried clawing my way out with an awkward huff of laughter.

“I want to photograph professionally.” I hung it around my neck again, using it like a barrier between us. “But I still need practice.”

“I am sure all you desire will come to pass. You have a natural talent.”

There was no hint of sarcasm in his voice, and my answering smile was shy and self-conscious. I tucked a ratted curl behind my ear.

“That’s the first time anyone’s ever said that to me, Qanek. Thank you.”

Those flames under his skin glowed brightly. His head darted back to his distracting task, and I hummed to myself as I walked around once again, set on exploring.

A chest sat like a pirate’s trove near his bed. I could peek at the garments inside and curiosity gripped me. There was a chill in the air and I was far from the fire. If I found a blanket or a sweater, I could wear that and not invade Qanek’s space again. Then he wouldn’t yell at me, and we could continue in companionable silence. And, dare I say it, contentment?

Smiling to myself at that perfect plan, I went to the chest and rummaged inside. Immediately, my fingers closed around a pretty red sweater made of a comfortable, warm, and stretchy material.

I pulled it out and held the sweater up for viewing. It was super cute and actually something I would pick out for myself in a bin at the thrift shop–it was in my favorite color, after all.

I slipped it on and turned…

To find Qanek glaring daggers at me, his nostrils flaring in a sure sign of the rage that would follow.