TWENTY-EIGHT #3
“My grandmother used to tell me stories. She said there would come a day when someone would rise—a girl touched by all four elements. Someone to bring balance back to the magics and push back the dark.”
Her eyes well with tears.
“She said you’d come to heal the land.”
Her fingers tighten around mine as though she’s afraid I might disappear if she lets go.
I swallow hard. The panic stirs again, the weight of it presses against my chest as the reality of this role rises up around me once more. What it means. What it demands. What people expect from me.
A hand settles on my shoulder and I look up.
Thane stands close enough that I can feel his warmth. His hand slides from my shoulder to the back of my neck, his touch light and reassuring. A reminder.
You’re not carrying this alone.
I draw in a breath and turn back to the woman. This time, I manage a smile.
I can’t give her false hope. She came here for a celebration and woke up in an infirmary. I don’t know what the future holds, and I don’t know whether I will become everything these people believe I can be. But I can give her this.
“I’m here,” I say, feeling more committed to my role in this war than ever before. “And I am at your service.”
Thane’s fingers brush the back of my neck again.
The bond shifts, subtle and certain, as though the space between us has narrowed without either of us moving.
Warm approval hums through the connection, followed by something softer that settles around my heart like a blanket. I don’t need words to understand it.
I stand, squeezing the woman’s hand. She holds on for a moment longer before finally letting go.
Thane’s hand brushes the small of my back. Not to guide me or to push. Just enough to remind me he’s there.
We keep moving.
Some patients bear burns. Others are wrapped in bandages, stitched and splinted. There are cracked ribs, shattered bones, and faces swollen past recognition. Injuries that will take time—and something deeper than time—to heal.
But not all wounds are visible. Some live behind the eyes.
Some people won’t look at us at all. Others hold our gaze as though it is the only thing keeping them from slipping beneath the weight of what happened. I see it in every face.
The memory of fire.
The memory of chaos.
The memory of music twisting into screams.
The night everything beautiful burned.
We stop at every bed.
Some of the wounded are sleeping, wrapped in salves and thick linen. Others lie awake, their eyes following us as we pass. And for those who want to speak, or those who need to, we make time.
We pause. We listen.
Thane kneels when needed, crouching beside beds, clasping hands, and bowing his head when words fail. I offer what I can in return: a listening ear, a dependable presence, the simple act of meeting someone’s gaze and truly seeing them.
We don’t hurry.
Whether the words come wrapped in grief, clipped short by pain, or trembling with relief, we give them our attention. However long they need, we stay.
Nothing about it feels rehearsed. Sometimes it’s a hand on a shoulder. Sometimes it’s a quiet word, or a pause long enough to matter. And sometimes, it’s simply standing close enough that someone knows they aren’t alone.
And when the ache builds—when it rises tight behind my ribs, when the grief gets too loud and I start to forget how to breathe—Thane is already there. A touch at my back. The brush of his fingers against mine. And sometimes, without a sound, a thought slips into my mind.
“I’m here.”
He always feels it before I say a word. The unease. The helplessness. The pressure building beneath the surface. And without asking, he steadies it—steadies me—simply by staying close.
Thane carries it all with a kind of grace that never asks to be noticed. He doesn’t falter or flinch from the worst of it: scorched flesh, empty sleeves pinned neatly in place, or the silence of people who have seen too much and survived anyway.
He meets every gaze. Greets every person the same, without judgment and without pause. And I watch him with awe.
Not for the warrior he has become or the title he carries. For the man who bows his head to listen. The man who doesn’t pull away from pain. The man who never lets his hand be the first to fall away.
Further down, we find an older rider. He’s still wearing his scorched tunic. One side is wrapped in linen darkened through with blood. His breaths come shallow. His eyes remain half-lidded but aware.
Outside the open windows, his dragon stands sentry on the parapet, stone-still with wings folded close, its gaze fixed on him with a fierce, wordless devotion.
Thane lowers into the chair, solid and focused, as though he intends to shoulder whatever burden the man no longer can. I remain standing behind him, my hand resting lightly on the back of the chair.
He speaks softly to the rider—Jon. I follow the conversation for a time, but movement near the far wall catches my attention.
A familiar head of blond hair. Dulled by sweat and plastered to his forehead, but unmistakable.
Kieran.