Page 34 of Tusks And Conditions

Behind us, the bar erupts.

Not in laughter, exactly. In something deeper. Guttural barks and table-slapping and what I think might be applause but sounds more like a series of small explosions. The motor-oil voice rises above the rest.

"Ironjaw! She's got you by the ear! Literally by the ear!"

"Dreck." Jagger reverberates through his skull and into my fingers. "I will come back and remove your spine."

"No you won't," I say, and steer him left onto the street.

He doesn't argue.

The Thornwall District at night is everything my risk assessment predicted and worse. The streetlights flicker in a pattern that suggests either faulty wiring or sentient malice. Something with too many legs scuttles across a fire escape three stories up. The sidewalk has cracks wide enough to lose a shoe in, and every doorway holds a shadow that is either a person or something that used to be one.

I keep my grip on his ear and walk faster.

"Sabine."

"No."

"I can carry you. This neighborhood is not safe for⁠—"

"You don't get to protect me right now. Right now you are in the penalty box. The penalty box does not come with speaking privileges."

His ear is warm under my fingers. The skin there is softer than anywhere else on him, which I know because three nights ago I mapped every inch of available surface and filed the data in a part of my brain that has no business existing. His pulse throbs against my thumb. Still too fast.

We make it to the main road where the streetlights actually function. A cab idles at the corner. The driver takes one look at the enormous Orc being led by the ear by a woman in beige business casual, and his eyebrows climb into his hairline.

"Get in," I tell Jagger.

The cab's rear suspension groans. The entire vehicle lists to the right as he folds himself into the backseat. I slide in beside him and give my address.

The driver pulls away from the curb. The cab stabilizes. Barely.

"Sabine. I left because⁠—"

"Because you're an idiot."

Pause.

"Because you decided that your feelings about my safety were more important than my feelings about your presence. Which is not protection, Jagger. It's control. And I already fired my last therapist for being less insightful than a spreadsheet, so I am not interested in having this conversation with someone who thinks leaving a coffee-mug paperweight constitutes adequate notice."

The cab takes a left. Jagger's massive frame sways into me, then corrects. His pack sits between his boots like a guilty dog.

"I will not apologize for wanting to keep you alive."

"I didn't ask you to apologize for that. I asked you to come home."

His jaw works. The silver piercing catches a passing streetlight and throws a brief spark across the cab's interior. He says nothing for four blocks. Five. Six.

Then, so quiet I almost miss it under the engine noise: "I missed your oatmeal."

"My oatmeal is objectively terrible."

"Yes."

We pull up to my building. I pay. We ride the elevator in silence, his bulk taking up two-thirds of the available space, his pack dripping something onto the floor that I choose not to investigate. I unlock my door. He ducks through it. The Snarbo launches itself off the couch and hits him mid-chest with all eyes weeping in transparent joy.

"Down," he rumbles, and the creature melts to the floor, vibrating.