Four Suits (Book 1)

Day 43: Hearts

Though her eyes are open, she can't think of why.

Her lids are droopy and leaden, but they're fixed above, as if glued that way. The cool air and a foamy fragrance—the distant lurching of waves—it surrounds her, muddled in her ears.

Slowly and reluctantly, Leda moves her sore hands and heavy arms to shield her face. It's wet. Soaked, even. Water? She blinks in the darkness her palms bring, closes her eyes, and blinks again. Streaks of sunlight penetrate the cracks of her fingers.

Every fibre of her body urges her to scratch her way to standing, find out where she is, but she can't muster the strength nor reassess the nightmare currently replaying like a record beneath her eyelids.

So she just lies there, in her drenched clothes, a numbing cold shooting from her back down to the heels of her feet and the lofting smell of the sea clogging her nostrils.

Her body shivers uncontrollably when she finally clambers her way upright on the patch of snow she's surrounded by. She immediately wants to grab her arms and retain the body heat currently escaping her, but it's tough to move them. It's like they've become icicles themselves. Almost like she's ended up swimming in a sea of ice...

Leda shifts her gaze right. Her surroundings are white for as far as she can see, save for the frozen water on the ocean ways ahead. Then, propped against seemingly nothing, is Orian. Leaned against his hand, his ears are flat on his head, fluffy tail wrapped around his now bare arms and sleeveless turtleneck. His jacket is nowhere to be found. He's also wearing his creepy Meisyr mask to primarily hide his eyes, but the rest of it is still chipped and ruined from their encounter with the Northern Dragon.

His mouth is the only thing revealed, and it's trembling. When Leda identifies the spade-patterned fedora rested upon his drenched pants, it takes everything she has to subdue a wheeze.

Nixon's hat.

But she doesn't see Nixon.

She can't spot Ro either.

Leda moves her mouth to shout but she only ends up emitting strangled gasps—like a fish struggling to breathe when on land. Nevertheless, it catches Orian's attention. His body jolts and he scurries to her side, keeping his injured hand motionless at his side.

"Master Leda." His shaky voice is smothered in relief. "Thank goodness. Are you all right? Please tell me you are."

Leda feels almost like a baby, how wordless her lips flap for awhile.

"Ro... wh-where i-is..."

"Master Ro is fine," Orian assures her. "He's still unconscious but I'm afraid his condition is extremely dire. I gave him my coat to keep him warm but it isn't working. We need to find him a doctor, and fast, or else—"

She grasps at the first thing she can: the soaked fabric of his thighs. Orian's words lodge themselves in his throat. His mouth collapses into the shape of an 'o'.

They're both wet. Did he swim them out here? Have they shipwrecked? And where are those two Hearts? Countless questions swim around in Leda's mind. But when she grapples the fabric even further, Orian seems to catch on to the one that's firing like police sirens in her head.

He can clearly see what she's fixated on—the fedora he'd knocked onto the snow on his way over.

Leda's eyes begin to blur.