A Little Broken [Three Trinities Haven Church]

[Oriena]

Ori wasn’t expecting intervention. She didn’t see any reason he would. But when the offer of the rag entered her peripheral she took it anyway. The glance she gave him as she did was dark and unreadable, but the deadpan comment pierced whatever wariness prowled at his witness of her vulnerability. Instead she choked a laugh, then winced as it only made the blood bubble and burn a little painfully. “I guess I do prefer to swallow my demons,” she said, tasting the drench of her own blood on her lips as she spoke. By the purringly amused way she said it, they were talking about different things again.

The rag was quickly soaking through. She heard him flee, unsurprised, and didn’t give it another thought. Instead she watched the flames, knowing she ought to be tilting her head up to wait it out. But she was thinking about her own advice; about hunting rather than being hunted.

The cold hands suddenly ringing the back of her neck made her gasp. The icy shock; the audacity of another’s uninvited touch from behind. She wasn’t sure if it annoyed her or turned her on, not that it was his intention – he was as afraid of her as they all were. Her eyes glanced into her peripheral, but she didn’t jerk away, nor lifted her head. “You have no idea,” she said into the rag.

“So what did you do? For them to be chasing you?”