Her head lifts sharply. “I was trying.”
The answer hits hard enough to cut through some of the rage. Trying to stand. Trying to do what the women did. Trying not to fail in front of the horde.
I look at her fully then and see it all at once. The terror. The shame of being afraid in public. The instinctive defense rising because she knows my anger is near and has not yet learned how often that anger points away from her rather than toward her.
I swallow the next hard words before they form.
When I speak again, my voice is lower. Rough. “You stood.”
Her eyes flicker.
I reach for her wrist instead of her shoulders this time. Less force. More anchor.
“Come.”
The walk back to camp is slower because of the injured. Warriors flank the women now, scanning every line of grass and stone. Keandra stays close enough to me that her shoulder brushes my arm once, then again when the ground dips unexpectedly. The contact should mean nothing.
It means too much.
Because I can feel how badly she is trying not to lean. How badly she wants steadiness without wanting to appear weak. How close fear sits to the surface in her.
I adjust my pace without comment. Shorter. More level. When the path narrows near a rock split, I put myself on the outer side automatically, between her and the open grass.
She notices that too. Neither of us speaks.
By the time the camp comes fully back into view, the story has outrun us. People are already waiting at the edge. Not crowding, but tense. Watching the return. Counting heads. Looking for blood and loss.
I feel the shift in the horde the second they see Keandra beside me. I walk her through the center line myself. Not because she cannot walk alone. Because the whole camp is watching, and what they see now will settle in them harder than any speech I could make. They will see blood on me. Dead predators behind us. The human wife beside me untouched. The meaning is clear enough.
No one failed under my protection. Not today.
Inside the tent, I turn on her the moment the flap closes.
“Sit.”
She obeys instantly this time.
I drop to one knee in front of her again and check her over a second time despite already knowing what I will find. No bite. No blood. No torn skin. My hands move over her arms, the line of her side, the edge of one calf where the grass scratched through the wrap.
Her breath catches. “Kaiven—”
“Quiet.”
The word is sharp enough that she goes still.
I find no damage beyond surface scratches and old fear. Only then does my body begin stepping down from the edge of rage.
I sit back on my heels and drag one hand through my hair, streaking more drying blood across my own skin. The scent of the kill is everywhere. Predator blood. Warrior sweat. Fear.
She watches me with those wide blue-gray eyes, and for the first time since the basin, I see what she saw. Not just her king. Not just her husband. The male who met violence with more violence and did not hesitate.
I reach for a clean cloth and wet it in the basin, then begin wiping blood from my hands and blade with slow, deliberate movements because if I do not do something with my body right now, the leftover need to kill will go searching for a target.
Finally, without looking at her, I say, “This is why you learn quickly.”
The tent goes quiet.
Then her answer comes softer than before. No defense in it. Only shaken truth.
