We set up camp near where we stopped for lunch: on the side of the main road with a view of Dragon’s Pass in the distance. Even with the concern about the potential undead, it’s as far as we can get from the cave before evening falls and even Meg doesn’t want to go any farther. We’re all exhausted.

Even with our exhaustion, we agree that there should be watches. Flynt says he’ll go first, and I decide to stay up with him: better two pairs of eyes than just one.

We sit together on a log on the other side of the fire from the tent, back to back to increase our view. We both have excellent senses, even at night, but so far everything has been quiet save for the occasional hoot of an owl or flutter of what are probably bats—or their high fantasy equivalent, anyway. It’s cold enough that there aren’t any crickets or nighttime insects singing. The closest we come is Meg’s light snoring from the tent.

I stare up at the starry sky, at the two moons shining at half strength, casting the world in a faint silvery light. Everything is still. I use the opportunity to pull up the various achievements I’ve gained over the course of the last day.

> [Achievement: I see Dead Things: What’s dead doesn’t always stay that way.]

> [Achievement: Selfless Action: You’ve assisted in bringing a party member back from the brink at cost to yourself. Well done.]

> [Special Achievement: Keeping Secrets: You’ve discovered something about a party member and kept it to yourself—so far.]

I close the window only I can see and sigh, leaning more heavily back against Flynt. We sit like that for an hour at least before he draws a slow deep breath.

“What’s been on your mind?” His voice is low and hushed.

“Just processing everything that happened today.” I glance back at my sleeping party members: Meg sprawled on her back, arms raised above her head, snoring softly, Jonas next to her, playing big spoon to Tyrus, their hands clasped together over Tyrus’s sleeping bag. “I wonder when that actually happened.”

“We don’t know that it has, yet,” Flynt murmurs.

“If not, it definitely will when we get back.”

“No doubt. Good for them.”

“I just hope it doesn’t implode. Make it awkward for everyone.”

Flynt shrugs. “We’ll figure it out if it happens. They’re reasonable people.”

“In my experience, romantic entanglements can make even the most reasonable people stupid.”

“Maybe. I’d rather them try to be happy though, even if it may hurt.”

I glance over my shoulder at him and he offers me a small smile that doesn’t show his teeth—though there’s sincerity all over his face and something almost sad in his eyes. I’m not sure how to read it.

I look away. “I think I understand Jonas’s powers,” I whisper, changing the subject.

There’s a slight pause before Flynt chuckles softly. I can feel him look back out at his direction, taking the pressure of his gaze off me.

“I imagine you do,” he says. “Did you before or after he used you as a resource.”

“Before. At least, I had an inkling of it.”

“I wasn’t sure if it was a surprise to you or not.”

“When did you figure it out?”

He shrugs one shoulder. I feel it from where we lean up against one another.

“There are only so many types of healing magic. His isn’t divine, and it’s not arcane. So, that leaves channeling. I wasn’t sure what type of channeling it was though, until today. I thought at first it was nature-based, but today proved life-siphoning.”

“Is there a reason to be worried about it?” I think of the chill of Jonas’s magic, the darkness around it.

“With Jonas? Probably not. He seems more afraid of it than anyone.”

“Why do you say that?”

“There’s a reason siphoning isn’t talked about much. It isn’t considered forbidden magic in Qeth the way it is some other places, but it’s not embraced, in large part because it’s so costly. It can also be extremely powerful. He’s not using his abilities like that, though, he’s taking from himself… for the most part, anyway. And he clearly defines himself as a healer. There are other avenues open to him. Some of them quite dark and most of them extremely lucrative. The fact he hasn’t taken them speaks very highly of him.”

I smile slightly. “That’s what I thought too. That withering hands casting, it just kept going. It obliterated that ooze.”

“He’s getting stronger,” Flynt says. “You are too.”

“So are you. The spells you threw today packed quite a punch.”

“It felt good,” he admits. “It’s nice to have the chance.”

I draw a deep breath and sigh, pressing back on him a little more, leaning my head against his shoulder.

“I can’t believe we’ve only known each other for what? Two weeks? It seems like longer.”

