"We'll have to wait here, for sunrise." Rhykal stared thoughtfully at the pile of rubble blocking the way they came, wiping off the thin trail of blood that was still trickling down his forehead with the back of his hand. They were still tied up, his hands.

The ceiling had collapsed between her and the prince. Rhykal had pulled her out of the way just in time, had shielded her during the quake and got them both to safety with a few minor injuries. He seemed to know what to do, what to expect, how to stay alive in this situation. She wondered if he'd been trained for that or if he'd survived a quake before. She also wondered who had saved her back there, Rhykal or Hasheem. Right now, it was Rhykal who was speaking to her.

Djari looked at the entrance to the old tunnel that was still standing. It led to the sea, Prince Lasura had said. They'd backtracked here, to find a way out.

"Because the tide is high?" That was what he'd said, though she still had no clear idea of what it was, tide.

Rhykal nodded. "It will go down in the morning. I imagine the exit is well underwater right now, and the sharks are out at night, to hunt around the coast."

Sharks. Another creature she had heard of but never seen. She would ask about that later. Right now, there were other things to worry about. "Can they get out? The prince and Saya?" They had no directions forward. All of them had been following Rhykal.

"If they're still alive, you mean?"

She pressed her lips together. 'If we die for this, it's your sin to carry,' Saya had said, and was right. "I know they are. I can feel it." She couldn't, not really. It was just a hunch, or wishful thinking on her part. But the prince was also the chosen one, just as she was. Until she saw his corpse, she would believe he was still alive. It benefited them nothing otherwise. Not in this situation. She was worried about something else. "Can they get out, without your directions?"

He looked at her quietly for a time, before deciding on a reply. "It will take a great deal of luck, if not a miracle. Too many turns, too many doors. Different things waiting, behind those doors."

She nodded. "Then I will pray for a miracle." What else was there to do, in any case, until sunrise?

Rhykal smiled, like an adult to a child. "You still believe in prayers? In miracles?"

She stared at him. He waited for her answer. He was listening to her. Which was new. Something had changed in Rhykal. He had also protected her, just now. "Come," she said, taking out the small knife she was carrying. "I'll cut you loose."

He blinked at that. "You will cut me loose?"

She walked over to him and began to cut the rope. "You could have killed me––killed us––anytime, even with your hands tied, if that's what you wanted to do."

"Maybe I'm waiting for the right time."

The rope came apart, fell down between their feet. She looked at him in the eyes, held them. She was certain now, of what she had suspected, after what had happened. Twice.

"You won't kill me," she said. "Because you can't. Because he won't let you. You know––you know––that whatever you are is what he is, and whatever you can do, he also can. Hasheem will kill you before you hurt me, and he will succeed because he has something important to lose and you don't. You know this, and you won't risk it." She stepped closer to him, to put her theory to the test. She was alive, wasn't she? He had saved her. One of them did. "He is there, isn't he? Watching you? Watching us?"

There was pain in those gray eyes. There seemed to be pain whenever he'd tried to hurt her, or when she confronted him like this. She had seen them before, but these signs of struggle had been occurring more and more often since he'd attacked her that night. She wondered...

She reached for him, for the face that looked like her sworn sword. Rhykal jolted as her fingers touched his cheek, but didn't back away. The pain and sadness in his eyes escalated. His lips were pressed hard together, resisting, holding something back, and struggling at the task. She felt like she was going to cry.

You are with me, here, even now.

"Hasheem..."

A strange sound. An escalating, thunder-like rumble came through the tunnel, the one leading to the sea.

Rhykal's eyes widened as he wheeled toward the source, his expression switched immediately into something like fear, like panic, like terror.

"Can you swim?" he asked.

***

The water came in faster than he'd anticipated, the volume of it filled the tunnel all at once, giving him no time to prepare before it slammed into them at full force. Somehow, for reasons he couldn't pinpoint at that moment, the same reasons that had made him do what he did when the ceiling had collapsed, the first thing he'd reached for, like instinct, like reflex, was the Bharavi.

