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“So this is my fault?”
I immediately feel the pang of ingratitude, but he doesn't understand. “You didn’t save me by untying me,” I say. “You just angered Hyrrm. He will claim me in the end.”
“You think a mountain is going to claim you.”
“I don’t think that. I believe it.”
“Then you are a very soft brained little meat machine.”
I draw in a sobbing breath and push the chalice of water away. The clarity of dying has been replaced by the confusion of living. I only know one thing about myself: that I was born for Hyrrm. If that is not true, then nothing is true.
Curling up on myself, I close my eyes and wait for the end to claim me.
“What are you doing, human?” His voice is rough, judgmental, as cutting as the sharp blades which cover his unnatural form.
“Dying.”
“You’re not going to die,” he rumbles above me. I feel his big hands on me, so much larger than any human male’s hands, and with so much more power behind them. He lifts me up and tries to unfold me, but I resist.
“Stop hiding, human,” he growls.
“My name is Tres. I’m not hiding. I’m dying. Like I am supposed to.”
A harsh bark of laughter surprises me. “I have not been on this planet long, Tres, but I already know there are few, if any humans at all with your life force. You are not dying. Not for a very long time.”
I turn my head and look at him through the messy red curtain of my hair. “Why? Why do you care if I live or if I die?”
“I mated you,” he says. “You are mine. And I do not allow what is mine to die.”
“You allowed what was yours to be tied up and left to starve.”
He shifts uncomfortably, an action which I find almost eerily human. “I didn’t know they were going to do that do you.”
“Who are you? What are you?” I repeat the question, my confusion growing. I know there are many things on this land I am yet to see. There are spirits and monsters and all manner of living things which remain hidden to human eyes, but this massive beast does not seem comfortable here. He seems… alien.
Again, he does not answer me. He doesn’t want to talk about himself, but he has to explain what is happening, why he took an interest in me. Why he had to ruin my death.
“You said I am yours. Who are you? Who do I belong to?”
“I can’t tell you that.”
“What?”
“Let us not speak. Words complicate things. Drink, human. You will live.”
I purse my lips and curl back into the ball from which I came, wishing I had never been born. My whole life I have only had the end to look forward to, and now this monster has taken that end from me too. I will not drink. I will not eat. I will not survive. I try holding my breath, but all that achieves is making me lightheaded.
Devastated, afraid, cold, and almost alone, I lie on the cave floor and wonder why I had to be cursed with so much sin. My birth was blasphemy, my life was forfeit and now my death is delayed. I could not feel more pity for myself if I tried. My spirit is shattered. Hyrrm would not want me, even if the monster had not claimed me first. I am worthless and broken.
“Stop hiding.”
His voice carries rough command with little sympathy.
I look at him and see those burning eyes searing into me.
“You will LIVE, little human,” he snarls. “You will survive this, and a thousand other terrible things, and your existence will be a triumph.”
“I’m dirt,” I whimper. “Let me go back to ground. Let my bones join back with the world.”
“I will not,” he says, tilting his head forward and looking down at me with an imperious, proud gaze. “You are mine. And you will live.”
I almost believe him. Then I feel the internal tremor of my heart, and I know that he does not understand me, or what I am. He does not know the weakness of my female body, the pointlessness of it. He does not understand that I was made to be used, as all women are, and that the only use I had is now gone.
Tears spring to my eyes. I’m now able to cry thanks to the water he made me drink. I thought I had already cried my last tears when they tied me down, but it seems there are always more tears in life, even when it seems to be over.
“Do not cry,” he growls. “You’re wasting water.”
“I’ll stop crying if you tell me what you are.”
He makes a snarling sound under his breath, but does not fall for my ruse.
When we sang together, I felt connected to him. But now we are close, touching, him tending me with more care than anyone has ever shown me before, and he will not say more than a few words to me.
