“You’re upright,” I said, my voice echoing slightly as I approached.
Dane glanced up. Relief washed over his face, quickly masked by his usual deadpan expression. “Morning, partner. I’m told the coffee situation is dire, but the tea is acceptable.”
I slid onto the bench opposite them. “Dire is my baseline these days.”
“You look…” Dane tilted his head, assessing me.
“Like I slept on a rock?”
“Like you’re alive.”
“I’ll take it.” I reached for the thick ceramic teapot and poured a cup. A bowl of porridge sat waiting, steaming gently. It wasn’t what I’d normally eat, but my stomach gave a feral growl of appreciation.
Goran ignored the meal. He watched the perimeter of the room, his dark eyes scanning the still shadows.
“How’s the back?” I asked Dane, nodding at him.
He rolled his shoulders, a test of range. “Sore. But the shattered feeling is gone. That healer, Una… she’s potent. I feel restless. Sitting here is making my skin crawl. I need to move. Run drills. Something.”
“Maybe don’t bench press the furniture just yet,” I suggested, blowing on a spoonful of porridge. “We don’t want to undo the miracle.”
“I’m fine,” he insisted, his voice dropping into that stubborn register I knew too well. “I’ll be cleared for sparring by this afternoon if I have my way. I need to burn this off.” He tapped his chest. “Too much adrenaline with nowhere to go.”
“You know you don’t have to be here,” I said, watching him tear into the bread. “You were not seen during the extraction. As far as the precinct knows, you’re just a detective on medical leave recovering from back surgery.”
He paused mid-chew.
“I’m serious, Dane. You’re not on the wanted list. You could go back to your flat, sleep in your own bed, and pretend you haven’t seen me in days. You have an out.”
Dane swallowed hard. He set the bread down on the stone table.
“I told you,” he said, his voice low and unyielding. “I promised I would find who killed Eamon. That debt stands. But look around, Selene.”
He gestured with his bread to the empty atrium, where only a handful of people stood.
“You’re going up against Highspire. Against Korenth and Varessia. And what do you have? A consultant, a couple of archivists, and…” He glanced sideways at the massive figure beside him. “The numbers don’t add up. You need bodies. You need muscle. I’m not leaving you to fight a war shorthanded.”
He took a bite of the bread, chewing slowly, his look hardening.
“Besides, if half of what Riven says is coming actually arrives, you’re going to need someone watching your flank who doesn’t speak in riddles.”
He swallowed, and his focus drifted. He stared past me, locking onto the giant man beside him.
The silence at the table shifted, tightening into a razor’s edge. Dane studied Goran with a mix of confusion and instinctive agitation. It was the way a dog looks at a wolf through a fence—recognition, but wrong.
Goran ignored the scrutiny. He remained fixed on the dark corners of the atrium, a statue carved from patience.
“You’re not a Varkyn,” Dane said.
The statement landed like an accusation, delivered with awkward bluntness. Dane usually avoided poking bears, but his common sense had been hijacked by the instinctual curiosity of a wolf trying to place a strange new member of the pack.
Goran turned his head slowly. “No.”
“But you smell like one,” Dane pressed, his brow furrowing. “Not… exactly. But close. It’s like looking at a photo of a fire instead of feeling the heat. You’ve got the blood, but the instinct is different. Quieter. Older.”
I lowered my spoon. I recognised it too—Goran carried a dense, terrestrial gravity, entirely unlike the weightless frequency of Aetherkind.
“What are you?” Dane asked.
