Page 48 of Elixir of Strife
“Not yet, little one. This isn’t where your story ends. Plenty of water, fit for a sea dragon. But too much, perhaps, for a tiny human.”
The world roiled and raged around me, the water whirling ever harder. Hard enough to separate me and Divina, the current pulling her screaming and sputtering away from me. And then it began, the sharp stinging of my skin, as if a million tiny needles were forcing their way into my body all at once.
I looked down at myself in horror and screamed. The water — all of it — was flowing toward me, as if a sudden depression had appeared in the exact space that my body occupied. I was taking it in through my skin. In order to drain this place and save the others — to save Max — I needed to swallow the sea.
“And so we drink,bruho. Both you and I. We drink deeply to preserve life, undeserved as it may be.”
Tears fell streaming from my cheeks. I wailed as I willed more of them to fall, to counter the horrifying quantity of water forcing its way through my skin. Where was it all going? How long until I burst at the seams? Would the agony ever stop?
And then it did. No more pain, no more wetness. Only the welcome, tranquil silence of a dead ocean.
I stared through my trembling lashes as I tried to focus on the faded, ghoulish stars of this strange, endless sky. I was so light, floating on my back. But how? All the water was gone. My head lolled to the side, falling onto the strong, sturdy cushion that was Max’s shoulder.
He was carrying me. Somehow, even horizontal, with my body full of water and my brain soaked like a sponge, I managed to swoon.
“My hero,” I muttered.
He smiled, leaned in, kissed me on the corner of my mouth.
Divina sat on the ground with her legs splayed, coughing up water. Daniel whimpered as he shakily descended the beanstalk. Flora climbed down opposite him, slapping at his fingers, antagonizing him the whole way down.
And Edel was taking a shortcut, holding something in one hand to slow her fall, floating languidly like a witchier Mary Poppins. It was a giant red flower, her own version of a magical umbrella.
“Everyone’s fine,” Max said. “Mostly. But no sign of the Quartz Spider.”
I groaned, clutching my stomach. “Man, fuck the Quartz Spider. Fuck him and the ugly horse he rode in on.”
Max chuckled. My insides were still raw. It was insane. I couldn’t have possibly absorbed all that water into my body, and yet it was exactly what had happened.
Bakunawa spoke again, his voice reverberating in my skull. “I am full,bruho. My belly is heavy with the ocean. I must slumber.”
“Thank you,” I told Bakunawa, both him and Max, all at once. “I owe you one.”
A flare of brilliant color lit up in my mind’s eye. Bakunawa chuckled. “I shall remember that.”
Maybe I shouldn’t have said that.
“And now,” the dragon rumbled. “Sleep.”
It was as much a declaration of what he intended to do as it was a subtle suggestion made to my body. My eyes felt heavy, my muscles gone limp. Maybe this was the dragon’s way of assimilating all the water and still insuring that the host — that I didn’t die.
My eyelids fell shut. As I drifted into soft, silent sleep, I noticed something strange.
Despite almost drowning in the torrent, my clothes were perfectly dry.
20
MAX
Leon stared at the ceiling as he whimpered, laid out on one of Silk’s buttery black leather sofas. Very popular on busy nights, the preferred lounging spots for the bar’s patrons. But after the events with the Quartz Spider, the place had understandably cleared out.
His hand settled above his belly, rubbing in little circles as his eyes flitted toward me, then away again. Interesting observation: each time he noticed I was looking at him directly, the mewling got a little louder. Very interesting indeed.
“Max,” he croaked. “I think I’m dying.”
I grimaced as I swished my drink in a little circle — rum on the rocks, because what a night it had been.
“You’re not dying. If you were really dying, you would know. And I would know, too.”
