She screamed and struggled when the monster dropped her into the pot of boiling water.

She couldn't escape the hands that pressed her down, but they were human hands, and a human voice was telling her, "It's not as hot as it feels. You are just too cold."

She tried to look at him, he wavered in her vision, but the gold hair identified him as the stranger who had scooped her up. She couldn't help the way her body arched and tried to evade the hot water, but now she could see the solid outline of the tub, and recognize the burning sensation as being similar to what happened when you tried to enter a hot tub too quickly.

She could also see that she was naked, and she released her grip on him to cover herself. Her head was spinning, but she still pushed with her feet, and protested, "It's too hot!"

"It is too cold," he argued. "You have to adjust a little at a time, but this water is almost as cold as the ocean is at this latitude. If I left you in it for half an hour without warming it more, you'd probably die of hypothermia."

His words completely contradicted what her body was telling her, but the heat was triggering an uncontrollable shivering that made her teeth chatter too much to argue. The water felt like it was boiling hot.

She tried to focus on his face, but the strength of the chills that ran through her wouldn't let her. He was watching her though. And she was naked. "S'stop looking at me!" she demanded. Although if he wasn't human, maybe he didn't care. She shook her head. He was obviously human, this was obviously a bathtub not a pot, and she was delirious because she was sick.

She felt so shocked that she actually slid deeper into the water when he let go of her, turned around so that his back was against the tub, and said, "Sorry. I won't look, but I can't leave you alone in here. You weren't conscious anymore by the time we got here."

The way her chills started to subside into softer waves of shivers made her think that maybe he was telling the truth. Spending a few weeks on the streets during the winter had let her experience ranges of temperatures that she'd been insulated from her whole life. Going from the freezing cold into a warm room could cause chills like this.

"When it stops feeling like it burns, we need to exchange some of the cold water for hot," he informed her calmly.

"It still feels really hot," she protested. Although it wasn't as painful as it had been at first.

"It will," he agreed, as he leaned forward and pulled a large iPad off of the counter that held the sink.

She was pretty certain that monsters didn't use iPads. Or maybe they did, but despite the watery wavering of her vision every time she tried to focus on him, she was sure he looked completely human.

"What is your name, and your birthdate?" he asked.

"What's it to you?" she snapped defensively.

He held the tablet above his shoulder level so that she could see the screen without answering or turning to look at her, and she saw that it was showing an urgent care site that was demanding the patient's information. She blinked at the screen, and then looked at the back of his head.

She could read the words on the screen from here, but his gold hair still shimmered with the ripples of water, like the water that covered her, only clearer. She could see the dirt embedded in her skin slowly clouding the water, it was so bad. She looked up and watched his hair ripple. The ripple flowed across his shoulders too. She swallowed. Delirious. It was the fever. Probably.

"Anne," she said finally, but then she didn't know which name to give him, so she gave him her birthday instead.

"Pleased… well, not exactly pleased to meet you Anne. It complicates things, but it is of no matter. My name is Chris," he said calmly as he lowered the tablet.

"Sorry," she apologized.

Tears sprang to her eyes, and she cupped a handful of water to splash on her face. It shocked her with how cool it felt against the raw skin of her nose. And when it touched her lips she remembered how thirsty she was. She could feel the mucus she was cleaning off her face though, and she eyed the tap.

"Any history of asthma or other respiratory diseases?" Chris asked.

She shook her head, and then remembered that he wasn't looking at her. "No."

The thing with her eyes wouldn't fit into anything on one of those forms, so she didn't mention it. She reached for the tap and bent forward, but when he heard the water he reached back and stuck his hand into the stream, and then turned and scolded her, "Hot, you need to add hot water!"

"I was going to drink it!" she protested as she crossed her arms protectively over her chest.

He had already opened the drain and switched the tap to hot, but he nodded and said, "Ah. Hold on a minute, I'll go get you a cup."

She stared at his reflection in the mirror when he stood. His face was as ordinary as she'd guessed, but the ripples didn't distort his reflection the way they did his face. Another shiver wracked her, but she didn't know if it was from the heat that was already spreading from the tap to her knees and toes, or from fear.

Her head was spinning.

--

He stood at the heart of an empire, and wished again that he could see as others of his kind could see.

On the whole, his clever plan had worked very well.

For the first few thousand years of his life he'd been dependent on his father, who had maintained extra gardens for him. Normally dragons did not maintain filial relationships with either parent beyond their first few centuries, but he was blind. Not blind to the beauty of the world, but to its energies, and the energy of life that he depended on to sustain his own life.

The first few centuries of his life, the other dragon had even been forced to hold his head for him while he drank from the hearts that he could not see, but eventually he had learned to feel the flow somewhat, at least where it was very strong. From watching his father build gardens wherever they traveled, he gradually learned to correlate physical features of the world that either indicated or helped create those flows. His father liked to use trees, which were longer lived than many plants, but other dragons had their own preferences.

The mankind were clever, and they were also blind like he was, although they could survive on a much wider variety of food sources. The other dragons grumbled a lot about the way they blindly tore up any garden they came across. He noticed when some of the more clever ones began planting some of the seeds they harvested, and thus, his plan to maintain a garden of his own had formed.

Even though his father had doubted him, the elder had still helped him locate promising sites. His father chose the first places that must be planted, and those that must be kept bare stone, to bend more strings to feed the natural pool that he selected. They had built a heart large enough to feed a dozen starving dragons, because even if it wavered a bit, it would always be strong enough for him to feel.

He had chosen a strong tribe, and shown them where to build their homes and where to plant their seeds, and finally, he had been free. Or at least, he had felt free, even if other dragons thought that he was trapped. Keeping the mankind working on maintaining the flow of the strings was difficult at first, but he helped those who maintained the traditions he set for them, and those who refused quickly discovered the cost. And it had worked!

For a while other dragons had mimicked his efforts, although on a smaller scale because they were just playing around, and a circle of dragon protected kingdoms had risen around his own.

Perhaps because he always maintained a single large heart instead of wandering from place to place like the rest of his kind, or perhaps because he drank freely and often from the heart of his vast garden, or perhaps because he was blind, and could not see the way to encourage a single plant, he learned that he could absorb the excess energy collected in his heart and gift it back. He could emit energy that encouraged plants to grow somehow, like a smaller sun. His kingdom flourished and became an empire.

But, the mankind had eventually expanded his empire beyond his personal reach, and had created many other empires across the world that rose and fell. Even in times of destruction, their numbers continued to expand. He wasn't actually bound to his garden and his empire, so he traveled sometimes, to see the way they were expanding across the world for himself.

They also grew increasingly warlike. Those who took from those who produced had always existed, but the scale of those conflicts grew larger and larger, even in his own empire. Eventually he could not sleep without waking to find them marching armies with thousands, or even tens of thousands, across the fields that his garden required.

When the elders decided that the mankind were nearing the end of their increasingly painful existence, he had decided to give up on them. He had abandoned them. He had learned enough to survive without help, and so he had slept with the others.

But they had not died. And, although it had taken some searching, he had found the place that the energy at the heart of his garden had shifted to, and it was full. They had not abandoned all of the traditions he had given them. And no armies marched to war across the fields, although warriors of some kind did march through the cities according to the single servant who had waited in the palace.

That one also said that famine would come soon if the illness that was among them continued to spread.

He stood in the heart of his empire, on the vast stone heart with a palace built atop it, absorbing the energy that he could not see. Replenishing his own strength and preparing to gift the rest back to his people.