Diving Deep - Solo

[FennWenn]

A pickpocket’s hand is his swiftest asset.

Yellowed fangs snapped a bare inch above Fenn’s head, brushing against his hair. Aside from two words — oh fuck — the boy’s mind was blank. The hand that had previously reached out as if to touch the kelpie, his right hand, his lesser hand, he threw outward. The motion captured the creature’s gaze for a split second. Misdirection. His other closed around the bridle’s loose reins. Slimy leather cords wrapped around his hand, and under his icen touch, froze in a hard knot.

The split second of instinct flashed away.

A stiffness overcame the kelpie as it processed both the miss of its strike and the hand on his bridle. The light in its eyes flickered. Shrieking out in incoherent panic, it whipped its head around, jolting the boy out of his confident stance and nearly off of his feet entirely. Terror rushed back into Fenn, tearing out of him in one useless squeak. Shit! The next phase of his plan wasn’t ready— he hadn’t even thought out what to do after grabbing the reins— it could bite off his face—

A tearing pain shot through his shoulder as the kelpie took off. His hand was still frozen fast to the rein. With no more time to think, Fenn found himself dragged along the jagged shoreline, wincing as sharp rocks cut into his legs and feet.

Suddenly — it all happened so fast — he was knee-deep in murky water. Then chest-deep. Then he was holding his breath as the waves rushed overhead. Saltwater stung his eyes shut. He felt chunks of ice generate spontaneously in the water around him, brushing his body and floating away, his runaway magic rebelling against the sudden pressure in his chest.

Unholy screeching looped on and on. The kelpie thrashed violently through the water; Fenn could feel the movements of its powerful body through his tightly-bound hand and aching arm, the slap of the steering tail. Blinded, his free hand grasped for its weedy mane, yanking it downward to force its head up by way of suggestion. It still had some horseish instinct left — it was steered, if only briefly. Upwards they went.

For the briefest instant, they licked the top of the water. Fenn gasped into the warm air—

And down, down, down they dove into the black depths of the water again, snatching the breath from his lungs. The fae shut his eyes to the filth and muck once more, holding onto what little air was left in him as the kelpie dragged him through the silt. His tongue was soaked with saltwater. Pain shot through his fingers as the beast twisted and swerved, still vocalizing its fury as it tried to shake him off. The base of his pinky was wrenched out of place, searing white-hot under his skin. And yet! Against the rushing of the water, in spite of the slick slime that oozed off the fae beast, Fenn held on. Thick ice continued to build up around his hand. He felt it travel up the bridle, further securing his grip.

His free hand brushed against something uncomfortably metallic — a squarish shape clasped around the leather cording of the bridle. The buckle!

Even weak from the struggle, Fenn’s fingers were deft.

A final earsplitting shriek ghosted the waters as the bridle was torn from its owner. Even from behind closed eyes, Fenn saw the burst of light that followed. Magic-brightness pulsed outward from the kelpie. All of his senses dulled in the wake of it. For a moment, the fae was shocked into a state of perfect, blank numbness.

When he was next able to feel anything, really, he realized that he was no longer underwater; he had been blasted clear into the air. With the loose wings of his shoulders, he hit the ground and crumpled. All air rushed out of his chest along with a sputter of water. The gray sky taunted him from above, clouds whispering on bubbling breezes that sounded louder to him than the splashy aftermath of the explosion, the dappled plop of something else raining down into the water. Fenn took a gasping breath and pushed himself onto his knees. Somewhere in the distance, a weary voice called out his name.

Strands of seaweed and a gooey green mass not unlike a beached jelly-fish floated to shore alongside him. The ooze was flecked with slimy grey muscle tendons and shards of bone. He stared at it a moment, slowly realizing that it was the kelpie’s remains.

Still frozen to his hand was an algae-crusted, limpet-latched bridle.