“I was thinking about that too, earlier,” he says. “To be fair, we’ve spent most of that time together. We live together, eat together, travel together, kill things together…”

“That’s true.” I pull my cloak a little closer to me against the chill, though Flynt’s body heat and the fire are largely keeping me warm. I close my eyes a moment, enjoying the closeness: the wildfire smell of him, the warmth, the way he seems to accept things as they come, excited just to be there. “I’m sorry you had to protect me.”

“What?” he asks, then chuckles. “When did I protect you?”

“Last night.” Was it really just last night? “With that Phaelen guy. I should have stood up for myself more.”

“What do you mean?”

I shake my head. “I hid behind you. Let you do the talking.”

He’s silent for a moment. “I thought that was all calculated on your part.”

“How so?”

He scoffs, breaking the tension that rose in his shoulders. “You really have no idea about Qeth politics, do you?”

“I’m trying. I’m learning.”

“Yes, well, some of it doesn’t end up in the books…. You refused to deal with him, Keira. It was a powerful move. And not only did you not deal with him, but you forced him to deal with us. A dwarf, two humans, and… a me. You all but turned away from the conversation. It was a significant slight to him, and a massive show of trust toward us.”

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“I didn’t realize I put you in that position.”

“I’m telling you, it’s not something to apologize for. I was glad for it. It actually meant a lot, at the time.”

I wince. Maybe I shouldn’t have said anything.

“There’s a hierarchy,” he continues. “At least for many elves. Elves on top. Then dwarves, little folk, humans, and then the, ah... lower beings.”

“Lower beings?”

“And that's the... nice way of putting it.” Flynt clears his throat, shakes his head. “Phaelen would have rather spoken to anyone else. Having to speak to me because it was our fire was one thing. Having to treat me with respect and deference because you chose me? Amazing.”

“So you did understand what we were saying.”

“Of course I did. My father made sure I learned all elvish dialects. I don’t read all of them, and my accent can be terrible, but I understand them.”

“I have a question about that. Stoutbrooke. It doesn’t sound like the most elven name I’ve ever heard.”

Flynt chuckles. “It’s not.”

“How did your father come by it, then? Because he may protest, but there’s a lot about him that is fundamentally very elven.”

“Please don’t tell him that. It won’t go far toward ingratiating yourself.”

“I won’t. But still. It’s true.”

“It was his first wife’s name. His family disowned him when he married a dwarven commoner, so he took her family name and kept it after she died.”

“How long ago was that?”

Flynt sighs. “Three hundred years? Maybe close to four. He was young when they married, and she also died young. They weren’t together long, especially by elven standards, but he loved her dearly.”

“Can I ask what his family name was?”

Flynt is silent for a long beat, then draws a slow breath, seeming to cringe. “Terravin.”

I blink and move, swinging my legs down on the other side of the log so I can look at him. “Terravin,” I repeat, elbows on my knees. “As in one of the Four Families, Terravin.”

He raises a finger to his lips. “From a far more distant branch of the family, but yes,” he says, voice just above a whisper. “Aside from Nyssa, though, he has not had contact with any of—”

“Nyssa is too?”

“Far closer than I could claim, yes.”

“Interesting. Also. I knew she was your aunt.”

“More a third cousin several times removed,” Flynt says. “Please don’t tell anyone.”

“I promise.” I return to our back-to-back position, looking at my side of the road.

It’s dark and quiet and still. The shadows of the mountains rise up in the background, unmoving giants in the night. The wind blows cold down from them, and every now and then I catch a moonlight glimmer off something high up between the peaks: the great dragon watching over us. It’s beautiful and eerie. I can feel myself starting to drift off, feeling the steadiness of Flynt’s breathing against my back, listening to the crackling of the fire.

“You should go to sleep,” he says, voice soft but still enough to startle me. “I have it from here.”

“I need to do my share.”

“Next time. You made it so we didn’t lose anyone today. Far as I’m concerned, you and Jonas are exempt this time around.”

“I didn’t take watch last night either.”

“That was a show of power, and don’t think anything else. Go. Get some sleep. You can take my shift next time.”

I sigh and nod, gather my bow, and steady myself on his shoulder before heading back to the tent. I pull off my boots and lay my bow beside Meg’s sword at the foot of my bedroll, before climbing in.

