Quietly, and with balletic grace, Kiro somehow heaves the bulk of his body up out of the water, throwing a rock high into the sky. He sinks back down and pulls me next to him.
We’re two heads, bobbing at the surface, watching the rock he threw sail up past the trees into the blue dome above us. It make its lazy arc down, plummeting down, down toward the dark swarm. It splashes.
The swarm darkens, pulsing furiously near where the rock went in, seeming to attack the water itself.
A chill comes over me. That would be us.
They were waiting for us, searching for us.
If we’d come up for air near where we went in, without being sneaky and smart, they would’ve killed us.
Fuck.
I turn to meet his golden gaze. Giant welts glow red on his cheekbone.
And then he smiles. I can’t believe he’s smiling at a time like this. “They’re dangerous,” he whispers. “But so stupid.”
And suddenly I smile back. We’re in this horribly freezing water hunted by angry wasps, and I just grin like a fool. I can’t stop smiling at him. I can’t believe how badass he is. How young. How beautiful.
His beauty rips at me.
“I’m going down again,” he says then. “Okay?”
“We can’t stay in here,” I say. My limbs feel heavy, and it’s not just because I have hiking boots on—the water is freezing. My fingers feel numb. So do my lips. We’re at risk for hypothermia.
“Keep moving,” he commands.
“This cold is dangerous, too.”
He says nothing. He knows it’s dangerous. “I’m happy to see that my mate can swim.”
“I’m not your mate.”
He smiles. He’s fucking with me. Keeping my mind off them. “They’re stupid, but they hunt well,” he breathes. “I’m going down again.”
An unspoken question—Can I last?
I nod, teeth chattering.
He studies my eyes, and then he disappears below the surface.
I tread water, keeping a watch on the swarm, ready for them. My bones feel brittle, like the cold is turning them to threads of steel. My breath comes in gasps, an effect of the cold. Everything constricts. It’s not good.
After a ridiculously long time where I start to worry, Kiro breaks the surface soundlessly.
My heart does this flip as our eyes meet. He hurls a series of rocks, one after another, seeming almost to defy gravity, the way he can get his body out of the water to make his throw.
He’s directing the swarm away from us, moving them away.
“I’m cold,” I whisper. “This isn’t good.” Does he understand how vulnerable we are to hypothermia right now?
“Soon,” he says softly, watching the swarm. “Once we’re out, believe me, we won’t want to jump back in.”
I try for a smile, unsure whether my lips actually form it. “Voice of…” My lips feel too cold to form the word “experience.”
“Yes.” He dives under and comes back up with more rocks, throwing them farther away. He’s landing them in the forest at the far end of the lake now. He’s getting a lot of fucking distance. I think he could’ve been a baseball player. He could have been so many things.
“They’re gone,” he says.