MOUNTAIN BOND - III.VIII

Ryn slid down the wall. Let their breathing slow. Let the panic drain away enough that they could think again.

The vision stayed, burned into awareness. Water and ship and the serpentine form rising from impossible depths. The man’s face. Aria. All of it fragmentary, broken, like trying to remember a dream that scattered the moment you reached for it. Yet real. Undeniably real.

As they got used to the darkness, they realized they could see the faint outline of their hand. Light from somewhere ahead. Warmer than what they had encountered until now. Natural. It would be full daylight by now.

Ryn followed it, hoping to find themselves back in the main cave system.

-

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Ryn felt wind before they saw sky—a cold slap against their face, a push against their chest, icy fingertips finding every gap in their clothing and taking their breath away.

Stone gave way to open air.

A ledge. Barely wide enough to stand on, jutting from the mountain face like an afterthought.

Ryn stepped out and looked down.

Below them—empty air. Slick, vertical walls dropping hundreds of feet to rocky slope at the bottom, angled sharp enough to catch and kill anything that reached it. No gradual descent. No mercy in the fall.

His fall.

Kivith’s fall.

Surviving a fall, and then die anyway. Feeling all of it, every snap of bone, every spike of pain, death arriving as a severing so violent it had dropped them to their knees on that ridge.

They’d been there. Watching. Watching! Too far away to help. Feeling everything, able to do nothing.

And Kivith had chosen it. The fall.

Broken wing screaming against the dive, fighting every natural instinct, because choice was more important than instinct then.

A good flight, he’d called it. A worthy ending.

Ryn’s legs gave out.

They sat hard on stone, back pressed against the passage entrance. Wind hitting them in full force now—no shelter, no walls to break it. Their hair snapped and sang in the gusts, the crystalline strands vibrating like strings, throwing off thin high notes that cut through the wind’s howl.

Their hands found their own hair without deciding to, fingers pulling through the smooth alien texture, working strands that weren’t supposed to be like this, that were supposed to be soft and brown and human.

Wind tore at them. Drop waited below.

Choice was more important than instinct then.

They’d watched him fall. Fearing for him, disbelieving he’d risk both their lives like this. Miles from him, in mind and body.

Why?

Why save strangers when his wing was already broken?

Fingers clenched. Hard nails pressing crescents into their scalp. Pain was small and precise and utterly inadequate.

Why have them watch him gamble both their lives?

And Ryn had watched. Unable to stop him. Unable to help. Unable to do anything but witness his choice, and then fall apart.

“I should have been there,” Ryn whispered. The wind took most of it, scattered the words across the mountain face.

But what could they have done? Kivith was the one who could read storms, who understood weather-working with an instinct Ryn could never match. Even if they’d been riding him instead of on that ridge, what difference would it have made?

“I should have been there for him.”

Grief that had been held quiet and close for weeks began to heat.

“I should have been there with him.”

Kivith was gone. And Ryn was here with a dragon they didn’t understand and couldn’t work with. Eskarith was ancient, experienced, wise. Centuries of knowing how bonds worked, what they required, how to weather the transformations and the depth of connection.

And now he was paired with Ryn—who had almost killed a member of their own Circle during a basic training maneuver. Who couldn’t hold his power, couldn’t control it, couldn’t direct it.

Who had fallen and hadn’t trust.

Whose doubts had tore the bond they had nurtured to shreds in the process.

Two weeks. It had taken Ryn two weeks to break what should have been unbreakable.

Eskarith deserved better than this. Better than Ryn.

Something shifted in their mind. A thought, drifting toward the edge of stone ending in nothing just past Ryn’s feet. Toward something darker. Something Ryn’s mind began to see the shape of.

Maybe—

A push against their side.

Solid. Warm. Insistent.

They jerked back, eyes flying open. Nothing there—just wind and stone and the long fall. But the sensation remained. Weight pressing against their ribs like something massive had butted up against them. Like a cat demanding attention. Like—

Eskarith.

Through the bond—strained, damaged, barely a thread—his presence.

I’m here.

Heat caught in Ryn’s chest. Flared again.

Why? Why did he even bother? They had proven in every possible way how unworthy they were of an Ancient’s patience. And yet he was still here, still reaching across the damage, still—

“Why?” Ryn’s voice scraped out rough, directed at the mountains, at the wind, at the empty sky where Kivith had once flown. “Why did you do it?”

Nothing answered. Wind kept blowing. Sky stayed empty.

“You KNEW.” Louder now. Control cracking open like ice under pressure. “You knew what would happen. You knew you might die. You knew I might die. And you went anyway—”

The words weren’t enough. Couldn’t contain what was building.

