Behind him, Drazan is still, as if that one word hit him just as hard as everything else.
Kael’s chest rises and falls too fast. Too uneven. His body is still on edge, still caught somewhere between what he was and what he’s becoming.
I feel it in the way his arm shifts against mine. Not pushing away. Not pulling closer. Just… holding.
“To save her,” Kael repeats, quieter now.
Not questioning. Testing it. Turning it over.
Drazan nods once.
“Yes.”
The silence that follows is heavier.
Kael’s gaze drifts, just slightly. Not away from Drazan, but through him, like he’s seeing something layered over the present.
“I remember…” he starts.
This time, something comes with it.
His shoulders tense. His jaw tightens.
“They were everywhere,” Kael says, voice low, uneven. “Closing in. You?—”
He stops. Breath catching.
“You were still fighting. Still pushing forward.”
Drazan doesn’t interrupt. He just watches.
“You wouldn’t leave,” Kael says, the words coming slower now, dragged up from somewhere deeper. “You kept turning back.”
My heart stutters. That doesn’t sound like abandonment. It sounds like truth.
Drazan exhales.
“I wasn’t going to leave you there,” Drazan says.
Kael’s head jerks slightly, like the words hit too hard, too fast.
“But you did,” Kael snaps, the edge back for a heartbeat. Not as strong. Not as certain.
Drazan doesn’t deny it.
“I did.” Kael’s breath stutters again. “You told me to,” Drazan adds more quietly.
That—that’s the blow that lands.
Kael goes completely still, like everything inside him just hit something it can’t push past.
“No,” Kael says, but it’s not sharp. It sounds like something breaking.
“You told me to go,” Drazan repeats. “You told me to take her and get out.”
Kael shakes his head. Slow at first, then harder, like he can force it away.
“That’s not?—”
