Page 2 of Thexan

It was strong.

Too strong.

The beat pressed against my fingertips with a force that didn’t match his condition, steady and insistent, as if his body were driving itself forward through will rather than stability. The texture beneath my touch was wrong in ways I was still adjusting to, the scaled surface holding heat differently, the structure beneath it less forgiving.

“That’s not right,” I murmured.

I leaned in slightly, concentrating on the rhythm beneath my fingers.

His hand moved.

Not fast enough to startle me into pulling away, but deliberate enough that I felt it before I fully registered it. His fingers closed around my wrist, the contact firm without being forceful, anchoring rather than restraining.

I stopped with my fingers still against his pulse.

His eyes remained closed, but the faint tightening along his jaw told me he was not as unaware as he looked. I watched his face, waiting to see whether he would surface or let me go.

The contact, however, changed something.

I felt it immediately.

My pulse shifted beneath his grip, the rhythm no longer entirely my own, heat spreading along my skin where he touched me in a way that had nothing to do with exertion or the warm air in the room. It wasn’t unpleasant. It wasn’t even painful, just unfamiliar.

I steadied my breathing before I answered him.

“Let go,” I said, keeping my voice even.

His fingers tightened slightly, though not enough to hurt. It was an answer, a silent refusal.

I exhaled softly through my nose, glancing briefly at his hand before returning my focus to the work in front of me.

“Fine,” I murmured. “We’ll do it this way.”

Instead of pulling free, I shifted my stance and continued the assessment with my other hand. Working around his grip as though it made no difference at all, I remained aware of the way my pulse had changed beneath his touch. The contact settled into my skin in a way I couldn’t ignore, not distracting enough to stop me, but present enough that I had to force my attention back where it belonged.

Little by little, the force of his heartbeat eased beneath my fingers until the relentless pressure became a rhythm I could believe his body might sustain.

It wasn’t just a consistent response—and that made it something I couldn’t ignore. I stilled, my concentration sharpening as I tracked the change. It was subtle but real.

My gaze shifted from his chest to his face, then briefly to where his hand circled my wrist before returning to study him more closely.

“Interesting,” I said under my breath.

I didn’t understand it yet. But I would. For now, he was alive, and I wasn’t letting him die.

Chapter Two

Thexan

Consciousness did not return all at once. It surfaced gradually, sensation layering over darkness until there was no longer any separation between the two.

Pain anchored me first.

It spread along my side in a steady, controlled burn, not sharp enough to disrupt awareness but persistent enough that I could not ignore it. The damage was deeper than the initial impact had suggested. My body was attempting repair, but the response was inefficient, the process slowed by disruption along my neural pathways.

I remained still long enough to let my senses recalibrate. Instinct urged me to rise, assess, eliminate. I refused it. Moving before I understood my condition would worsen the damage, and I had survived too much to make that error now.

The air was wrong.