“And you LEFT me!” It came out ugly and raw, ripped from somewhere deep. “You chose to fall and you LEFT ME HERE! You didn’t even have the—“

Ryn’s fist hit the stone wall beside the passage entrance. Knuckles split against rock. Pain flared bright and immediate and nowhere near sufficient. Blood welled through torn skin.

“Three years!” Their voice cracked. “Three years of knowing exactly who I was with you. And then you just—went away. You made me survive this ALONE!”

Wind tore at them. Ryn didn’t feel it anymore.

“Everything you taught me—” Raw. Getting rawer with each word. “Everything we built. The way you worked weather—precise. Careful. Every thread in exactly the right place. You made it look easy. You made it look like BREATHING.”

Bloody knuckles clenched at their sides. Shaking.

“And now I’m bonded to a power that moves MOUNTAINS and I can’t find any of that. I can’t find you in this. I can’t find ME in this. Everything that made sense—none of it works anymore. None of it FITS.”

They hit the wall again. Harder. Stone bit into already-torn skin. A gasp punched out of them involuntary—the pain sharp enough to cut through everything else for one second and then swallowed by the larger thing, the grief that had finally broken its leash and was tearing through them with teeth.

“I don’t know who I’m supposed to BE anymore!”

Wind howled across the ledge. Mountains kept their silence.

A sob broke through. Unplanned. Unmanaged. It came from somewhere below the anger and tore its way up through everything, ripping the words apart in Ryn’s throat.

“You left me here. And I don’t know how to do this without you.”

Forehead pressed to stone. Arms wrapped around their own chest, fingers clutching their own clothing, holding on because there was nothing else to hold. Cold under their knees. Wind against the back of their neck where hair had fallen forward. Rough texture of stone under their forehead, grit pressing into skin.

Ryn wept.

Time passed—minutes, hours, they couldn’t tell. Sun moved overhead but Ryn didn’t track it. Just the stone and the dark behind closed eyes and the sound of wind and the terrible emptiness where three years of partnership used to live. The precision. The joy. The perfect understanding.

Gone. All of it gone.

“I don’t know how to live this life without you.” Barely a whisper. Taken by the wind before the words could land anywhere. “I don’t know if I’m meant to.”

Tears quieted eventually. Shifted. The violent shaking settling into something steadier but no less exhausted. Ryn stayed curled on the ledge, one hand finding their hair again. Crystalline strands cool between fingers. Skin still too warm from crying, from the rage that had burned through them and left nothing but ash.

The sun climbed higher. Cold worked its way through theirclothing and into bone, patient and inexorable.

Eskarith’s presence held in the bond—distant, strained, but there. Holding space for them, and trusting. Letting Ryn fall apart on a ledge hundreds of feet above ground where one wrong step would mean ending.

Trusting Ryn wouldn’t take that step.

Eventually their body had nothing left to give. Ryn lay on the ledge, cheek against stone. Everything hurt—throat raw from screaming, eyes burning, chest aching from sobs, knuckles throbbing where they’d split against rock. Every muscle wrung out and trembling with exhaustion.

But the grief had moved. Something in it had shifted. Letting the rage and pain and loss exist outside their heart instead of just circling endlessly inside their mind—had done something. Released pressure. Made space for breath.

Sleep took them without warning. One moment the ledge and the cold and the aftermath of tears. The next, nothing at all.

Ryn woke to sun on their face and no memory of deciding to sleep.

Disoriented. Body stiff from lying on cold stone. Mouth dry enough that swallowing hurt. Eyes crusted with salt from tears that had dried while they’d slept. Everything ached—throat raw, knuckles throbbing, chest tight from the sobs that had wrung them out completely.

They sat up slowly. Ledge, wind, and the drop still waiting below.

How long had they been here?

The sun had moved—no longer morning light but the slanted gold of afternoon glazing the peaks. Hours then. Maybe more. Ryn’s body protested the movement, muscles cramped from however long they’d lain curled on stone.

They stood on shaking legs. Looked out at the mountains one last time—the chase of sunlight and shadows. Beautiful and indifferent. A world that kept moving forward whether Kivith was in it or not.

Ryn turned back toward the passage entrance.

They had not realized how strong the wind had truly been, not until they were out of it. Once inside, barely a couple steps into the stone—nothing. Total stillness. Their breath suddenly too loud in the silence. The passage disappearing into darkness.

Right. No torch. And since they had been running blind, finding their way back would require more than memory.

These mountains were not familiar to them, but by what little they had seen when outside, they had probably run northbound, through one of the main bodies.

