Page 21 of Drown Me Gently

“You’ll have to wait and see,” Ulric replied.

Auren narrowed his eyes, suspicious now. “That’s what you said before you dragged me to the Murkmire flats.”

“It was ecologically important,” Ulric muttered.

“It reeked,” Auren shot back, lips curling in disgust. “I couldn’t get the smell out of my hair for days.”

Ulric fought the urge to smile. Even the way Auren complained stirred something in him lately. He kept his voice even. “This will be different.”

Auren abandoned his sculpture and drifted closer, his body language trying for casual but failing. Ulric didn’t react when he settled so close that their shoulders almost touched. “You’re awfully cagey for someone trying to bribe me.”

“I’m not bribing you,” Ulric lied. “You just need to trust me.”

Auren’s expression changed. It lost its usual biting edge and settled into curiosity. Almost trust.

Trust. That was dangerous.

Ulric rose and made his way to the cave’s entrance before he could say something foolish. “No glaring tomorrow,” he said over his shoulder. “Play nice and I’ll make it worth your while.”

He was so hurried to get out of there, to get out of that stifling proximity, that he almost missed the quiet response.

“I look forward to it.”

They left at dusk.

The water shimmered with fading light, orange streaks filtering through the surface like the sea itself had caught fire. The warmth of it kissed their skin as they swam, turning scales and tattoos to molten reflections. Auren stayed close, quieter than usual, though the tension in his shoulders betrayed his anticipation.

Ulric led them beyond the kelp forests and through a shallow underpass, where columns of coral bent with the current like swaying reeds. The route narrowed, then opened again into a wide clearing over the reef’s edge.

And there it was.

The Abyssal Bloom.

Not the cold, starlit kind they’d seen before—this was its opposite.

A crack in the sea floor split, and through it, warm mineral waters from deep vents surged upward in long, spiraling plumes. Caught in the currents were ribbons of sun-reactive plankton, only active for the brief window of time when the light hit just right.

Now, in the magic hour of sunset, they glowed—not with blues or greens, but oranges and ambers. The water blushed with warmth, as though they were swimming through sunlight made liquid.

Ulric glanced over.

Auren’s eyes were wide with awe, every sharp edge of him softened by the light. His red hair burned brighter than ever, suspended in the warm currents, his skin kissed in gold.

Ulric swallowed hard. “I thought you might like it,” he said quietly.

Auren only nodded, drifting further into the bloom where rays of sunlight turned his hair to flame and fins to glass.

He looked like a god.

Conjured from salt and sunlight.

Ulric watched from a distance, trapped in a tempest of thought.

Why did Auren look so right here?

Why did this beautiful creature—this infuriating, brilliant, untamable man—look like he belonged in the sunlight?

Why couldn’t he bring that radiance downward?