Saya and the Dragon Chapter 216: Sands of Time

Chapter 216: Sands of Ti

The sand is warm and soft and treacherous, like half the n I’ve ever trusted.

Waves creep up the shore, lick at my ankles, then slither back with a hiss like they’ve reconsidered their life choices. Behind is a perfect trail of —each step, each little press of toes and heel, a neat line of proof that I existed here, that I walked and breathed and cursed the gods on this stupidly pretty beach.

Then the next wave rolls in and erases like I never happened.

Just… shwoop. Gone. Blank. Smooth. Like I was never here at all.

I sigh. It escapes before I can stop it, sothing long and heavy and stupidly sentintal. I watch another wave co in, nibble away more of , and I think of all the things I’ve bled and sweat for that vanished just as clean. Brothels. Lovers. Coins. Nas. Lies. Every “forever” that lasted a season, if I was lucky.

“One day,” I mutter, toes curling into the wet sand as it sucks gently at , “this is us, you know? Washed away. Like footprints. Like we never—”

He exhales behind . You wouldn’t think a sigh from sothing bigger than a barn could sound tired instead of thunderous, but it does. There’s this low, old sadness in it that makes the wind feel older too.

“I rember when this bay wasn’t here,” he says.

I blink. I turn.

He’s sprawled like an accidental mountain along the curve of the shore, tail curled lazily, wings folded, chin propped on one forearm like this is just another afternoon—and not so quiet, aching eternity he’s casually referencing. The light paints his scales gold and bronze and old scars white. There’s sand on his snout. He hasn’t noticed.

“Before the sea chewed through that cliff face,” he continues, nodding at the far side of the water. “Before these dunes. Before the little fishing village that thought they could chase off with nets and good intentions. Before… this shape of the world.”

His eye rolls toward , lazy and ancient and unbearably smug.

“So forgive , dear, if I don’t weep over footprints.”

I stare at him.

Then I throw my hands up.

“Fuck you, old lizard.”

He huffs, amused, a little plu of smoke curling like the world’s most judgntal incense.

“It’s just—” I kick at the sand hard enough to spray it everywhere. “It’s depressing, alright? I get one miserable, ridiculous, naked little life. One. I get sold, beaten, branded, fucked, stolen, rescued, lost, found—” I gesture at the waves, helpless and furious. “And it all gets wiped clean like I was so ssy chalkboard nobody liked the lesson on.”

The sea answers with another indifferent rush.

He watches for a long mont. The wind tugs at my hair. I suddenly feel very small and very loud.

Then his voice cos soft. Too soft. It makes sothing in my chest pull tight.

“Sand forgets,” he says. “The world does not.”

I snort. “Poetry now?”

“Shut up and listen,” he snaps automatically, then gentles again. “You think you vanish because a wave erases your outline. But you’ve burned cities into stories. You’ve carved scars into people. You’ve burrowed under my damn scales and made a nest there.”

His gaze lowers, ets mine.

“I will rember you when this bay is a mountain again.”

Sothing traitorous and embarrassing prickles behind my eyes.

I turn away fast, scowling at the sea like it personally offended .

“Still,” I mutter. “lodramatic bastard.”

He gives a lazy, self-satisfied rumble. “Takes one to love one.”

“I don’t—” I start, then stop, then grit my teeth. “Shut up.”

A wave washes over my feet again. Warm. Brief. Alive.

Behind , he shifts closer. Just enough that his shadow falls over , his warmth against my back like a promise he’ll pretend he never made.

The sea keeps breathing. I keep standing. Neither of us disappears. Not today.

I wiggle my toes in the sand and sigh.

“…still fuck you,” I say, quieter.

“Of course,” he replies dryly. “But you’ll have to get in line.”

The thought sneaks up on the way bad truths always do—quiet, sharp, impossible to shake once they land.

He’ll still be here.

Not here here, on this exact smug patch of sand with my footprints getting bullied by the sea—but sowhere. Watching coastlines change nas. Watching empires sink politely into the water. Watching new idiots build cities right where the old idiots drowned.

And I won’t.

My toes dig in harder, like that might anchor to sothing that doesn’t give a shit.

“You’ll be around,” I say, not looking at him, “long after I’m gone.”

The words sit there between us, ugly and plain and very hard to laugh off.

For once, he doesn’t make a joke.

He nods. Just once. Slow. Ancient. Like he’s acknowledging a law, not an opinion.

“Yes.”

I swallow. “But you’re old. I an—really old. Ancient. You talk about bays like they’re bad renovations.”

