Yishumi

"Where is he?" I asked in a panic. No one met my eyes.

I felt like the air from sucked out of my lungs. The air around me was sucked up into a vacuum as well. Everything was losing colour.

Why wouldn't they tell me where he was? I needed to see him!

I ran towards the forest. My feet were barely grazing the mud underfoot. The heavens were crying onto my face and the orishas were trying to swallow me into the soil. But I resisted their hold! I needed to get to him before it was too late. I needed to make sure he was safe.

He was all the family I had left in this world.

He's all I had left.

I needed to find him.

Please, father, grant me your strength, I begged him through the grey cloak of the weeping sky.

"Nik!" I heard a voice all call out. That must be him. I am getting close, I told myself. I was almost there.

"Nikola!" The voice called out desperately. I could feel the furious heat course through my veins and towards my eyes and I allowed the both my internal flames and the cosmic plasma collected by the gods merge as I scorched the trees before me and raised the forest to the ground. I would not even allow mother nature to stand in the way of me reaching my brother in time.

I needed to find him.

I reached the edge of a cliff and looked ahead onto murky waters.

"Nikola!" I heard coming from beneath the grey waters. I jumped off the cliff and into the watery depths. I felt the shock of the impact penetrate my entire body at once, but it didn't stop me. I forced my frigid muscles to push through the frozen water and towards the darkest depth of the ocean. Almost there, I told myself.

I kept swimming. I swam thought the pain and the pounding migraine forming at the base of my skull. I didn't care. I kept swimming. Pain is temporary, I told myself. I swam until I lost all sensation in my legs, but still I trusted that my arms would pull up the slack. I swam until my lungs screamed and tore at themselves. I couldn't see anything – there was an endless nothingness surrounding me and all the air was missing from my world. I didn't care. I fought to go on. I just needed to go a bit further, but every muscle was enflamed and agonizingly useless against the frozen void. I couldn't breathe. I couldn't see and it was all my fault. He was going to die.

It was all my fault-

"Nikola!" I was suddenly jolted out of the darkness and into crushing embrace. I tied to pry my eyelids open, but they were too oxygen-deprived to cooperate.

"Breathe, skatt. Breathe, Nik!" She said into my ear. I tried to focus on Melissa's voice. She was here and I was with her. It wasn't real, I repeated in my head.

"It's my fault, "I wheezed out. She shook her head and kissed my forehead.

"It's okay, skatje. Just breathe.," she whispered, pulling me into her loving embrace and rubbing soothing patterns along my spine. I just held onto her for dear life and allowed myself to dissolve into a puddle of sobs into her shoulder.

"It's going to be okay, skatt," she whispered, kissing my shoulder, and laying back with me in her arms. I continued to sob silently, clinging onto her small frame and attempting to match her breath pattern.

"Just breathe", she repeated, "just breathe".

The sun was pouring over the long dining table as I munched down on my gecko strips in silence. I could see Sam and a tired Lissa exchange worried glances but neither of them spoke about it. We were not alone in the dining hall, so it was not the most appropriate time to do so but either way I was grateful.

"You ready, ghost?" A familiar voice interrupted the awkward peace we were sitting in. I rolled my eyes at the braided haired warriors' appearance. His sleeveless leather vest was so blatantly a seduction piece that it was cringeworthy. Not to mention his insistence on wearing the tightest breaches on Nana Buluku' luscious green Earth.

I glared at him. But what irked me most was the smile on Sam's idiotic face. What part of Saley's insistence on the use of the derogatory term was funny.

"Wouldn't miss it, fluffy," He quipped back. This was getting ridiculous.

Sensing my annoyance, Lissa connects the dots for me, "Desaley here, is being kind enough to show Sammy how to hunt this land." I roll my eyes, I already knew that, but that didn't explain the weird niceties between them. I didn't like it.

"What time you heading off?" Saley's annoying voice piped up.

"Last I checked, I answer to the chief not you," I snarl. He only scoffs.

"You're the watch dog for my princess. I think I deserve to know," he said. It was my turn to scoff at his entitlement.

"You're a runt. You're not entitles to shit," I said simply, smirking at his clenched fists.

"Nikky," Sammy whined. I rolled my eyes and leaned back in my seat, glaring at the pest until he finally got the message and left us alone.

"Catch you later, ghost," He said before walking off.

We finished our breakfast quickly after that, allowing me the opportunity to get my bags together in a haste. I placed my bags at the door of the bedroom before taking a step out to the balcony and motioning for Lissa to join me. She grinned and walked into my awaiting arms. I stood with her secure in my embrace, looking out over the rainforest.

I kissed her behind her ear, hearing her sigh out and relax deeper into my arms, before whispering, "I'm going to miss you." She turned in my arms and smiled up at me. I smiled back. Nothing else mattered when she was in my arms. Everyone and everything else could fuck off and die and I wouldn't care because the woman I love was safe in my arms and smiling at me in a way only she knew how.

We both leaned in and our lips joined in a soft embrace. Kiss Melissa was like coming home and for someone how has been without one for as long as I could remember, that was an irreplaceable feeling. One, I would fight … kill to ensure that I never lost it.

"I'll miss you more, skatt," she whispered against my lips. I smiled against her lips when I kissed her again. I took my time kissing her top lip then her bottom lip and then I moved my lips across her face, peppering her face with delicate kisses all over her beautiful face. Listening to her giggle in delight was another gift I didn't deserve but was more than happy to receive.

This weekend was going to be horrible without Lissa and Sam beside me, but I had a job to do. Like Sam said, the sooner I could get Riley hitched to some unfortunate bastard, the sooner I would be free to resume my life with the people who actually mattered – my family.