In Too Deep
Rowan + Lucian
08-25-2022, 10:17 AM
Before he’d had time to really ponder or dread it, Rowan was slowly starting to realize that today might be the day he died. Not just in that vague, hypothetical way where any day could be the day he died, but that what he faced now was truly mortal danger. He’d thought that he would feel more alive in the moments before his death, more real, but instead everything had started to feel distant and dreamlike. He wasn’t even certain he could find his way back to his shoddy, half-built shelter now anyway. Rowan focused on the only thing he had left to focus on, the half-drowned rat of a creature dangling from his snout. All reason said he should have dropped the stranger and maybe have a chance at making it to tomorrow. Instead, he braced the both of them up against another knotted tree trunk, but only just long enough to crouch down and shimmy under his skeletal frame, hoisting him up on his shoulders like a bony carpet. As dilapidated as Rowan had become, he hadn’t wasted away entirely, and unlike his cargo he’d had body mass to lose in the first place. “Just hold on, then,” he said simply. It wasn’t as if he could see any better, but he knew the way there, and could trace the path in his head. It hadn’t been far, only a few trees over to where the roots formed a natural sort of staircase. The stranger’s body was upsettingly light at his back. |
WC: 254
Total: 1708/2500