Another nod. A faint, tired smile curling one side of his mouth.

“And you,” he says, “are like a firefly.”

I turn sharply. “A what.”

“A firefly,” he repeats, unbothered. “Bright. Annoyingly energetic. Impossible to ignore. You blaze like you’ve stolen light from sowhere and refuse to give it back.”

He lifts one claw, watching it catch the sun.

“But you burn fast.”

There it is. No poetry cushion. No mythic varnish. Just the truth, laid bare and unsentintal as bone.

“Oh,” I say.

It cos out smaller than I an it to.

I wait for the sting. For anger. For the familiar itch to bite back.

Instead there’s just this strange, hollow quiet inside , like when the music cuts out mid-dance and you realize how tired your legs actually are.

“A firefly,” I repeat. “So what, I blink in and out, make a nice impression, then pff. Darkness.”

He tilts his head, considering.

“No,” he says. “Darkness is what cos before and after. You’re the interruption.”

I glance at him sideways.

“That’s supposed to be comforting?”

“It’s factual,” he replies. “Eternity is mostly empty. You don’t asure light by how long it lasts. You asure it by whether it changed the night.”

The sea hisses again. Another wave steals another step of . I watch it go, then shrug, because what else is there to do.

“Well,” I say, rolling my shoulders, “good for the night, then. Lucky bastard.”

He snorts. “You misunderstand. Fireflies are not replaceable.”

I blink.

“You don’t get many,” he continues, voice lower now. “Most things live dim. Careful. Predictable. You don’t.”

I look down at my feet, at the sand clinging to my skin like it’s trying to rember .

“…still kind of unfair,” I mutter.

“Yes,” he agrees imdiately. No argunt. No correction. “It is.”

That does it. That cracks sothing.

I sit down hard in the sand, knees to my chest, suddenly exhausted by the effort of being bright all the ti. The world slls like salt and warm stone and endings that don’t care about my opinions.

After a mont, I feel it—his tail settling behind , solid and warm, a ridiculous, ancient thing choosing to be right here anyway.

I lean back against him despite myself.

“Don’t go getting sentintal when I die,” I warn.

He exhales, slow and smoky.

“I will be unbearable,” he says. “Entire centuries of it.”

I huff a laugh, weak but real.

“Good,” I say. “I’d hate to be forgettable.”

The sea keeps moving.

For now, I’m still lit.

***

So that’s what I am.

A firefly.

I roll the word around in my head like a coin, testing the weight of it. Not a princess. Not a curse. Not a chosen anything. Just a little blinking bastard with bad timing and worse survival instincts.

Good for one night.

Good for a brief mory.

I watch the waves chew at the shore again, patient as tax collectors. Another line of sand disappears. Another proof-of- gone.

Figures.

I’ve always been rented short-term. Bought for an hour. Promised forever by n who couldn’t rember my na by morning. I was never ant to last. I was ant to flash. Distract. Make soone look up from their miserable little life and go, huh. That was sothing.

Then back to dark.

I pick up a bit of driftwood and snap it between my fingers. It gives way easy. Everything does, if you lean on it long enough.

“One night,” I mutter. “That tracks.”

I glance back at him, sprawled there like the world’s oldest bad decision. Immortal. Endless. Still breathing after bays get bored and rearrange themselves.

“And a brief mory,” I add. “You sure know how to sweet-talk, you know that?”

He doesn’t rise to it. Just watches , that old, heavy gaze that has seen too much to bother lying now.

I sigh and tip my head back, staring at the stupid blue sky like it owes an explanation.

“Well,” I say finally, “if I’m only here to blink, I might as well do it properly.”

I rub sand off my palms, stand, and brush myself off with exaggerated care, like I’m preparing for a performance. Because that’s familiar. That I know how to do.

“No point in being one of those sad little bugs that barely lights up,” I continue. “I’ll be the annoying kind. The one that gets in your eyes. The one you rember because it ruined the mont.”

I grin, sharp and crooked, and look straight at him.

“Try forgetting that, old lizard.”

For a heartbeat, sothing flickers in his eye. Not amusent. Not pride.

Grief. Anticipated. Hoarded. Ancient.

He says nothing.

I turn back to the sea before he can say the wrong thing.

The wind lifts my hair. The salt stings my nose. My feet sink into the sand again, fresh prints already forming, already dood.

Good.

Let the night notice .

If I’m a firefly, then I’ll burn bright enough to be a problem.

Even after I’m gone.