When darkness falls, Tanith rises from her work and stretches, her spine curving in ways I’ve no business noticing.
She studies me with an expression I’m learning to interpret—exasperation layered over a gentleness she conceals as carefully as I conceal my own responses.
“Arax. When did you last rest?”
“Rest isn’t?—”
“When?”
I consider the question. Process the timeline. Arrive at an answer I don’t wish to share.
“Niren Hollow. Before the ambush.”
“That was five days ago.”
She crosses to where I stand and stops close enough that I can count the individual variations in her irises. “You’re my protection detail, apparently. If you collapse from exhaustion at a critical moment, that protection becomes meaningless.”
“I won’t collapse.”
“You’ll rest anyway.” Her hand rises, hesitates, lands on my forearm. The contact sparks through my nerves—not painful, not unwelcome, but intense enough to disrupt coherent thought. “That’s an order from your partner.”
“You can’t order me.”
“I just did. Sleep, Arax. I’ll take first watch.”
The suggestion is absurd. She requires rest more than I do—human physiology is far more demanding than dragon—and allowing her to guard while I sleep inverts every protective instinct currently driving my behavior.
But her hand remains on my arm. Her eyes hold mine with an intensity that makes refusal difficult.
“Two hours.”
“Four.”
“Three.”
“Done.”
She releases my arm and moves toward the cot, lowering herself onto its edge with her back against the partition. Her position gives her sightlines to both the entrance and the space where I stand.
“Rest. I’ll wake you if anything develops.”
The arrangement is pure operational absurdity. My vigil is what matters.
I move to the opposite side of the tent and lower myself to a seated position against the wall. Not the cot—even my current state of compromise doesn’t extend to sleeping in a bed while she watches from a chair.
“Close your eyes.” Amusement threads through her tone—rare, and startling. “I won’t let anything eat you.”
“That isn’t my concern.”
“What’s your concern?”
You. You’re my concern. Everything about you—your safety, your proximity, your continued existence—occupies the space in my mind that used to contain mission parameters and strategic objectives.
“Nothing requiring discussion.”
She makes a soft sound that might be laughter. I close my eyes.
I don’t rest. Not truly. But her presence settles into the space around me—steady, close, undeniable.
The last thing I process before the drift takes me is her breathing. Steady. Present. Close.
