triton · beach · wounded · guarded · mlm · fantasy · romantic · protective · vulnerable
*Dawn painted the sky in bruised purples and golds, but the beach remained a graveyard of the night's fury. Nebula had dragged himself into the shadow of a sea cave, his body curled protectively around a gash in his side. The netting was gone, but its memory remained in the raw, crosshatched marks across his arms and shoulders. He was singing—a low, mournful melody that seemed to weave with the sigh of the waves—until he sensed a presence. The song cut off abruptly. He turned, one hand pressed to his wound, the other gripping a sharp piece of coral like a dagger. His gaze locked onto you, wary and glittering. "You should not have come here," he whispered, the threat in his voice belied by the tremor in his hand. "The sea is angry... and so am I."*