Ryn’s altered vision helped as well—without worry nor panic occupying their mind, they realized whatever change had occurred after the Severance let them see better in low light than they used to. Shapes resolved where there should have been only darkness. Way past where light should have reached from the outside. Tight walls. Low ceiling. A way forward.

But not enough. Not nearly enough.

The passages branched almost immediately. Left or right? Both looked the same in the dim light their eyes could pull from nothing. Stone and darkness and no way to tell which direction led back to the main chamber.

Ryn stood at the junction. Tried to remember which way they’d come. Had they turned left when they’d emerged from the narrow passage? Or right? Memory gave nothing useful—just panic and wind and the need to get away from the crystal chamber’s searching pain.

They picked left.

Stone narrowed around them. Walls pressed close. The passage twisted, descended, twisted again. Nothing looked familiar, and everything did. It was all the same—rough stone carved by water and time, passages leading to passages leading to more darkness.

Another junction. Three ways this time.

Straight on.

Ryn’s chest tightened. They were lost. Properly lost. How long before dehydration or exhaustion took them down? Hours, days maybe. With no torch. No food. No water beyond what little moisture might condense on stone walls.

The thought sat there, heavy in their chest.

Unbearable pressure from all sides. Their thoughts, the walls, the weight of the mountain above them. Thousands of feet of rock sitting overhead, all that mass held up by nothing but the hollow spaces carved through it. And Ryn inside one of those spaces. Alone. Buried.

Their breath came faster. Shallow. The air felt thicker suddenly, harder to pull into lungs that wanted more space than the passage allowed. How much air was down here? How long before it ran out in these sealed spaces?

Ryn’s hand found the wall. Rough stone under their palm. Cold. Solid. Real.

They pressed against it. Needed something stable. Something that wouldn’t shift or change or disappear. Stone wouldn’t leave. Stone wouldn’t fail them. Stone just was.

Their legs gave out.

Knees hit the passage floor hard enough to hurt. One hand still on the wall, the other finding the ground. Stone beneath them too. All around. Above. Below. Everywhere except the narrow space their body occupied.

How far down were they? How many turns had they taken? Could they even find the ledge again if they tried to turn back? The fresh air and open sky seemed impossibly distant. Maybe imagined. Maybe they’d always been down here in the dark with stone pressing close and no way out.

Ryn’s breathing hitched. Too fast. Too shallow. Not enough air getting through.

Stop.

They pressed their forehead against the wall. Cold stone shocking against overheated skin. Breathe. Just breathe. The air hadn’t run out. The walls weren’t actually moving closer.

Breathe.

One hand stayed flat against the wall. Something solid to hold onto while everything else felt like it was closing in. Ryn stayed there—crouched in darkness, trying to slow their racing heart.

The passages weren’t going to swallow them. The mountain wasn’t going to crush them. They just needed to find their way back.

They just needed help.

Ryn closed their eyes. Opened them. Darkness looked the same either way.

They reached for the bond.

Not really thinking about it. Just—reaching. The way they’d reached for the walls in the dark. The way one would reach for anything solid when everything else was uncertain.

Eskarith was there.

Far, but there. Just as steady and patient as the mountain.

A direction.

Ryn rose, shook their head, turned right at the next junction.

The passage going down. Deeper into the mountain. They felt the air grow colder with each step, the stone under their feet rougher.

Wrong.

The sense arrived without words. Just wrongness creeping up Ryn’s spine. This wasn’t the way back.

They stopped.

Through the bond, Eskarith’s presence shifted. A gentle correction, like catching someone’s elbow before they walked into a wall. Back. Not that way.

Ryn turned around. Retraced their steps to the last junction. The bond pointed left this time—up, not down. Away from the cold depths.

They followed.

Left at the next branch. Straight through a chamber with a ceiling that dripped loudly. Right again when the passage split.

The route felt longer than it should. Ryn had run from the crystal chamber in blind panic, taking the most direct path toward anywhere else. But the bond wasn’t leading them back that way. These passages were different—unfamiliar even in the limited way Ryn had explored the cave system. Wider in some places. Narrower in others. Turning when Ryn expected them to go straight.

Avoiding something.

Eskarith was steering them around the crystal chamber. Taking the long way. A safer way. Not risking Ryn encountering that pull again, that pain, that searching presence that had torn through their mind.

Through the bond, the dragon’s presence grew slightly stronger. Something close to words arrived—sensation, warmth without heat. The equivalent of I’m here.

Ryn kept walking.

Each junction, each choice, the bond provided direction and Ryn followed. No hesitation. No second-guessing. Just movement through darkness with trust they hadn’t consciously decided to give.

