His, their rebirth was uglier than her first. Where Caenis had been gently eased from her mother and swaddled in silk, blood washed away by gentle hands before the newborn princess was presented to her father, Caeneus clawed and chewed and fought free of the earth's womb. His tomb. Winning free after years awake and aware, naked, Caeneus collapsed to shiver in the moldering leaves littering the forest floor, choking and vomiting centuries of mud and rot out of his lungs, the stench of the spattered mess tainting the first true breath taken since he'd been forced into the ground.
The filthy man squatted back on his heels to shake the clods of dirt from his hair, clawing the mud from his eyes to blink slowly, struggling to quiet Caenis long enough to gauge their surroundings and assess possible threats. They were alone. Of that, Caeneus had no doubt, his senses honed razor sharp by years of hunting and battle. The forest was dark and still, save for the soft, natural sounds of those animals more accustomed to the dark, and the warrior stood slowly, faltering as limbs long held prisoner took their own time relearning to whom they belonged.
A questioning brush against his mind, and the man swayed, palm pressed to the sturdy trunk of a nearby tree as he fought to answer her, himself. Years had given them opportunity to come to terms with the maddening dichotomy of sharing their mind, but fresh out of their prison, Caeneus refused to let her come forth, fighting to make her understand. Too soon, too dangerous... too filthy.
The last at least won him what felt like a laugh, even if was tinged with hysteria, and his lips curved in a reflection of the sound echoing through his mind. Laughter was world better than the screams that had marked their shared awakening. Screams and terror, tears and desperation. Stumbling, sometimes crawling, Caeneus dug mud out of his ears to listen carefully, sorting through the night song until he was rewarded by the gurgle of water flowing over rock. The pool was shallow, but the water spouting from a cleft in the rock was pure, clean and he drank until the mess in his gut rebelled and Caeneus threw himself to the side to vomit on the ground, unwilling to foul the water. The cycle repeated over and over, Caeneus began to despair but eventually, when he was too weak to lift his head even to wretch, the water miraculously stayed in his belly.
Eventually, Caeneus heaved himself into the chill pool, scrubbing at skin that would have been bloody and torn save for Poseidon's gift. That, at least, had remained intact. Under the years, centuries' worth of grime, his flesh was unmarred. Not a scratch, not a bruise. No evidence of his entombment save the dark memories that would forever linger to haunt their shared mind.
As close to clean as could be managed, Caeneus struggled out of the water to flop onto the narrow bank, the stars above blurring as tears came. So long lost, so long trapped... if not for her...well, he had gone mad. They had both gone mad, unable to move, unable to communicate past desperate shrieking. While time did not heal all wounds, it had at least tempered the madness, provided them an opportunity to reach rather than lash out, and had she not calmed his desperate spirit, Caeneus had no doubt they would still lay trapped underneath the earth and stone used to murder him so many eons past.
He had won free; it was time to see if she had survived, as well. Caeneus deliberately closed his eyes, shutting out the stars to imagine reaching for her, unsure how else to test if their theory held true. Reaching... reaching... breath held until his lungs ached to burst and then...