Grief. Real grief, moving across her face. She knew what was in that chest. She knew what it cost him to keep it closed and what it cost him to open it.
“Good,” she says. Quiet. Then, to me: “And you said his name. No conditions.”
“No conditions.”
She looks at Thyran for a long time. Whatever she sees in his face — the way he sits closer to me, the way his hand rests on the table near mine — it makes something in her settle.
“Thyran.” She points her spoon at him. “She’s terrifying.”
“I know,” he says. There’s something in his voice that wasn't there when I left. Warmth, and not the kind his body produces. The kind that only comes from sitting at a table with people and talking.
The dinner stretches long. The fire burns down. Eira talks easily, and Thyran talks more than I've heard him talk to anyone who isn't me. Short sentences. Sparse. But he’s talking. Responding. Present. And from the way Eira watches him, this is more than she'd have believed possible.
She stands at the door when she finally leaves. Her coat over her shoulders, the cold pressing in from outside. The conversation has been warm all evening, open, almost light.
Then she looks at me. Direct. The humor gone from her face.
“There are soldiers. South. Human military. They've been asking questions in the trading posts, showing a description.” She holds my gaze. “Word travels fast in the territory. It won't take them long to find their way here.”
The warmth in the hall drains out through the walls.
I think about the scout at the door, weeks ago. Thyran filling the doorway, his face flat, telling a woman he'd known for years that he hadn't seen anyone. Lying to his own people. For me. That was a patrol checking the perimeter. This is different. This is soldiers with a name and a purpose.
Thyran goes still beside me. I feel his temperature climb. Not desire. Something else.
“How many?” I ask.
“Small patrol. But they're thorough.” Eira’s eyes are steady. “I thought you should know.”
She looks at Thyran. At me. Back at Thyran. Then she steps out into the cold and pulls the door shut behind her. Her footsteps crunch across the packed snow and fade.
I stand in the hall, look at the fire and think about soldiers. About the army I walked away from. About commanders who lie and orders that kill and the length of their reach into territory that isn't theirs.
My hand finds the knife at my belt. Old habit.
Thyran puts his hand on my shoulder. Heavy. Warm. Steady.
I lean into his hand. The weight of it. The heat of it soaking through my coat.
The hall is warm behind us. The Wastes are cold and wide and somewhere south, men with swords are looking for me.
His hand tightens on my shoulder. He doesn't ask if I'm afraid. He already knows I'm not.
THYRAN
Three days of something close to peace. She reorganizes the storage. I hunt. We eat together at the table. She tells me the venison is overcooked, and I tell her the fish are in the wrong order again. Neither of us means any of it. Both of us know.
She sleeps against me at night. Her back to my chest, my arm around her, the comb on the table where she sets it after braiding her hair. The hall is warm without tending the fire. My body heats the stone and the stone holds it and she sleeps through the night without dreaming.
On the fourth day, they come.
I hear the footsteps before I see them. Boot leather on packed snow, the rhythm of a formation. Human feet, human weight, human pace. Not Jötunn. The stride is too short and too even.
I'm at the door before Eseld looks up from the shelves. She sees my face, and her hands go still on the jar she’s holding. She sets it down. Wipes her palms on her trousers. Reaches for the knife at her belt.
“Stay behind me,” I say.
“No.”
