Draygon Inferno | Book 2 | ✔️

Chapter Five

           Elias opened his eyes. Water lapped against his skin, his hair floated outward like vines moving with every ripple. He lifted one hand to see the webs between his fingers diluting the light behind them, shining in a dull gray-green of his flesh. A fin extended from his wrist to his elbow, matching the same translucency of the webbing. Elias lifted his legs, but they were no longer his legs. Outside of when he showed Wren, it had been years since he last allowed his tail to replace his feet, giving into his full Aquantian magic, and there it was in all its glory. Water slid along his scales, dripping back into the pool.

"Oh thank the Goddess you're awake!" Ross' voice echoed.

"What happened?" Elias flipped on his side, swimming to the edge of the small pool where Ross sat with his feet dipped into the water.

"You passed out, Dawlin'." He hooked an arm under Elias' armpit, helping Elias onto the edge of the pool. "I swear you were turning to green salt before my very eyes!"

"Apologies for worrying you. I failed to truly account for the Ardornian sun and how the sands can amplify the heat." Elias shook his head. "I was foolish."

Ross laughed, brushing a hand through the soaked tangles of Elias' silver hair. His fingers grazed Elias' cheek. "You are a strange one, apologizing to me when you were the one drying to death."

The Aquantian sighed and turned his head away, pulling back from the humans contact. There were times when he wished the simple kindness of a touch meant as much to him as it did his human companion, or even as much as it did to Siobhan even though she tried to hide it. He saw how a single touch could bring a smile to a person's face, yet for him it meant nothing.

Elias examined their surroundings. Two red posts rose from the hard rock edge of the pool, rising to support the circular lattice of the roof. Red and green and yellow woven rugs concealed the lattice forming the spherical room. Several thin mattresses sat on sheets of carpet covering the sand, spreading around the wide portable building.

He lifted his tail fin out of the water, turning his body to the side. Both hands brushed water off the shimmering green scales. His entire body tingled with the friction created by the motion. Until he fully dried, his body wouldn't return to the more humanoid appearance. He at least wanted his legs back which meant getting as much water off his tailfin as possible. The tingling spread into his tailfin, strengthening as it stretched to the feathery fluke. As his thigh muscles pulled his legs apart, the scales broke free in sticky tendrils, dropping harmlessly to the ground.

"Where are we?" Elias looked to Ross who had a look of both wonderment and disgust on his face. Often he wondered what the shedding of tailfin scales must look like to a human who'd never seen it before. To him it was normal, like a snake shedding its scales but in a gooey substance. For others it must've looked like flesh melting off his body.

Ross shook his head so subtly that Elias wasn't sure he caught it at first. "Dammed if I know." He pulled his feet from the water and stood up, walking toward a blanket hanging down from a post. One hand pushed a section aside. "After you passed out these weird Ardornians descended like they were waiting for us. They had a wet blanket to wrap you in and got you to a box filled with water."

"Weird Ardornians?"

Ross glanced back to them. "I've never seen someone so pale before. Their hair, their skin, everything is like snow, yet they look Ardorn born. And they didn't speak a word! Not a single word. Kept motioning with their hands as if I was supposed to understand them."

"Ah. They must be The Silent." When Elias' legs returned to normal, he stood up and found his robe sitting folded by a mattress and his satchel. He carefully slid his arm fins through the sleeves, they'd vanish once the last shred of water dried. "They're Ardornians who were born without pigment to their skin or hair. They've taken a vow of silence to the Caracal head of the Ardornian three-headed God. Their history is fascinating to read about. They speak with their hands and in the past their tongues were cut out as penance for being born with pale skin. And—"