He went back to the shelf and returned with the warmed pot and a strip of clean soft leather, and began to apply something cool and faintly sharp-smelling to my forearm. Arnica, I thought, or whatever the prehistoric equivalent was.
His hands were steady. Mine weren't, quite, and I was grateful that he didn't remark on it.
I watched him work, the firelight catching the reddish tones in his beard, the small crease between his brows that appeared whenever he was concentrating on something that mattered to him. He applied the salve with the same deliberate gentleness he brought to everything, smoothing it along the marks Nathan's fingers had left with strokes so light I could barely feel them.
The silence between us was warm. Safe. I let myself sink into it.
"Rivik," he said finally. "Why he angry with Nathan?" I sighed, watching as Daska wrapped the strip of soft leather loosely around my forearm. Not tight enough to be a bandage. Just enough to protect the skin while the salve worked.
"Tell me," he said.
"Nathan," I said slowly, trying to put it together in his language. "He grab me. Rivik see. Rivik angry because... Nathan hurt me?"
Daska nodded, but he frowned.
“Why Nathan grab?”
I closed my eyes.
"Angry because I stay here. He want to leave. I say Dev not ready, and he—" I mimed the grab, his fingers closing around my arm. "He hold me. Shout."
Daska didn’t say anything, but I could feel the sudden shift in his mood, the tension that filled his body. He seemed to grow bigger in the dancing firelight, even though he hadn’t shifted.
"How angry you?" I asked.
He didn't look up. "Not at you."
"I know. How angry?"
He looked at me, eyes full of fury and tenderness combined. "Very."
"He always like that," I said, and wasn't sure why I was explaining. Some leftover reflex, maybe. The old habit of softening Nathan's edges for other people, making him smaller and less alarming so everyone else could be comfortable. "Not that bad, but... like that. Yes."
Daska sat down and took my hand in his. I watched, looking at how small my hand seemed in his big one.
"You were with him." It wasn't quite a question.
"Three summers."
“He hurt you then?”
I shook my head. “Not grab. Not hit. Hurt…” I trailed off, not quite knowing how to say it. Daska knew.
“Hurt here.” He reached over and gently touched my forehead. “And here.” Another touch, this time to my heart. I nodded, feeling my throat tighten and not quite understanding how this man could see me so clearly.
“Ellie.” He cupped my face with both hands, making me look up at him, his dark eyes intent. “Daska not hurt Ellie.” It wasn’t exactly a statement this time, more a promise, as though he was trying to convince me. My heart ached for him.
“Know. Know here.” I touched my heart. “Daska not hurt. Daska not break.”
His thumbs traced along my jaw, light as moth wings, and he looked at me for a long moment as though he was memorising something.
Then he leaned forward and kissed me.
Not like the first time, which had been desperate and breathless and full of everything that had been building between us for weeks. This was slower. Softer. The kind of kiss that had nothing to prove. His hands stayed cupped around my face, holding me like I was something worth holding carefully, and I felt my eyes sting and press close to stop myself from crying, which was absolutely ridiculous and I didn't particularly care.
When he pulled back, he rested his forehead against mine. His breath was warm against my lips.
"Daska not break," he said again, very quietly.
