He tilted his head, still smiling, as if waiting for her to elaborate.
She blinked, her snarl faltering.
"No, you idiot, I meant—" Her words died in her throat, drowned by the absurdity of his question.
He just returned to brushing the flute, humming again, oblivious to the storm brewing in her chest.
Nyxsha growled and stormed into the shadows, her tail whipping hard enough to topple a crooked stone column with a crash.
Dust billowed, bones rattled, and she didn't look back.
Later, Azareel approached her with a cracked stone bowl filled with murky water, his movements careful, almost reverent.
"For you," he said softly.
She slapped it out of his hand, the bowl shattering against the wall in a spray of shards and liquid.
"I am sorry." He apologized, his voice gentle, and swept up the pieces without complaint.
Later still, she found him folding her nest of torn cloth and bones into a softer shape, his bloodied hands working with quiet care.
She tore it apart in front of him, ripping the fabric to shreds and scattering the bones with a snarl, then stalked out of the cathedral into the ashen fog outside.
He followed, ten steps behind, his limping gait steady despite the pain etched into his face.
She roared at him, her voice shaking the twisted iron spires around them.
He stopped walking, but didn't retreat.
He waited, his silver eyes calm, unyielding.
When she was fifty paces away, she turned to glare.
He waved, a small, earnest gesture that made her fur bristle.
She turned back, furious, and kept walking.
She glanced again—still there.
Like a stubborn weed in a cracked stone.
That night, Nyxsha brought him to the edge of a chasm, a gaping wound in the Abyss's flesh where the wind howled like a dying beast.
Below, acid fog swirled, its greenish glow illuminating writhing tentacles that snapped at the air.
The pit was a death sentence, a place even monsters avoided, its edges slick with the bones of those who'd ventured too close.
She stood at the precipice, her black fur rippling in the gusts, her eyes fixed on the swirling depths.
Azareel sat on a jagged rock nearby, humming his clumsy tune, his torn robe fluttering in the wind.
"See that?" Nyxsha said, pointing into the pit, her voice sharp.
He looked, his silver eyes reflecting the fog's sickly light. "It's beautiful."
She blinked, her tail freezing mid-lash. "It's a death pit."
He nodded, his expression serene. "Still beautiful."
Nyxsha rolled her eyes, her growl rumbling low in her chest.
She took a step toward him, her massive form casting a shadow that swallowed his frail frame.
He didn't move, didn't flinch, just met her gaze with that maddening gentleness.
She bared her fangs, her voice dripping with venom. "I eat people like you."
"I thought you had no appetite," he said, his tone light, almost teasing, echoing their earlier exchange.
Her claw twitched, digging a gouge in the stone. "I kill everything I touch."
"You haven't killed me."
"Yet."
"You dropped me in bones."
"You deserved it."
"I agree."
Her growl built like a drumbeat, vibrating through her chest.
She loomed closer, her voice a snarl that shook the air.