"We're there." He set her on her feet.
"Oh goody," Kira muttered. Resignation filled her.
They moved out of the cover of the trees, Kira taking those last few steps on her own, her pace slow and measured.
"See the conveyance," Graydon murmured. "Make it there, and you're done."
She could do that. She'd pay for it later, but she could do it.
The trek across the small distance felt interminable. The edges of her vision were fading as Graydon snapped a few words. The Roake near the conveyance moved, opening the door and stepping back.
Graydon was careful not to touch her during the forced march.
Kira reached the conveyance and stopped, staring at the two stairs standing between her and blessed unconsciousness. They might as well have been a mountain guarded by a fast-moving river, that was how much of an obstacle they presented.
"One step at a time," Graydon murmured.
One step at a time. Like everything else in life. Focus on the next thing. Only then could you look up.
Kira didn't know how she made it up the steps, her vision entirely gone, her head spinning. Finally, she collapsed inside, Graydon crowding in after her. She was past caring who saw or judged. Her body was done.
Darkness reached up for her; she reached back.
*
Kira groaned on her return to consciousness. Her body hurt, but not to the extent it should have. Before, it had felt like she'd burned off a couple of layers of skin. Now, she felt better than she had any right to, not good as new, but close.
She blinked up at a strange ceiling.
"Jin, we're going to need to talk about what you term non-lethal," she muttered.
She sighed when he didn't answer. She wasn't surprised since the comms had gone dead somewhere in the middle of that last barrage, the energy coursing through her system from the laser fire probably shorting them out.
Kira shifted in the comfortable bed, taking in her surroundings. This wasn't her tiny, dark room in the initiates hall, nor was it the med bay.
She'd been an unwilling guest of too many a hospital room not to recognize when she was in one. None of those had looked anywhere near as inviting as this.
The walls were stone, the furnishings comfortable and of obvious quality. Narrow windows marched along one wall, and a fireplace took up one corner, the fire within bringing the comforting smell of burning wood as it chased away any lingering chill.
Unlike Luatha, which seemed to prefer bright whites, the room had a color palette that was warm and welcoming. Homey, for lack of a better word.
This was the sort of place you'd look forward to coming home to at the end of the day.
It was someone's room, Kira decided as her gaze found the man sitting in a cozy-looking chair next to the bed. He stared at something in his lap.
Kira almost didn't recognize him without his synth armor.
She started to sit up but didn't make it far before the pain that had been absent upon waking made itself known.
"I'd take it easy," the man said, not looking up. "The healers did a lot, but it'll take more than twenty-eight hours of rest for you to heal."
Kira relaxed into the bed and stared at the man, her gaze roving over familiar features, ones she saw in the mirror every day, ones nearly identical to the statue Graydon had showed her of the previous Overlord.
This man was older than the one who'd posed for the statue, the rigors that came from living a hard life stamped on his face, but the line of his jaw was the same, the set of his eyes. Hair so red it was nearly black was pulled away from his face, exposing the harsh lines of his features and the neatly trimmed beard he wore. She suspected that hair was nearly as unruly as her own.
A scar bisected one eyebrow, missing the eye, before continuing on to his cheek. Another smaller scar was visible on his forehead.
The man was huge, giving Graydon a run for the name Mountain. His long sleeves had been pushed up, exposing forearms corded with muscle. His chest was broad, his legs the size of tree trunks.
