𝐠𝐮𝐚𝐫𝐝𝐢𝐚𝐧 𝐬𝐚𝐢𝐧𝐭 // 𝐧𝐢𝐤𝐨𝐥𝐚𝐢 𝐥𝐚𝐧𝐭𝐬𝐨𝐯

𝐬𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐧. 𝐯𝐮𝐥𝐧𝐞𝐫𝐚𝐛𝐢𝐥𝐢𝐭𝐲

CHAPTER SEVEN

Vulnerability

     Nikolai couldn't find Estelle.

The lake was littered with broken pieces of the glorious Hummingbird and Nikolai had lost his goggles and his wool hat, but those were the least of his worries. He had to find her. She knew he wouldn't be able to do anything after this without her.

Taking a deep breath, Nikolai submerged under the water, twisting around to look for sinking bodies. He came back up again for air, shouting her name a few times before swimming a different way to look.

When he was out of the water, he heard a meek voice somewhere to his right. "Nik—"

Nikolai's head snapped to where the sound was coming from, and nearly forgot how to breathe when he saw her, barely afloat with a piece of debris. Her hair was soaked and all in her face, her shoulder wound turning the water red. He nearly took another moment to admire her, until he realized that this was not the time for that.

As quickly as he could, Nikolai made his way through the water towards her and took her in his arms, adjusting her to the point where he'd still be able to swim to the shore.

When he got there, the rest of the crew were already there, some injured or unconscious. Tamar helped expel water from a sailor's lungs while Tolya healed Ana's side injury. It wasn't a deep one, but certainly a painful one. As soon as she saw Estelle in Nikolai's care, she scrambled towards them, kicking up sand.

"Tolya," Nikolai called, gently placing Estelle down. With her hair splayed out against the sand and water sputtering out of her mouth, she looked like a drowned rat. Still beautiful, just soaked. And dying.

Estelle groaned, shifting around, her hand shooting out to grab her shoulder. Her distressed state killed Nikolai, he wished he could take the pain away from her if he could. If given the choice, he would take the pain and give it to himself instead.

Tolya leaned over her shoulder and peeled away the clothes over top of it. The wound was severe, she was bleeding out of claw marks and teeth bites alike. Nikolai clenched his jaw.

The uninjured Squaller turned on Alina, furious. Nikolai watched both the encounter and Estelle at the same time. "What happened back there? Kovu was almost killed. We all were!"

Alina leaned her head against her knees. "I don't know."

"You don't know?" said the Squaller incredulously.

"I don't know," she repeated, anger shoving into her words. "I didn't ask to be shoved into the Fold. I'm not the one who went looking for a fight with the volcra. Why don't you ask your captain what happened?"