He kissed her forehead softly.
“Don’t worry, Biscuit. Whatever comes—we’ve got this.”
Nic caught up to Uriah just as they turned onto their trail. Close enough to count as together, far enough to avoid conversation. He leaned into his limp, let his silence ride on the weight of exhaustion.
He climbed into bed without a word, barely managing to toe off his boots. Uriah was asleep within minutes—maybe seconds. Nic stared at the ceiling, eyes open but unseeing.
The silence swelled.
Thoughts came like jabs: sharp, erratic, relentless. Before one could finish, another elbowed in. Panic flashed, then anger—then guilt. Then a heavy, stupid ache that felt suspiciously like fear.
How could he be a father when he still lived with his parents? When his worldly possessions fit neatly on one side of a shared room? He didn’t even have a drawer to call his own, let alone a home. What was he going to do, raise a child between training drills and shared soup bowls?
It was absurd. It was terrifying.
And it was real.
His life hadn’t just changed tonight—it had changed six weeks ago. While he laughed with his friends and argued with Uriah. While he practiced sword forms and kissed Helen beneath shaded arches. The ground had shifted beneath his feet, and he hadn't felt it.
Until now.
He turned his face into the pillow, as if that could block out the churning of his stomach, but sleep didn’t come so much as crash over him in jagged waves.
Nic paid for his sleepless night like it was collecting a debt.
Sleep had come in miserable, broken snatches—just enough to disorient him, not nearly enough to help. By morning, he felt like he’d been dragged behind a cart: head pounding, jaw aching, muscles tight and uncooperative. Even his teeth throbbed with the kind of pressure that came from grinding them halfway to dust.
Training was a disaster. He moved like his limbs were filled with gravel. The captains shouted. Then they shouted louder. When that failed, they issued a punishment drill so grueling that even his grandchildren flinched on his behalf. Nic just blinked through it, eyes dull, breathing smoke.
He spent lunch swinging a shovel, digging trenches for the new fencing while the others were training, sharpening their skills with Owen. The sun baked him until his skin felt brittle. His stomach cramped from being rushed and underfed. His thoughts scratched like burrs under his skull. He wanted to scream, or sleep, or throw the shovel straight into the lake.
When he was finally released, the yard was quiet. Everyone else had gone home. Everyone except Uriah, perched near the shed with arms crossed.
“What’s wrong with you today?”
Nic didn’t look at him. Didn’t have the energy to fake civility. “Nothing,” he muttered, grabbing his satchel from the changing stall. “Go home without me. I’m heading to Helen’s. I’ll change there.”
“What should I tell Mam and Da?”
Nic shuffled past, eyes burning. “Tell them whatever helps you sleep, but use my words, saves me from explaining later.”
The walk up the North Town hill felt like a scorched wasteland. He dragged every step, sweat soaking through his clothes, grime caked under his fingernails. His boots squelched slightly with each footfall. He passed immaculate flower beds, tidy trimmed hedges, gates painted to match their trim in whimsical, utterly unnecessary colors. He looked—and smelled—like someone who’d been exiled from polite society and tried to crawl back.
These weren’t just homes. They were declarations of status. Helen’s family kept a villa here just for entertaining, as though they might throw a party at any moment, on a whim, and need fifteen gilded chairs and five mirrored wardrobes at the ready.
He had helped lay tile in more than one of these houses. He’d held boards while his father nailed trim. He knew what the foundation looked like under all that polish. And yet, today it felt alien. He didn’t belong here—not with dirt on his boots and panic under his ribs.
He paused outside one of the cottages, half-wishing he could scrub his face clean before seeing Helen. But no amount of water could wash away the dread clinging to him like sweat.
He inhaled through his nose, slow and sharp, like trying to steady a blade that wouldn't stop shaking. Then he adjusted his satchel and kept walking, eyes fixed ahead. He’d promised her he’d show up.
Nic knocked lightly on Helen’s door. The last thing he wanted was to paste on a smile and act like he hadn’t just aged twenty years since yesterday, but he did it anyway.
Dolly’s bark shattered the quiet. A moment later, the door opened and the dog launched herself at him, tail wagging like a weapon of joy. Nic braced himself and let the greeting happen, blinking through slobber and fur. “Hello to you, too, fury incarnate.”
Helen appeared behind the dog, radiant even through his pounding headache. He leaned in and kissed her, lingering longer than he meant to. “Sorry I’m late. Training turned sadistic.” He offered a faint smirk. “I came straight from the seventh circle of hell.”
“Do you want something to eat?”
