Nova Peak blutbefleckt

the shift of rocks beneath his paw dragged mahler out of another soft free-fall. finding the strength to lift his ears and sweep his distant gaze across the inside of the cave, the man nodded and at last his efforts failed. sinking to his belly, the gargoyle shifted himself with agonizing movements onto his side, curling into the darkness far beyond the mouth.
only then did his teeth grit finally, visibly; eyes shuttered, jaw gone to clenching as ripples of fire pulsed along his torn neck. he lay still until the torment had passed, swallowing the bile that threatened to choke him with vomit.
"vylla," he rasped from the shadows, "do not — please do not allow phaedra to see me this vay," mahler begged, heart thudding as he imagined with horror how his small lilyflower might internalize this.
he had lost thade to the wilds, and phaedra had escaped into herself — mahler could not conceive that more hurt should come to the girl around his actions.
"not now, not until i can ... explain." a breath, a weak reaching for her sunflower eyes, and then mahler drooped, at last, into a true faint.