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I struggled to push myself up, coughing as air refused to fill my lungs. The settling dust burned my eyes and made breathing laborious.
"Samriel?" My voice was choked and far away past the ringing in my ears.
"K-kin…"
I moved toward his weak voice, crawling a short distance through rubble and blood. After a few blind swipes, I smacked Samriel in the head.
"Thanks…"
"Sorry. How badly are you hurt?" There was a grimness to his single laugh that worried me.
"Bad."
The dust settled around us and revealed how grim Samriel's condition was. His legs were crushed beneath a rock and his wings were pinned in the rocks above us. His blood covered the cracked stone floor, the dust mixing with it to create a gritty sludge. I put my hand over my mouth when I gasped but quickly removed it when I realized it was covered in his blood.
He laughed weakly but it quickly devolved into sharp, wet coughs.
"Stop laughing. You're making yourself worse." I looked around our tomb for any sign of an escape route. I attempted to keep my panic down when I realized we were trapped in a crevasse not even large enough for me to stand in. I looked down when Samriel's hand took hold of mine, surprised by his smile. "How can you smile?"
"Stubbornness."
I shook my head. "You're a strange creature, Samriel." I looked up at the unstable rocks again and realized the only thing giving them structure was Samriel's shattered wings. "How long can you hold those?"
"Few minutes."
I sighed heavily and curled my knees to my chest. I gave up on keeping my tears hidden, quietly sobbing. Samriel's hold on my hand was the only comfort I had as I waited for our inevitable end.
I heard his bones and the rocks begin to crack, blood dripping on me. I found myself praying to anyone deity that would listen.
Desperate times.
As the rocks came tumbling down, the ground beneath us cracked open and sent us careening into darkness. Samriel pulled me against him and positioned himself so that when we did land he would take the brunt.
It felt as though we were falling for longer than possible. We slammed into the ground with a sickeningly wet crunch. The air was forced from my lungs and blood flew from the Demon's lips.
"You took quite a fall."
Panic outweighed my pain when I heard a voice I had only experienced in my nightmares. I looked up at Cres as the barefoot deity approached. He was different than my dreams. He looked tired, beaten down. The lines of Corruption were more like an odd kind of bruising.
"Good thing your friend softened your landing. Not sure how well he's going to fare." He focused his black and chartreuse eyes on me, staring into my very spirit. “Tell me, how is it that you have found yourself at my feet?”
I stood on shaky legs, glancing down at Samriel. He was still taking shallow breaths but he stared blankly at the distant point of light we had fallen from. “We were on our way to find someone to teach me about Magic. There was a cave in when we were attacked by another Demon. Where are we?” I looked around but there was only darkness around us. The only light streamed in from the hole above us.
He stalked around the edge of the patch of light. “This is my prison. My eternal solitary confinement. I was told I would never be found. Yet, here you are.”
In an instant, he was standing mere inches from me. He placed a hand on my shoulder, his touch like the static right before a lightning strike. When he took a step back, a black scorpion had been burned into my flesh.
“As I thought. You are one of mine.”
I held my shoulder and glared at him. “My people don’t follow you anymore.”
He smirked at me. “That hardly matters. That Spark inside of you is a splinter of my Power and connects us forever. I imagine it has been very difficult to control all that Magic without a guide. I can help. If you get me out of here.”
I shook my head. “I can’t do that.” I frowned when Samriel's breaths became staggered gasps.
“I can save him. All you have to do is help me escape.”
Samriel’s eyes drifted in my direction and tears began forming in mine. I could see his light fading.
“Do we have a deal? His life for my freedom? I’ll even throw some Magic lessons your way. Free of charge.”
I closed my eyes and sighed. “We have a deal.” When I laid my bloody hand on the scorpion burn, it was as though fire had engulfed my entire body and I fell to my knees with an agonized cry. Samriel's body convulsed as his body pieced itself together. His bones crunched and his limbs bent at disturbing angles before everything settled back into place.
“That’s better.” It was unnerving to hear Cres’ voice come from Samriel. He stretched out Samriel’s wings so the membranes could knit themselves back together. He offered me a clawed hand. "We should go before anyone notices my absence.” He pulled me up and kicked off the ground. We whizzed through the crevasse above, the wind burning my face.
Once we had reached the surface, Cres set me down and turned toward the rising sun. He closed his eyes, a light breeze rustling Samriel’s hair. He looked down at me and I was unnerved by Cres’ sickly green and black eyes staring at me from my companion’s face. It was only minorly better when he put Samriel's disguise into place. "We should keep moving. We are still too close to my prison for comfort."
"When he’s better, you'll give Samriel's body back, right?"
His grin was maniacal. "When he’s better."
What have I done?