She was looking up at him while he was leaning around her on his hand on the other side of her, just propping himself up enough to give her space. He almost wanted to lie back down so she couldn’t escape.

“The Demons have been scratching at the walls and trying to get inside,” she told him. He noticed she looked pale, had dark smudges under her eyes, and her usually glossy hair was a nest of knots. “They could smell me. I-I thought it would help if I lay under you to hide my scent, like how you did when you brought me here under your cloak.” Then her eyes flickered around the room, almost as if she couldn’t look at him, as she said, “And I felt safer next to you.”

She feels safe with me? Her words brought to light the tapping he could hear on his window. The drapes that were usually left open, were closed, and he knew she must have shut them so she didn’t have to look at the Demons crawling around the outside of the house.

He could hear and smell many, but they were scattered rather than bearing down around his room. She had been right. She’d hidden the worst of her scent by using his body to shield her.

“How did I get here?” The last thing he remembered was collapsing on the other side of the salt circle.

“I brought you here.” She let go of the sword and turned to him more. “And you are so fucking heavy, by the way. It took me forever.”

Orpheus chuckled, knowing she was absolutely right. She was a little human woman. She must have dragged him across the ground since he doubted she’d been able to carry him. The fact she had at all was amazing.

His earlier chaotic emotions and mind were calm after having been asleep for so long, but it didn’t stop his disappointment that she’d run. He’d lost his flare of hope.

However, her lying next to him, against him, saying she felt safe with him, brought joy and relief.

“Are you okay?” she asked while reaching forward to touch his chest.

Orpheus’ eyes blackened when he felt her ruffling the fur over the top part of his chest. The sensation of the feather light touches from her fingertips caressing the protruding bones of his ribcage sent a vibration of pleasure through him.

His vision snapped back open to white. He looked down, seeing she was touching his body directly and backed up and away from her.

“My clothing?” He looked further down to see he still had his trousers on, but he hadn’t been in the presence of a human without shielding his body for eons. It disturbed and horrified them to know what he looked like.

Her hand slapped against her chest when she retreated it.

“You were hurt. I bandaged you and washed the blood I could from you.”

He touched his chest where he could see the wrapping strips of cloth before his hand slipped down his torso where the rest of them were.

She’d seen my body. And she had still chosen to lie beside him and regarded him as safe. He also couldn’t smell fear from her, even now when she slipped her gaze over it.

She wasn’t scuttling to get away. She didn’t even look bothered. She just continued to lie there under the furs.

His head tilted when he saw the exposed ridge on top of her shoulder, her gown and the furs low enough to reveal it.

It looked as though she had bandages over her own body.

He reached forward, moving the furs and the gown more to see she did. A light growl vibrated in his chest.

“You’re hurt.” His vision flared red as the fire of anger clutched his gut. “I should have made the Arachnid of Sorrows’ death more painful.”

She’d always left his territory alone because he never entered hers. It was one of the many silent truces he had with the more intelligent Demons that surrounded his home.

They never entered his lands, even if they could smell he had a human.

Reia covered her shoulder with her hand.

“I-I didn’t get this from the spider one.”

“A different Demon hurt you?” More rage bubbled, a desire to maim and hurt those that had dared touch what was his.

His fins, usually helped to stay down by his clothing, extended when they hardened, no longer being loose flaps.

His fur raised to puff out, no doubt making him look larger and more feral.

“I got it trying to protect you,” she grumbled, averting her gaze, most likely from his obvious seething as it shook him.

Everything flopped suddenly.

“Protect me?” His sight moved to the sword behind her, seeing the blade had the remnants of dried Demon blood on it.

“I broke the salt circle when I dragged you inside it and two of them followed.”

“I told you to get inside!”

“I-I couldn’t just leave you out there,” she stuttered, her face contorting into a deep frown. “They were going to eat you! I couldn’t just let you to die.”

He was about to push more thoughts from his mind to berate her, to tell her of the dangers she’d brought to herself, but they never finished forming into a projected voice. Realisation dawned.

She didn’t want me to die. She risked her life to save me.

Him! A Duskwalker. Other offerings had tried to kill him, and

yet Reia had gone out of her way, allowed herself to be hurt, to save him.

He huffed, unable to quell the tenderness that radiated in his chest and around his heart. Does she care for me?

Could it be possible?

He ripped back the fur lying over her and sniffed her shoulder to find the light metallic scent of her wound. Then he sniffed around her body, forcing her to let him as he tried to search for anymore. He growled when he reached her ankle, finding the smell there as well as a bandage.

“Never again,” he growled at her. “Your life is precious. It is dangerous out there.”

“I know,” she said softly, turning her gaze once more as he crawled to be above her. “And I’m sorry. I-I won’t leave again, I promise.” All her fight disappeared at her words, all her strength as she fell limply onto the bed. “I’m really tired.

I was worried they’d come inside and attack us.”

The darkness under her eyes seemed to deepen.

“You haven’t slept.”

She shook her head.

She said I’d been asleep for two days.

He knew he’d been filled with sleeping venom until his body healed, and then he’d probably been stuck in a sleeping state past that in a haze. He’d only been stung by the arachnid once before, and he hadn’t woken instantaneously then either, like his mind had wanted to stay asleep even though the venom had vanished.