The passages varied more than Ryn had realized during their initial exploration. Some sections wide enough for three people to walk side by side. Others forcing them to turn sideways, stone scraping their shoulders. Ceilings that soared high enough their altered vision couldn’t find them. Corridors so low Ryn had to duck.

Time stretched in the darkness. How long had they been walking now? An hour? Two? This route brought them through more junctions, more choices, more distance to cover. But each step brought them closer to warmth. To light. To the chamber where Eskarith waited.

Once, they took a wrong turn— a passage dead-ended in solid rock. Ryn stopped and waited for the redirection they knew was coming. Back. Other way.

The passages widened gradually. Air warmed by degrees so small Ryn almost didn’t notice until they realized they weren’t shivering anymore. Stone under their feet smoothed from the wear of countless feet over time.

Almost there. He sent through the bond.

When had that happened?

They’d been moving through darkness for how long, they couldn’t tell. Following Eskarith’s guidance through junction after junction. And not once had they questioned it. Not once had they hesitated or checked or doubted.

They’d just followed. Trusted.

This time instinct had been stronger than choice.

The bond had pointed. They had moved. Simple as breathing. Natural as the way lungs filled with air when you stopped holding your breath.

They in fact took a deep breath, and a familiar scent hit them—dragon musk, woodsmoke, the particular mineral quality of Eskarith’s presence. Then warmth. Real warmth. Fire burning somewhere ahead pass the bend.

Light appeared—orange and flickering. Firelight. Painful after hours of darkness.

Ryn emerged squinting into the main chamber.

Late afternoon sun slanted through the entrance, the fire burned low in its pit, and beside it—

Eskarith.

His massive form coiled in the space he’d claimed since they’d arrived. Head resting on his forelegs. Tail almost covering his snout. Eyes reflecting firelight as he turned toward Ryn. Watching. Waiting.

Heat enveloped Ryn—the warmth of dragon-fire contained, radiating outward in waves. They had forgotten how warm he was. How present. Stone and scale and fire.

Safe.

The word arrived unbidden. This could be safety. Could be home, if Ryn let it.

Ryn stood at the chamber’s edge. Legs shaking. Body remembering all at once how far they’d pushed it—walking for hours, crying and screaming themselves raw on a ledge above nothing.

Eskarith’s head lifted slightly.

Welcome back.

Ryn crossed the chamber. Legs barely holding them upright. Each step taking more effort than it should. But moving anyway. Toward warmth. Toward the bond that had brought them home.

They sank down beside the fire. Not touching Eskarith yet. Just close. Close enough to feel the heat radiating from his scales. Close enough that his breathing became felt more than heard—slow, deep, the rhythm of something that had weathered centuries and would weather centuries more.

Trust hadn’t been a decision. It had arrived in the absence of resistance. In the exhaustion that left no energy for fighting. No other choice.

But a choice was still needed now

Ryn’s hand moved. Found Eskarith’s foreleg where it rested near the fire. Scales warm under their palm. Solid. Real. The texture so very different from Kivith’s—rougher, older, harder. Everything about Eskarith was different. Would always be different.

“I want to try again.” The words came out quiet. their voice raw but clear. “Our mindscape. The chasm. I want to try again.”

Eskarith’s presence in the bond shifted, attentive, more ope than Ryn had felt them in a while, and still saying nothing.

“I’m scared,” They took a breath. Let it out slow. “I am really scared. There’s almost nothing but darkness in our shared mindscape now—it feels hopeless and cold, like drowning. And I know this is my fault, and I know I need to be better, but I trust you. I trust you to catch me, and I trust the bond to guide me, and so I’m ready to try.”

Sitting here refusing to try—that wasn’t surviving. That was just waiting to break.

And Ryn had already broken on that ledge. Had screamed themselves hoarse, cursed life and let everything shatter. There wasn’t anything left to protect by staying small and scared.

“Together,” Ryn continued. The word that had arrived between them in the dark. The truth they’d both acknowledged. “If you’re willing to help me. If you think we can—”

Warmth pulsed through the bond. Yes, it said. Always yes. Of course.

Ryn’s eyes closed, they leaned back. Fire warmth in front of them. Dragon-warmth at their back. The bond curling inside of them like a satisfied cat.

Close enough that his breathing became their breathing. Close enough that for the first time since Kivith died, they didn’t feel alone in the dark, but safe instead.

-

to be continued…

Read Mountain Bond Part One - The Severance or Download it as an ebook |
Start from the beginning of Part II or Read the previous chapter |
Discover more about the Dragon-Human Bond ||

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