Page 36 of Tusks And Conditions

I take the pen. Flip to page three. The signature line waits, bordered by tiny runes that pulse in slow, patient gold. My initials will dissolve the bond. Hers will seal the dissolution. Clean. Legal. Final.

I set the pen down on the table.

"No."

Her eyes snap to mine.

"What do you mean, no?"

"It is a short word. Two letters. I am confident you have encountered it before."

"Jagger." Color floods her cheeks. "This is a legally binding government document. You can't just say no to a legally binding government⁠—"

"I just did."

"That's not how bureaucracy works!"

"And yet."

She presses both palms flat on the table, leaning toward me. The tremor runs through her wrists and into the wood. The spreadsheets crinkle.

"You left," she hisses. "You left me a note on a coffee-mug paperweight and disappeared into that horrible office with the leaking ceiling and the floor that smells like wet dog and old blood, and now you're sitting in my kitchen refusing to sign annulment papers? You do not get to do this. You do not get to⁠—"

Her words crack.

One crack. Hairline fracture. Right down the center of the word "this."

The Snarbo whimpers and covers three of its eyes with a tentacle.

I push the papers to the far edge of the table, out of her reach.

"I am not signing those."

"Pick them back up." She points at the papers like they personally offended her. "Pick them up and sign them like a rational adult."

"No."

"Jagger Ironjaw, I swear on every tax code in the federal register⁠—"

"I am not signing them because I do not want to."

That stops her. Not the words. The way I break on want. I have taken crossbow bolts to the shoulder with more composure than this. Sabine stands frozen with her index finger still aimed at the annulment papers, her mouth slightly open, her brown eyes too wide behind her glasses.

The Snarbo slinks under the couch.

Smart creature.

"You don't want to," she repeats. Flat. Testing the sentence for structural integrity.

"No."

"That's... that doesn't..." She pulls out the chair across from me. Sits. Folds her hands on the table in front of her, fingers interlaced. I have seen her do this exact posture in her office when a client's numbers do not reconcile. "Please explain your reasoning."

My reasoning. She wants my reasoning. As if what is happening inside my rib cage can be organized into columns and balanced at the bottom of a ledger.

I look at her hands. Still folded. Still trembling. She tucks her thumbs tighter to hide it.

"Three weeks ago I was sleeping on a concrete floor. I had a bounty contract pinned to the wall with a hunting knife. The ceiling dripped something brown into a bucket I had to empty every four hours. I owned two shirts, both of which had blood on them. I ate cold meat out of a tin and I read my books by the light coming through a crack in the wall because the electrical wiring is a fire hazard I cannot afford to repair."