Level_5

[Skybreaker] Envieux [Level_5]

Me, neither. We seem to be doing quite alright. (:

[Skybreaker] Envieux [Level_5]

By the time Asbel had hauled them both to the relative safety of the muddy bank, he no longer had the energy to care about what was going on. For whatever reason, Frey had nearly killed himself, screaming the whole time, the sound scratching the surface of his mind and embedding itself there forever. For whatever reason, the prince was weeping against his shoulder, and Asbel let him, too exhausted and confused to push him away. The prince's eyes, when open, were sane -- thank goodness -- if terrified, but at least Frey had been found in more ways than one, and might be brought back to the camp in one piece. Never mind that, for the second time in as many days, there wasn't a shred of mischief or hatred in the young prince's expression. For the second time in as many days, Frey was looking at him with an expression that couldn't be deciphered.

The streak of lightning jolted the phoenix back into himself, and snapped his eyes away from a wary appraisal of Frey's person. His heart slammed into his throat, and with a whisper of surprise, he scrambled away from the lip of the pond as electricity crackled across its surface. They had nearly been killed. And if Asbel hadn't come, Frey would be dead -- either drowned or electrocuted. They might die still, out here in the cold and the damp.

Frey's arms around him, then, were a strange, welcome shelter from the bite of the rain and from the growling hatred of the thunder overhead. Frey was soaking wet and bleeding, and the front of his nightshirt was streaked with blood, but there was a stillness in the prince -- a welcome quiet after the wild panic of before. And while Frey had always represented danger and near-death (and did so still, it would seem), the arms around him seemed protective, not antagonistic, and Asbel settled cautiously into the embrace. Wariness took more than one touch to break, but for now, so tired and cold and wet, someone's closeness was a warmth much needed.

Thank you.

Asbel glanced up, surprised and suspicious, but the words ached with sincerity, and the phoenix nodded once in understanding. Anyone should have done the same, and he'd had no thought but to help, as anyone would have done, but if Frey was grateful, Asbel would not shut him down as he had before.

"What will you tell your brother?" he asked softly, as the crashing of Augustine and Cassius drew nearer, and as Augustine's voice called again for his lost little brother. But Cassius seemed to know where to go, and they had only a few minutes left before they would be found and rescued.

[Skybreaker] Envieux [Level_5]

Ha ha, likewise. I think that might be the largest time gap I've had in recent roleplays.

[Skybreaker] Envieux [Level_5]

You're welcome! And I am in the central time zone.

[Skybreaker] Envieux [Level_5]

Ah, well, congratulations! :D

[Skybreaker] Envieux [Level_5]

As Frey pulled away from him in the tent, Asbel sat up and turned to face him -- just in time to see the young prince cough up a mouthful of blood into his cupped hands. Disgust turned his stomach, and Asbel recoiled with a wordless exclamation of horror. What was this? No nightmare would do that!

"What are you--" The phoenix began, but his concern was cut short as the prince dashed from the tent, and Asbel followed before he realized he'd moved, forgetting proper clothes or protection from the rain in his haste to follow. Nightmares he understood all too well. He'd had them, too, of course: dreams that threw him into the frigid darkness of the abyss between one incarnation and the next -- that dead-black emptiness all that he ever remembered of his lives before. But whatever happened to Frey was not just a bad dream: Asbel had seen the blind panic in the prince's eyes. Something had hurt him.

The rain beyond the protective shell of the tent struck Asbel like pellets of ice, but through the gloom the phoenix managed to see the prince only a few steps away. He started to call out, to call the prince back inside, but Frey began to scream that chilled him in a way that the rain could not, and then there was no shadow of the young men in sight, only the thrash of torn branches and sodden grass as the prince fled.

Asbel threw himself after him, following the sounds of the half-conscious prince even as shouts rose from the other tent: a confused and alarmed Augustine calling his brother's name. But Asbel couldn't speak, so focused did he have to stay on following Frey through the near-blackness of the forest, and he was not so mercifully spared the myriad attacks on his body: he stumbled through the woods, clothes cut, face and bare chest and bare ankles bleeding from scratching branches, hair caught and pulled with every other step, bare feet frozen and cut by underbrush so like blades and so different from the soft carpets of home.

Another cry disrupted the crashing ahead, and the phoenix nearly tumbled down the same hill, so close was he at last on Frey's heels. He scrambled down the steep, soaked hill and -- without no thought but one -- waded into the rain-gorged stream into which the prince had fallen. Trembling with the cold and the pain of a thousand stinging cuts and with the effort of finding his breath and with the effort of finding Frey, Asbel slid his arms around Frey's chest, hooked beneath the young man's arms, and slipped on the stream bed in his efforts to haul his delirious companion back to less dangerous ground. He could hear, faraway, the clamor of Augustine and Cassius coming in search of them.

His glow was weak, hardly there at all after the onslaught of the rain, and he was panting so hard he nearly couldn't speak, though he tried all the same. "Your Highness -- get up, please get up."

[Skybreaker] Envieux [Level_5]

No worries! Take all the time you need. I'm wrapping up with the semester, so my replies will probably be annoyingly prompt.

[Skybreaker] Envieux [Level_5]

Ha, I think everyone in the world has that game now, not just Japan.

Also, I keep meaning to ask: What timezone are you in?

[Skybreaker] Envieux [Level_5]

The most difficult part of falling asleep beside a strange, Asbel decided, was dealing with the invasive presence of their very breath. The phoenix, alone at night since shortly after hatching, had kept company in the evenings with summer breezes and the occasional fall of rain. The rustling breath of another person beside him was almost too loud, too unfamiliar to fall asleep to.

Exhaustion had stolen him into sleep long enough, but Frey's midnight panic woke Asbel in an instant, and the phoenix froze, dizzy with a similar alarm. Were they in danger? He lay stiff and silent in the near-darkness, lit again, but with his back to Frey, Asbel could not (and would not turn to) see what harried the prince. A nightmare -- that was all. If the brat had a bad dream tonight, so be it: after his attitude, the young man deserved nothing else.

Asbel closed his eyes to force himself to sleep again when arms coiled around his waist -- and every nerve in his body lanced alarm through his body. He did not flare, did not burn, but did not dare to breathe, either. Frey was still asleep, apparently, and what was presumably his face was pressed against Asbel's bare shoulder and left dampness there: tears in the dark.

"Your Highness," he whispered, half-hoping Frey would wake up, half-hoping he would stay asleep. The phoenix squirmed, trying to dislodge the arms around his waist and steady his own racing pulse. "Your Highness, let go. You are in no danger."

[Skybreaker] Envieux [Level_5]

Soon. ;---; Soon.