Page 203 of Grim and Oro
The hive is spinning as we leave. The world is starting to slip beneath me. I can’t feel my hands, or my legs. Somehow, I stumble to the edge of the wooden structure.
“A plan,” I say to myself, wondering if the words make it out of my mouth. “We have a plan.”
I hear my name. Or maybe I’m imagining it.
There’s no way Isla is saying my name in my ear as we fly over the forest. There’s no way her voice—that voice—is filled with concern.
“Oro.”
It happens again. Am I dreaming? I can hardly see. I can hardly get a full breath. My head feels strange.
I glance at her to see if this could possibly be real, and there she is. Just inches from my face. Her green eyes are wide.
I want to fall into them, I want to fall into this moment, I want to fall into a world where we could possibly work together, I want to fall for her completely.
We hit the trees, and the dream takes over.
Green eyes, crinkling at the edges as Isla smiles. She’s lying on the golden sand. Drops of water slide down her heated skin. I run my mouth along her shoulder, and she makes a sound I’ve never heard before. I want to make it happen again.
She’s wearing a dress with barely any fabric, and it’swet, and it feels wrong to look, to study her this closely, but then she takes my hands and guides them down her body.
“Oro,” she says.
Isla.
“Oro,” she gasps, as my lips trail down her neck.
Isla.
“Oro,” she pants into my ear.
Isla.
“ORO.”
I blink my eyes open, and Isla isn’t underneath me anymore. She’s on the other side of a dark cave.
I swallow, wincing as the pain of the last few hours crashes into me. Remlar cutting my throat. Isla and I flying.
Falling.
I tense and look over at her again. Is she hurt?
No. The blood I smell is only mine.
I try to put the pieces together, as I reach up to touch my throat. The skin is healed.
I vaguely remember the cold of a stream ... How did we get there? Did she ... did she drag me?
Did she drag ushere?
My eyes shift quickly to the mouth of the cave, where sunlight spills in, just feet away.Daytime.
It’s been hours. The sun would have killed me. Yet here I am, in this cave. Facing a woman who might still be my enemy.
“You saved me,” I say, frowning.
She gives me a biting look. “I’m not as weak as you think I am.”
