Page 16 of Song of the Abyss

She could hear him.

Holy shit, she could hear him.

Reeling from the sound of his deep, echoing voice that was so gravely it sounded like the burble of water passing by the glass, she blinked as he moved away from her. He sank a little deeper into the water, his eyes on her a little too sharp.

But she could fucking hear him.

Not a mess of overlapping sound or the knowledge that someone was speaking, but not having the faintest idea of what they were saying. His voice was so deep, she could only compare it to the sound of water underneath ice. A boom of sound that she’d so rarely heard since her accident. Loud, echoing, and so incredibly deep.

It was stupid. It was risky. It was taking her own life in her hands and thrusting it at this monster who had just showed up in her pool one day. But she suddenly launched herself into the pool.

Anya wasn’t even sure what was going through her head, other than the thought that she had heard him speak. That she could hear the tones of his voice and it had been such a long time since she’d heard the clipped movement of words. They’d been muffled for so long and she had resigned herself to never being able to understand what someone was saying, so her mind just sort of... fractured.

She’d met with the doctors. She’d met with other people like her, but so few of them were injured after they had fourteen years of hearing. Most of the people she knew were born deaf. She wasn’t born like this, and she wasn’t entirely deaf. She existed in a world between two peoples and...

Oh, she had missed hearing someone talk.

The water struck her a little too hard. Maybe she’d belly flopped, but then suddenly there was a massive hand around her waist again. The same way he had pushed her up and out of the water the last time.

Webbed fingers held onto her suddenly clinging clothing, the claws scraping against the lace of her shawl. And none of it mattered.

She braced herself against his chest, her hands on either sides of those blocky pectoral muscles where she could feel two hearts beating just slightly out of rhythm with the other. He stared down at her with wide eyes. Maybe she’d shocked him. She had no idea. All she could focus on right now was the feeling of that massive hand spanning her waist, his fingers just slightly moving against her back. And it was... nice.

Not as scary as she had thought it would be, at least.

Licking her lips, she told herself not to do it again as she noticed his gaze followed that movement. “I can hear you speak,” she whispered. “I... Just do it again. Please?”

He frowned down at her. Maybe that should have been intimidating, but the gills around his neck flared suddenly and all she could think was that they were pretty.

“Say something,” she whispered, her words a little close to begging. “Please.”

He said one word, the guttural tones breaking through the injuries in her ears and she could hear what he had to say. It was loud, probably louder than was safe for her to be around. He might even be injuring her further, but oh... Oh, the sound of a word.

“More than one.” Anya’s eyes fluttered shut, luxuriating in this moment.

He said two words.

She peeled one of her eyes open, frowning at him in disapproval this time. The undine was toying with her. He was...

Responding to every single word she said, like he understood what she was saying.

Anya froze, and suddenly all of this came into very clear focus. She was in the middle of her pool with her arms hooked over his neck. Her legs dangled in the water from where he held her up, but that massive and muscular tail brushed between her legs every time he flexed his muscles to keep them upright. His arm was around her waist, his massive hand wrapped around her back, but his fingers were eerily close to her breast. She was close enough to his mouth to kiss him.

And the undine understood what she was saying.

7

Daios

Daios liked the sound of her voice. It was a little rough, a little raspy, slightly off key—just like her singing—but it was pretty. Prettier than he’d expected. He must have heard her talking in their first encounter, but he couldn’t for the life of him remember it.

Maybe that was because he wanted to remember this as their first meeting forever. With her pressed against his chest and all that long, lean body at his mercy. He’d swallowed hard the moment she’d leapt into the water. Her awkward limbs flailed, and he was reminded again of her swimming.

She was a terrible swimmer. She used her arms far too much, and there wasn’t enough movement in her twin tails.

Legs, he reminded himself. Mira called them legs.

Either way, she wasn’t very good at swimming. She was so slow, so weak, and now she splatted into the water like an overdramatic whale rather than the graceful dive of his people. He’d be afraid she couldn’t swim at all if he hadn’t already seen her survive the water, even if that was only for a few moments. Still, some part of him needed to hold on to her and so he... did. He grabbed her by that tiny waist and banished the thoughts inside him, screaming for bloodshed and violence.

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