Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
It had taken him a day to memorize the layout of the cave system Denara had called home. The days bled in and out of him like spoiled wine; he couldn't figure out what hour it was, didn't know how many days he had spent here. When he asked Denara about it, she shrugged and told him that she had no idea how time passed. She didn't even know what year it was.
He spent his days slaving away in Denara's garden which was full of plants that he could only dream of seeing. Some were even declared extinct yet here they were. There was one time when he looked at the gaping mouth of the cave from there and saw how vehement the waters roared and splashed against the rocks. It had taken all his will to look away and stop thinking about that one thing he had been avoiding.
He spent lunchtimes with Denara in the kitchen, in the cavern adjacent to the gardens. Rather convenient, really. Perhaps he would adopt this arrangement if he ever owned a house.
When it's bandage-changing time, Denara would snap at him to get ready in the cavern beside the kitchen, where his rock waited for him. He had come to love that rock, no matter how hard and cold it goes when the wrong breeze blows through the cave.
The only other part of the system he hadn't dared asking Denara about was the one beyond his cavern. He had spent the past days trying to get her to talk about it but the girl was just like his rock. They both wouldn't budge.
Denara was an expert in starting conversations but would never quite finish them when it gets too personal. Nyxis kind of understood that defense. Here was a stranger who dropped from the sky, snapped at her, the moment he woke up and was now asking information about her. It's only natural that she would feel threatened.
At random times throughout the day, he would hear Denara sing, her soft voice floating past curtains and reaching him. It always reached him. He was so focused on the timbre of her voice that it had taken him a while to realize that Denara wasn't singing in any language familiar to him. He spoke Ylanela and she had been kind enough to honor that by speaking it to him. He heard of Keijula in his slowly-returning memories. He was pretty sure he was with someone who constantly switches between Ylanenla and Keijula when agitated.
But Denara's songs...they were in another language entirely.
It wasn't the Ancient language either, he had concluded one day as he was harvesting okline. Denara's voice was once again tempting him to stop working and just bawl at the divinity of her voice. The words did not sound like the normal Ancient words he'd use in Escuira spells. They were...too weird for it.
So what language was that? He shouldn't even be thinking about that.
Now, as they were eating yet another stewed fish meat, he worked up the courage to ask her something—anything. He shoveled a spoonful of soup into his mouth. "So," he started. "Why are you singing often?"
Denara froze, her hands hovering by the ladle stuck in the cauldron. "Because I like it," she answered without looking at him. "Why? Does it bother you?"
