𝐆𝐎𝐃𝐋𝐘 𝐓𝐇𝐈𝐍𝐆𝐒 ᵉ*ᵗᵐ

68 ┃ 𝐝𝐫𝐢𝐟𝐭𝐰𝐨𝐨𝐝 𝐡𝐞𝐚𝐫𝐭𝐬

━ ⭑─⭒━

━ ⭒─⭑━

You didn't even realize you were moving until your feet left the ground.

One moment you were frozen—lungs tight, rain slanting down around you like the world was holding its breath—and the next, you were running. Tripping. Barreling forward through the wet grass and tangled undergrowth, heart hammering so hard it drowned out everything else.

You crashed into him.

Your arms wrapped around him with a force you didn't know you had, nearly knocking the breath from both your chests. He staggered back half a step but didn't fall—didn't pull away.

Instead, his arms came up around you, slow and shaking, like he wasn't sure if he was dreaming. Like he didn't trust that you were really there, either.

But he held you.

Tightly. Desperately. Like a man clinging to a rope at the edge of a storm.

Your forehead pressed against his collarbone, nose brushing the damp skin at his throat, and all you could hear was his heartbeat—ragged and stuttering beneath your ear.

It was unsteady. Too fast. A wild, broken rhythm that matched your own, thudding through the space between you like a promise you didn't dare speak yet.

You didn't breathe. Not for a long time.

Your hands curled against the back of his tunic, bunching the wet fabric into your fists. You stayed there like that, clinging to him as if the moment might vanish if you so much as blinked.

Your mind spun—whirling with everything, with nothing, with the sound of your name on Hermes' lips, with the memory of Apollo's last kiss on your skin, with the compass still faintly glowing somewhere in the rain-soaked dark.

And then, finally—you pulled back.

Just enough to look at him.

The water kept falling, soaking his hair, sliding down his lashes, dripping off the curve of his chin. His cheeks were pink from wind and rain, his lips slightly parted like he wanted to speak but couldn't.

Your hands lifted before you even thought to do it. They reached up, trembling as your fingers brushed the sides of his face. His jaw was rough with a few days' stubble. His cheekbone bore a fresh bruise, dark and angry. You cupped him gently, your thumbs brushing the cold curve of his cheeks, rain pooling in the dips of your palms.

You stared into his eyes.

And gods—they were brown.

That soft, warm brown that saw you once in a crowded hall and never stopped watching after that. The same eyes that had gone wide when you stood at the front of the court. That had narrowed with quiet hurt when you disappeared. That had glimmered with something unspoken when you promised to come back.