Close enough to feel.
Not close enough to reach.
I take point because I refuse to let anyone else risk the edges. The path here is barely a path at all — more suggestion than structure, crumbling stone that shifts under every footfall. One wrong step and the mountain will swallow you whole.
Behind me, the group moves in exhausted silence. No one has the energy for conversation anymore. Even Finn has gone quiet, his usual chaos muted by cold and fatigue.
I check on her without meaning to.
It’s become reflexive. A glance over my shoulder every few minutes to confirm she’s still there, still upright, still breathing. I tell myself it’s tactical. That I’m monitoring the group’s weakest points.
I’m lying.
Kaia walks a few paces behind Torric and Finn. Her gait is stiff — exhaustion she won’t admit to, wearing at muscles that have been pushed too hard for too long. Bob prowls at her side, edges sharp. Mouse scouts the ledges ahead, darting between shadows with predatory focus.
Her shadows are wrapped close today. Tighter than normal. Protective in a way that tells me she’s more strained than she’s letting on.
Her breath fogs in the air. She keeps rubbing her arms.
I hate that I can’t give her my coat anymore. That she wouldn’t accept it if I tried.
The boulder came two days ago.
Loose stone, weakened by frost. It broke free without warning — a crack, a rumble, and then half the mountainside was falling toward Darian.
I moved first.
Her shadows moved faster.
The Eds swarmed — dozens of them, throwing themselves between Darian and the crushing weight of stone. The impact was brutal. When the dust cleared, several of them were just gone. Crushed. Unmade.
Kaia gasped. Her hand went to her chest — to the bond, I realized. The one she shares with all of us. The one that includes him now, whether any of us like it or not.
That’s when I understood.
She won’t let Darian die. Even now. Even after everything.
Not forgiveness. Not yet.
But connection.
And connection is what terrifies me.
I’ve started noticing the pattern.
It’s subtle. The kind of thing you’d miss if you weren’t watching. If you weren’t cataloging every movement, every glance, every unconscious shift of weight.
But I am watching. I always am.
Every time Darian stumbles, Kaia glances back.
Every time the air thins or the footing gets treacherous, he moves closer to her. Automatically. Like gravity.
Every time she slows, his pace matches hers.
She tries to ignore it. Pretends she doesn’t notice the way their orbits keep intersecting.
Her shadows do not pretend.
