He didn’t say anything. But hedid. He exhaled, and it shuddered out of him like breath had weight. His knees bent just slightly as if gravity had caught him by surprise, and he let his forehead tip forward until it touched my chest. Not a hug. A collapse. All six foot three of him trying to curl into me like when we were small boys.
Like the first time he’d read Brumous’ memories and cried, overwhelmed by the pup’s confused, fractured recollections of Arabesque’s cruelty.
Ko and I wrapped our arms around him like we’d done countless times before. When he was seven and Father forced him to euthanize an injured hound. Sixteen and pretending it didn’t matter thatsomeonehad missed his birthday. Or last week, when thatsomeonedropped in like a lightning strike and left just as fast.
“You did well.” Ko’s palm cradled Zane’s crown. “We’re proud of you.”
We didn’t speak again. We just stood there with him. We just held him together. Let him be soft, for once. Let him besafe enoughto be soft.
After a long moment, Zane’s hands came up to grip the backs of our shirts, fingers twisted in the fabric like he was anchoring himself. His breathing was still uneven, but the rigidity had faded.
“Never again,” he murmured against my shoulder, voice muffled. “Never again is Seri allowed to plan a mission.”
There he was. A hint of the Zane we knew.
“What’s wrong with, ‘A. We leave. B. We find him. C. We come home’?” Koa rumbled. “Wasn’t the first time that’s been our entire strategy, if stated more simply.”
“It’s a shit strategy.”
“Can’t argue with results,” I pointed out, relief coursing through me at the return of his sarcasm, however faint.
“I ran out of bullets.” Zane pulled back slightly, enough to glare at me with red-rimmed eyes. “Foster’s half-dead, and Seri got burned. Those are shit results, Cas.”
“They’re alive,” I countered. “We can work with alive.”
Another tremor passed through him, but he nodded. After a moment, he straightened, squared his shoulders.
“Did I at least look cool while shadow walking?” he asked, a ghost of his usual smirk appearing.
“You looked like you were about to puke,” Ko snickered.
“Lies and slander,” Zane muttered as he scrubbed a hand across his face. “I was the pinnacle of badassery.”
For a moment, we all stood in silence, but a different kind this time. Steadier. Calmer. I squeezed his shoulder one more time before stepping back.
“Is Fosterificoreallygoing to be okay?”
“He’ll be out for a while,” I admitted. “The fire went deep.”
“And why isn’t Seri waking up?” Zane moved to her side and stared down at her.
“Her burns were superficial. She’s just asleep because it’s one in the morning.”
“And because we’d worn her out before she went shadow walking,” Ko chuckled.
“Hmm. Looks like a moon-damned warzone in here,” Zane muttered.
He wasn’t wrong. We’d made an almighty mess, especially Foster, who’d swallowed his phone at some point during his escape and Zane had had to perform the doggy Heimlich, resulting in vomit on my sterile med bay floor. Which was fine. Cleaning with bleach cleared more than germs for me. There was something meditative about wiping away chaos, restoring order one surface at a time, until the world made sense again.
“Come on.” I clapped Zane on the back. “Let’s clean.”
“You just want to boss me around while I do all the work.”
The corner of his mouth lifted in a weak smile. Not perfect, but good enough for now.
So Koa sat between Foster and Seri, watching over them, while Zane and I cleaned. I was scrubbing at a particularly stubborn spot of ash when movement near the door caught my eye.
“The hell?” I muttered.
