“Thank you,” she mumbled.
“You're welcome. It's the least I could do, given the circumstances. Besides, when you're feeling better I'll be sure to remind you of the time I helped you pee in the woods as frequently as I can.”
“You dick.” She scowled playfully at him.
“Sit there a moment,” he instructed and Lori obediently dropped her bottom back onto the snow, taking care to avoid the yellowed patch.
Lephas untied the water skin from his pack and handed it to her. It was full, clearly replenished at some point whilst she had been unconscious. She drank greedily, unaware of how thirsty she had been untilwater hit her lips.
When she finally came up for air, she handed the container back. The demon took a quick swig out of it himself before strapping it back to his pack
Without another word, Lephas shook the blanket loose. He wrapped it around her shoulders and swept her gently back up into his arms.
The demon strode on and Lori was amazed at how much easier he was moving. They made good time with him trudging expertly ahead through the snow. Power and strength rippled through his muscles beneath her.
“Is your rib healed too?” she asked curiously.
“Everything is healed,” he replied. “Even injuries I had from before I met you. I used to get this shooting pain in my ankle sometimes in the cold weather from where I broke it as a kid and that's completely gone too.”
“You're like a new man,” Lori teased.
“You joke, but I genuinely feel like I am. I feel incredible.” He laughed.
“I'm glad. I wish I could say the same thing about myself.”
“You're recovering slowly. It's taken a lot out of you and you were pretty exhausted to begin with. I'm happy to see you a little livelier today, but take it easy.”
Lori nodded, her eyelids growing heavy. She restedher face against Lephas's wide chest and curled into him.
For a while, she lay still, just listening to the demon's heavy footfalls crunching through the snow and his deep, even breaths as he fought onwards. She had so many questions and so many things she wanted to talk through with him, yet weariness plagued her.
Sleep took hold with little warning and Lori nodded off for a short time. When she next opened her eyes, the forest around them had changed significantly.
Maybe it was the bright afternoon sun that sparkled off the snow, but the faerie swore this part of the forest seemed slightly warmer. There was certainly less snow on the ground, patches of dark earth broke up the vast expanses of white.
“Where are we?” Lori asked, her voice croaky from sleep.
“Oh, you're awake again. Just in time too. I've got a surprise for you.” Lephas smiled at her.
The faerie eyed him warily, causing him to laugh softly.
“Don't look at me like that, it's a nice surprise. I promise.”
“Since when have we found anything nice out here in this fucking hell hole?” she grumbled and adjusted herself in his arms to get a better look around.
“Well, thisisgoing to be nice.” Lephas assured her.
The climate was unusual here, the air almost felt damp and heavy. The demon gripped her tight as he skilfully climbed up a slight rocky incline.
“I don’t know whether you had noticed before, but we’ve been tracking alongside that cliff we threw ourselves from,” he explained breathlessly. “My logic was if we followed it whilst the ground is at an incline, we may eventually get to the fissure point - the place where the cliff broke away originally. We'd be back on even ground from there and could carry our journey into more familiar territory again.”
“Snore. What's the surprise?”
“I'm getting to it,” Lephas chastised with a laugh. “Anyway, I'd been so preoccupied with finding that fissure point that I hadn't really given much thought to what had caused the cliff to form in the first place, however many hundreds of thousands, maybe even millions, of years ago.”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, without boring you too much…” He smirked. “Cliffs form when one part of the ground collapses away from the other, right?”
