HER KIND

Two Days

'Chapter 26'

─── · 。ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

"I mean, what were you thinking?"

"You could have gotten hurt, Dria."

"Could have? She almost died. You almost died!"

"You're not helping, Pierce," Jared groaned as he crouched in front of her on the couch, "chill, go take a walk."

Pierce stopped his rampant pacing, looking between Jared and her. "Now, Pierce," finally meeting her eyes. He huffed before walking out of the living room, his receding footsteps echoing through the wooden house before the sound of the back door shutting filled their ears.

Jared sighed, his head hanging before he lifted it and got up from his crouched position.

He walked around the old wooden coffee table before dropping onto the couch opposite her. His eyes never left hers, and he seemed to scrutinize her.

"He's right, you know," Jared started, "you could have died."

"But I didn't," she stubbornly said.

"Yeah, but you could have," he said, his sentence bringing back the silence.

Dria's eyes diverted from his, unable to keep the pride high, and her shoulders slumped to prove it.

"I just..."

"I just wanted to be there for him. He's only 7 years old, Jared. He's just a little boy, my baby brother. I wasn't going to leave him in the ground, to rise and wonder where he was,"

Jared ran his fingers through his brow mop, "But he's not just a boy, Hendrietta. He's a nulpine, and when they get their powers, they do things they can't control."

"But Marcelo didn't hurt me—"

"Elliam isn't Marcelo," Jared cut her off.

Silence once again filled the gap between them.

"How long was I out for?" Her head rose to meet his eyes as she waited for his response.

He looked away from them and to the warm fire that hummed as the wood broke apart due to the heat.

"Two days," he said nonchalantly, "you've been out for two days. Marcelo can't sleep, keeps having nightmares. Elliam won't even eat; he won't even come near any of us, afraid he'd hurt us. Kane is practically mute; he didn't realize how much you meant to him when you didn't wake up. Katerina tried her best to keep them from worrying, but she isn't you," his tone was neither condescending nor calm.

"There's a reason Pierce and I have been training like that and why Pierce is constantly reading the books. We both understand why they are being hunted, they are power beings, Dria, powerful. On his waking, Liam was able to lift you off the ground without so much as a sweat. They are not like you and me; they feel more now, they need more now. What they don't need is someone who doesn't know jack shit about them. What they don't need is you dying on them, especially by their own hands,"

Jared got up from the couch, stretching his body, "Pierce was the one that found you. We arrived back on the horses with everyone waiting for us in the living room except you and Elliam. When we asked where you were and Edrick explained, Pierce didn't wait to hear anymore before running out the back door and into the woods,"

"He had to cut you down, the roots thick as chopped and chopped. He kept calling your name, but you wouldn't hear him. When I got there, Elliam was already back to normal, and he was just standing there, watching as the roots seemed to tighten. Pierce asked him to stop the roots, but he's just a boy; he didn't know how. That's when Marcelo and the others arrived. Edrick told Marcelo to freeze the roots, and with shaking hands, he did."

Jared ran a hand through his tired hair, his eyes reflecting the weight of the recent events. "We're on borrowed time, Dria. We need to figure this out, for all our sakes."

With that, Jared left the room, the door closing softly behind him. Dria sat alone, the lingering echoes of his words sinking in. The gravity of their situation pressed heavily on her shoulders.

Driven by a mix of guilt and determination, Dria rose from the couch. She walked towards the back door, the chilly evening air hitting her face as she stepped outside. There, in the fading light, she saw Pierce chopping wood with precise, controlled movements. The rhythmic thud of the axe hitting the logs echoed in the quiet surroundings.

As she watched him work, a swirl of emotions engulfed her — gratitude for Pierce's swift action, guilt for the worry she had caused, and a growing understanding of the responsibility they all bore. The weight of the impending challenges settled on her, and she knew that the journey they were on had just become even more complex.

─── · 。ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

I know, another short chapter, but I didn't want to drag it out when I could have ended it so beautifully. I mean it's a heartwarming chapter.

𝐼𝒻 𝓎𝑜𝓊 𝑒𝓃𝒿𝑜𝓎𝑒𝒹 𝓉𝒽𝑒 𝒸𝒽𝒶𝓅𝓉𝑒𝓇, 𝓎𝑜𝓊𝓇 𝓋𝑜𝓉𝑒 𝒶𝓃𝒹 𝒸𝑜𝓂𝓂𝑒𝓃𝓉𝓈 𝒶𝓇𝑒 𝓁𝒾𝓀𝑒 𝒶𝓅𝓅𝓁𝒶𝓊𝓈𝑒 𝒻𝑜𝓇 𝓉𝒽𝑒 𝒶𝓊𝓉𝒽𝑜𝓇'𝓈 𝒽𝒶𝓇𝒹 𝓌𝑜𝓇𝓀. 𝒮𝒽𝑜𝓌 𝓎𝑜𝓊𝓇 𝓈𝓊𝓅𝓅𝑜𝓇𝓉!