Page 31

We'd gone maybe twenty paces under the canopy when it hit me that I'd never done this before.

Not just walking through Gledhi with someone else. Walking through it at all without the collar's silence sitting between me and everything alive around it. Every other visit, day or night, the black crystal had muffled the forest into something distant and manageable, a shape I understood rather than a thing I felt.

Now there was nothing between us.

Roots spread out beneath my boots in slow, patient networks. Insects moved through bark in numbers I couldn't have counted if I'd wanted to. Small quick heartbeats scattered through the undergrowth in every direction, birds settling and resettling overhead, something larger breathing steady and unbothered somewhere off to my left, it pressed in close enough that my steps slowed without me noticing and my hand rose toward my throat.

There was nothing there to reach for anymore.

That was the problem.

I made myself breathe the way I'd been taught, narrowing instead of shutting down, finding myself first, then Ashter, then letting the rest of it exist at the edges without chasing any single thread of it. It took longer than it should have. Long enough that I noticed Alex had gone quiet beside me.

He hadn't said anything. He hadn't touched me or asked what was wrong or done anything except match his pace to mine and wait, which was somehow worse and better than if he'd simply asked outright.

By the time the forest settled back into something I could hold without effort, my hand had dropped back to my side on its own.

"Alright?" Alex asked, easy enough that if I hadn't caught the careful way he was watching me, I might have believed he hadn't noticed anything at all.

"Fine."

"Didn't ask if you were fine. Asked if you were alright."

"Same thing."

"Sure it is." He didn't push past that, which was the only reason I let it go too.

Ashter pressed hard against my leg for a few seconds longer than the moment required, warmth radiating up through my side before he decided I'd stabilized enough to go bother something else, and bounded off toward a fallen log like nothing had happened at all.

Alex watched him, then glanced at me. "So, where are we going?"

I looked at the path ahead. "I don't know."

He nodded like that was perfectly reasonable.

I didn't ask how he managed to be comfortable with that.

A few hours later, I sat beneath the broad roots of an old Silverbark tree while Alex tried to convince Ashter that retrieving sticks was an essential skill.

It started by accident. Alex had picked up a fallen branch and tossed it out of the way while we crossed a shallow stream. Ashter chased it, grabbed it in his jaws, and came back with enough enthusiasm that Alex took the whole thing as an invitation. Twenty minutes later, he was still doing it.

"This makes no sense," Alex said through his laughter as Ashter skidded through a patch of leaves, missed the stick completely, and had to double back. "You're supposed to be a murderous lump of coal. You shouldn't be this cute."

Ashter found the branch, crushed one end between his teeth, and came charging back with smoke curling behind his legs.

"He'd probably be offended if he understood you."

Alex took the wet, mangled stick from Ashter's mouth. "He understands me."

"He understands that you keep throwing things for him."

"That's the foundation of a strong friendship."

"You've known him for a few hours."

Alex glanced at me. "Funny. Somebody said something similar to me earlier."

I narrowed my eyes.