At that moment, she was sure that she would die.
She couldn't deduce how she felt towards it, the thunderous growl of the dragon sending everywhere quaking to the extent that she had been vibrating on the ground she had fallen to.
Her heart was hammering, the racing of her chest painful to the point that she could feel it in her lungs, throat, everywhere.
Her eyes were shut tight, her eyelids aching from how hard she was squeezing them, her lips trembling and even though she felt the need to cry from her fear, her tears had deserted her, her throat betrayed her and her tongue felt nailed down to the roof of her mouth.
She couldn't say a word.
There were small rocks falling from the top of the den on her, like it would collapse anytime soon.
Maybe that was what the beast wanted. To watch her die from something else asides from her flames, crush this den on her, bury her alive, and give a 'befitting burial' to her master.
At that moment, Belladonna's hatred for the beast was boundless.
What a cruel creature.
What an embodiment of evil.
In her mind, her last words played. They were a jumble of words and her thundering heart didn't allow her to make sense of it but she was sure that it had involved Eli.
A good part of it had.
Suddenly, she couldn't hear it anymore.
The ground had stopped its quaking, the walls had ceased their trembling and small muddy rocks had stopped raining on her.
She peeked, peeling open one eye after the other, only to see that the dragon had turned away from her and set its eyes on another prey, but there was no one else here, no one else except, well, Eli but he was dead.
There was no way the dragon could be attacking a dead man.
The light red glow that caught her eyes made her thoughts take another turn though. The dragon was huge and she could barely see anything from here as it obstructed her view but that light, she was sure about that light.
Her heart leaped in hope but she tried to suppress it from racing wildly in her veins.
She had to be sure, she couldn't just rush to a conclusion and base her hope on just the ray of glowing red light.
With a last growl, the dragon slid aside and landed on the floor that trembled as the body came in contact with the ground and the beast let out a weak cry.
Eli was breathing heavily behind, and she could see the damage the dragon had made to his face that she hadn't seen before. It had scratched out fresh scales, there was blood everywhere and his gloves were ripped apart.
His gaze was set on her, and her eyes welled up with tears as she moved up to her knees, the dragon fallen between them, the distance feeling little the longer they looked at each other, the sound of their breathing all they could hear.
His chest was racing and falling weakly.
He was breathing.
He was alive.
Alive!
She knew it.
That mask was a mistake.
It wasn't a sign.
Her Eli couldn't die just like that.
Her Eli couldn't die.
Her lips parted to say his name but that only resulted into a choked gasp when she watched him slip weakly down to the floor at that moment.
She scrambled to her feet, walking around the dragon, the distance seeming like one that would never end, the gigantic distance caused in-between them by the beast, an awful stress.
She wanted to get to him already, and when she finally did, her hands hovered above his body, in an attempt to help him out of here and get him to a physician as soon as possible, but everywhere she made an attempt to hold only looked like it promised pain for him.
Her breathing was loud, and it was becoming increasingly hard to force away her tears so she could remain clear-headed at this moment.
Why was she crying so much?!
This wasn't the right time to cry.
This was the right time to get into action.
Wait.
She would need to get him out.
His mask wasn't here.
He didn't want anyone to see his face, and although Belladonna believed that the hallways would be empty right now, she still didn't want it to be that at his vulnerable moment, the part of him he had hidden the most would be left exposed.
Her gown had taken many hits from the raining rocks earlier and it was way too easy for her to rip the lower part of the lining fabric, and wrapped it carefully around his face, ensuring that he was still breathing while she did that.
He let out a little groan and she smiled, tears rushing up her eyes against her will.
She reached down to his hands to find his gloves gone, ripped apart, and scattered on the floor. Her heart skipped a beat in fear for only a second before everything seemed to have faded away into a distance, every sound, every sight, every smell, all of it, except for the zigzag lines on his hands that stretched to different parts of his hands, looking like dark spider webs that designed his skin.
It was like an entire entity on its own, she could see inside his hand, all a composition of the dark artistically carved webs.
They called to her.
They enticed her with a beautiful harmony of voices that seeped into her ears, and held her captive.
A temptation she couldn't resist.
There was also that rich earthly smell.
Ah.
How could something smell so perfect?
So alluring.
So wonderful.
True, she had never smelt something so wonderful in her entire life.
It was beyond what words could describe, it was beyond that which she had the words to describe.
It was beyond anything and everything.
It was alluring.
Everything was alluring.