I try to move. To sit up.
The star on my chest explodes. It is a fresh agony, a tearing, burning white.
I roar. The sound is a wet, choked thing, trapped in my throat.
"Shhh. Shhh. It's all right. You're safe."
The voice. It is not a thought. It is not a smell. It is a sound.
And it is... cool water.
It washes over the red haze. It soothes the burning. The Urog in me hisses, like water on hot coals, and retreats.
She is here. The small female.
She leans over me. Her sky-eyes are wide in the firelight. She is so close. Her snow-skin is flushed from the heat. I can smell the life of her, the blood pumping beneath that fragile skin.
She holds a wet, steaming cloth.
She dabs at my wound.
I roar again, a true sound this time, shaking the small den. My muscles tense. My clawed hand—my killing hand—snaps up. KILL.
The magic surges. Kill the thing that hurts!
"I'm not hurting you." Her voice. Cool water. "I'm helping. It's… it's infected."
She does not flinch. She does not scream. She does not look at the black claws hovering inches from her throat.
She just looks into my eyes.
Her gaze is steady. Her sky-eyes are not empty now. They are… stubborn. She dabs the hot, wet cloth against my wound again.
It stings. A sharp, clean fire. But the deep, rotting itch of the infection... it eases. The red haze churns, confused. Hurt. Help. Hurt. Help. The Urog magic has no word for this.
I lower my hand. Slowly.
I watch her.
She dips the cloth in a bowl of steaming water. Her movements are small, quiet, sure.
This creature. This small, soft, foolish thing.
She is not a threat. She is...mine.
It’s not a thought. It is an instinct. It rises from a place deeper than the red haze. A place the Dark Elves did not burn.
She is mine.
She dabs the cloth again, her brow furrowed in concentration.
The red haze surges, angry at the new thought.
I watch her fragile, snow-skin throat, the pulse beating there.
This human is mine.
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