The flood hurled them both back toward the dead end of the tunnel. He managed to grab onto a rock with one hand before they eventually crashed into the wall, lessening the impact as they hit. The water, with no where to go but back out, turned into a whirlpool that and trapped them at its epicenter, keeping them under as it tossed and spun them in all directions. He held onto the Bharavi, through the current that tried to rip them apart, through the voice in his head that kept on screaming, telling him to not let go. He'd die holding onto her like this. She was going keep him underwater longer than needed. Not many people could survive the great flood after a quake, but without her, he could move better, more freely. Without her, there was a chance.

They never moved, his hands, his arms that fastened around the Bharavi. They stayed wrapped around the small, helpless figure he was holding against his chest, so close, so tight it felt like a part of his own limbs, his own body, an extension of him he had to save––something he would die from, if lost.

It lasted for some time, before the water receded and the current sucked them back out the way it came. He managed to come up for a breath as they were pulled through the tunnel, at first toward the sea, and then the current pushed them out of the path, into a hole underwater, through another passage he didn't know existed.

By then, he realized the Bharavi had gone limp in his arms. Somewhere along the way, she must have run out of breath, or the impact had knocked the air out of her lungs early. The former meant there was still a chance, the latter meant it might be too late. They had been underwater for quite a long time.

And he was swimming now against the current, in panic, in dread that was swallowing him whole, toward a raised platform he spotted nearby. The current hit a corner just before he reached it, changed direction, and drifted him off to the side. He lurched for it, kicking his legs like a mad man, and managed to grab on to the ledge just I time before they were swept away. He pulled them both out of the water and, without paying attention to the voice that kept yelling something in his mind, began to frantically pump air back into her lungs.

It felt like running in the dark, toward a light that kept on fading, drifting away. An eternity seemed to have gone by while she lay unconscious, refusing to move or breathe. His own chest was heaving as something like water, like sand poured in to take up the space, leaving less and less room for air. It all felt connected somehow: the pain, the cold, his own ability to breathe, the way his heart was beating, and hers. She was dead and he was dying because of it. He was trying to save her without a clear understanding why, driven by nothing besides an unshakable feeling that if she were to die, it would kill him.

Then she made a gurgling sound, her body jerked up violently before she threw up the sea water. He slumped back, watching her come back to life, feeling the tightness in his chest dissipated, and something else along with it. Everything felt so light all of the sudden. The voice in his head grew quieter, fading quickly into complete silence. And then everything faded to black.

***

"You still believe in prayers? In miracles?" Rhykal had said.

Why wouldn't I? Djari thought as she lay on her side, watching him breathe. Him being Rhykal or Hasheem, she couldn't tell. Did it matter? They were both unconscious, having passed out from over-exertion. From having saved her life.

She had been given miracles. Had been saved and protected too many times than she deserved, Saya had said. By Hasheem, by her brother, by her father, by the prince, and now, by Rhykal, for reasons she didn't understand. It wasn't Hasheem who'd gotten her out of the flood. She could always tell them apart, at least when they were awake.

The figure lying next to her could be either. He might wake up as Hasheem, or he might not. For now, she knew she was cold, and he was shivering, and so she wrapped her arms around him––around them––trapping the heat between their bodies, keeping them both warm. She thought of praying, and couldn't decide what to pray for. She remembered the prince's words the night before they went in to the tunnel, which complicated things.

'Maybe your sworn sword does exist, but so does Rhykal,' he'd said.

He was right, she couldn't deny it. Who was she to decide which one of them was to survive if they couldn't live together? Did she have the right to make that call? Who do I pray for?

'Your love for him will always be the problem. It will destroy the White Desert, if not burn down this entire peninsula.'

'...you will drag us all to hell with it. This peninsula included. That's what you're doing.'

Two people, speaking different words, on the same night, with the same meaning. Maybe they were right. Maybe something had to be done about it. What should she pray for, then? Her destiny to be fulfilled? Her wishes to be granted? That Rhykal would die, and Hasheem would come back to her?

And then she remembered her mother's words, something about life in the desert being too short, too unpredictable. She went to sleep with him in her arms, hoping to find her answers at sunrise. Maybe the gods had their own plans in mind. Maybe whatever she decided wouldn't change a thing.

That night, she ended up praying her mother's prayer, words she'd almost forgotten.

'Pray for tomorrow. As long as you wake up alive, you will always find a way.'

***