valar morghūlis | umber

Umber now knew exactly how Georgie must have felt yesterday when he'd fallen through that hole: there one second, gone the next. But at least she had the fortune of knowing where he'd gone. As they continued to make their way down the shoreline, Umber had found himself prattling on and on about nothing in particular, really. He looked over his shoulder to make sure his friend was listening, and instead found that he'd been talking to himself.

"Georgie?"

He looked down at the sand. There was only one set of tracks- his own- and much of them were already being washed away by the incoming tide.

Instantly, he pulled out his sword. Georgie wouldn't have run away wordlessly, he could feel that in his gut. But looking around him, Umber struggled to find any place she may have easily disappeared into. There were no tracks at least so far as he could see which led back up to the forest from here, there was no way she was fast enough to have already climbed to the top of the rocky cliffs ahead. He didn't see any sinkholes or caves to duck into for cover. All that was left was the ocean itself.

Panic quickly began to set in then. He hadn't ever seen a shoreline in person before now, but he knew they were dangerous. Unpredictable. Walking down the entire length of one in a place like a Hunger Games arena wasn't a smart move. Umber kicked himself for not having realized it sooner; it was only ever a matter of time before something nice in an arena turned out to have a sinister twist!

Before he knew it, he was submerged in the incoming tide up to his waist, hands cupped around his mouth as he shouted her name over and over- "Georgie! Georgie!" to not avail. Scanning the horizon, he saw no signs of her princess dress floating by. Perhaps it was a good sign. Perhaps it was proof something more sinister than the waves themselves had taken her.

After several minutes of panicked searching, he began to accept that he wasn't going to find her here. He slammed his fists down into the water hard enough to sting the flesh of his knuckles. Then he chopped at it with his sword, water splashing up all around him- "No!" He shouted. It wasn't fair! Every time Umber convinced himself things were going well, something absolutely horrible happened! Running into careers left and right, falling through holes, scraping his shins, and living freakin garden decorations trying to decapitate him with swords. Now this: his one and only true friend in this Game, gone without a trace.

Very suddenly, the sky grew dark. The sun had not even been on the verge of setting yet only moments before, and now it may as well have been midnight as Umber's gaze shot up into the sky. He saw not a moon, not stars twinkling up above, but something else entirely. A creature. A huge, moving creature, with wings big enough to blot out the very sun. Umber's jaw dropped in awe and he instinctively lowered himself further into the water to hide. It was jarring enough to see a creature like this in real life. Realizing it was in the process of landing nearly made him piss himself. At least I'm in the water, he thought, the grip on his sword shaky at best.

He knew what it was. He played too much tabletop roleplay not to. A wyvern perched on the salt bluffs before him, easily dwarfing a horse as it turned its massive head to slowly regard Umber with red eyes. Umber did not move. He dared not even breathe. At first, he swore the creature's pure black scaled skin was moving, swirling like smoke in a lightless room. Then he realized he was seeing smaller wyverns crawl around the large one's torso.

They all stayed that way for quite some time: the large one staring at Umber in the water, Umber trembling and staring back, the little ones crawling about and not taking any notice of their current situation. Over the next few minutes, a few more smaller ones also descended from the sky, also quickly climbing up onto the large one just as soon as they could, before being seemingly warmly greeted by the others. Umber realized he was seeing a mother and some fledgings, and he'd just interrupted a flight lesson. After the last of her children flocked to her, the black wyvern spread her massive wings as flew away toward the small island across the bay. The beaches were so close together here that he could see waves slapping against the other shore.

Realizing that if he had any chance of finding Georgie it was on that island, he marched over to the closest boat and flipped it right side up all on his own. Making sure to grab a pair of oars, he shoved off and began to paddle.

"I'm coming Georgie!" he called, "Hold on!"