Fuck.
"The point," Ursik continues, undeterred by my lack of attention, "is that I'm going to dominate tomorrow's Leprechaun Trail. Kerra and I have a strategy. We've been planning routes all week."
"There's no dominating," Kai points out with the patience of someone who's explained this concept multiple times already. "It's not a competition. The whole point is partnership bonding."
"Everything's a competition if you have the right attitude."
"That's why you lost three fingers to frostbite two winters ago." I shift position, the new angle giving me better sight lines across the hall. Still no sign of her. "Too competitive to admit when you needed to stop."
"I got those fingers back."
"After I spent six hours reattaching them while you complained the entire time."
Ursik waves off the memory like it's irrelevant. "Details. The important thing is I won that challenge."
"You nearly died."
"But I won." He grins with the particular brand of stupidity that's kept me employed as a healer for years. "And I'll win tomorrow too. Watch and be amazed."
Kai catches my eye over Ursik's shoulder, his expression carrying a knowing quality that makes my spine stiffendefensively. He's noticed I'm distracted. Noticed I keep scanning the crowd instead of engaging properly with their conversation.
Noticed I'm waiting for someone.
"Speaking of partnerships," he says, tone carefully neutral in a way that immediately puts me on guard. "How are things progressing with yours?"
"Fine." The answer comes automatic, clipped. "Ressa's doing well with the festival activities."
"Doing well." Ursik's eyebrows climb toward his hairline. "Is that healer-speak for something more interesting?"
"It's regular-speak for she's managing the challenges without issue."
"Right. Managing." He exchanges a look with Kai that I don't appreciate. "Nothing else happening there."
I level him with the flat stare I usually reserve for patients who insist injuries aren't serious despite obvious evidence otherwise. "What exactly are you implying?"
"Nothing! Just making conversation about festival partnerships and bonding progress and—oh, there's Saela."
Kai's entire demeanor shifts the moment Ursik speaks. The careful neutrality dissolves into something warmer, his gaze tracking across the hall to where Saela's just entered with Shae. Even from this distance I can see the way his expression gentles, the slight curve to his mouth that he probably doesn't realize he's doing.
"I should—" He doesn't finish the sentence, already moving toward her with the single-minded focus of someone who's stopped pretending he has other priorities.
Ursik watches him go with a grin. "Look at him. Completely gone."
"You say that like it's a bad thing."
"Not bad. Just funny watching the mighty warrior reduced to puppy eyes over a human female half his size." He takesanother drink, his attention shifting back to the crowd. "Though I suppose we're all—wait. Is that Ressa?"
My entire body goes taut like a bow string drawn too tight.
She's standing near the entrance with Shae, the two of them clearly just arrived together. And she looks?—
Fuck.
Beautiful doesn't adequately cover it. Ressa's wearing a green dress I've never seen before, simple in design but the color brings out the warm undertones in her skin, makes her brown eyes look almost gold in the firelight. Her red hair falls loose around her shoulders instead of tied back, soft waves framing her face.
She looks healthy. Rested. The gauntness that haunted her features for weeks has filled out slightly, her cheeks carrying color instead of the pale exhaustion of someone barely surviving.
She looks like herself again. Like the person she was before everything went wrong.
