Across the deck, I feel his presence before I see him.
Garokk kneels in the shadows just beyond the main console, one hand braced against the metal like it’s the only thing holding him upright. He’s bloodied—arm gouged, shoulder torn, knuckles split wide open. His chest rises and falls like he’s been drowning and only just now remembered how to breathe.
But it’s his eyes that catch me.
Not wide. Not pleading.
Just… open.
Raw.
Waiting.
I rise—slow, careful, still holding Pyramus to my chest. My boots echo on the grated floor.
He doesn’t speak.
Neither do I.
Not at first.
He looks down. Not at me. At the boy. At the soft curls pressed to my shoulder, at the small hand curled in the fabric of my coat.
He knew. Heknows.He’s always known.
But I haven’t said it.
Not out loud.
Not until now.
“He’s yours.”
The words aren’t loud. They don’t need to be.
And they’re not a confession.
They’re arelease.
A truth that’s lived in my body since the day I realized I was carrying him. Since the day I thought I’d lost both of them.
It hangs in the air like smoke and starlight.
Garokk flinches.
Just once.
Then he nods. Slow. A breath hitching in his chest.
“I figured,” he rasps. “When he looked at me… I figured.”
I kneel beside him, still holding our son.
Pyramus stirs, lifts his head. Looks at Garokk. Then at me.
“Is he staying?” he asks.
His voice is soft.