“My turn?” Meg’s sleepy voice asks in the dim light.

“Not yet. Flynt will wake you.”

“Okay.” She’s asleep again in no time and I can’t help but chuckle at that as I burrow into the blankets, shivering in the chill away from the fire. We need to get separate tents, tents that close to keep the warmth in, but I understand why we haven’t. This is cheaper. And it’s not private, but it is easier, it’s safer, and when we’re all packed in together, it’s probably warmer, too.

I lay there for a little while, listening to the snoring of my companions, but eventually doze off. I dream of waking up back home and being terribly disappointed, then spending years of my life trying to find a way back. A dragon appears in my condo complex’s swimming pool and tells me to keep searching.

I wake up snuggled against Flynt’s warm back while Meg’s back is pressed against mine. I guess everyone had a bit of a restless night. I blink in the early morning light and glance up to see Jonas staring down at me, sipping a cup of steaming liquid, other hand at his waist.

“So precious,” he says, his voice soft as he laughs quietly.

I groan. “Creep much?” I mutter, trying not to wake either of my bunk buddies.

“I heard you stirring. I made tea. Tyrus is working on breakfast. We want to let them sleep a little longer. I think they divided the night in two. Neither of us got a wake up.”

“Idiots,” I murmur. “Give me a minute to coax my body into moving.”

“Okay. We’re by the fire.” He turns and disappears from my sight line.

The morning is crisp and my little cocoon of bedroll and friends is nice and warm. I lean my forehead against Flynt’s upper back, feeling the planes of muscles there. Meg’s weight is comfortable behind me.

I probably doze a little longer before I groan and push myself into motion, carefully crawling out. Meg grumbles in half sleep and turns onto her stomach, hugging the little lump of cloak that she is using as a pillow. Flynt is still as stone, breathing slowly, steadily. He could probably sleep through anything.

I tiptoe over them and pull on my boots, buckle on my quiver, and drape my cloak over my shoulders before picking up my bow and carrying it with me.

“Nice sleep?” Tyrus asks.

“I have knots the size of boulders in my shoulders.” I sit on a rock around the fire pit and accept a cup of tea from Jonas. They have my bag open at their feet, which makes sense—how else would they get the makings of breakfast—but it gives me a momentary anxiety attack as I think of a certain legendary object in there.

Then, I remember that unless they know it’s there, they’ll never find it. The glory of magical bags. My ridiculously OP, I’ll-never-be-able-to-use-it-in-a-million-years [Cloak of Dragon Scales] is safe. Or at least, still secret.

“That sounds pleasant,” Jonas says. “Any further thoughts on what we discussed yesterday?”

“What did you discuss yesterday?” Tyrus asks.

“Jonas is trying to encourage me to have a love life.”

“I don’t know that I’d put it that way.”

“Ooh,” Tyrus mutters, wincing. “Complicated. You know that they both—”

“So I’m told. And I don’t understand it.”

“Me either,” Tyrus agrees.

“Thanks.”

“You’re great. But I don’t see anything especially besotting about you.”

“I feel the same way about you, Tyrus.”

Jonas shrugs. “He’s adorable.”

Tyrus clears his throat at that and gives his companion a flat look before taking another sip of tea and stirring what look to be some kind of potatoes and eggs in the skillet over the fire.

“I hate love triangles,” I say. “They’re never as exciting as they seem like they should be.”

“I don’t know that it’s so much a triangle as a straight line, though, right?” Jonas asks. “You in the middle, each of them on either end.” He draws it out in the air in front of him. “I mean, current sleeping position aside, I don’t think either is the other’s type.” He draws out a triangle.

I glance over my shoulder to see Flynt and Meg both on their backs, arms and legs partially tangled together as they both lightly snore.

“I wish I had a picture,” I mutter. “Should have kept my phone.”

“What do you mean?” Jonas asks.

“Nothing. Just that it would be nice to have a little memento to pull out for when they start to bicker at each other. But fine, you’re right. Either way, though, I don’t really want to make a choice, particularly when I like and care about each of them.”

“That may also be a possibility,” Jonas says, shrugging.

I cringe. “Yeah. Probably not. Previous experience suggests I'm shitty at managing a romance with one person. And I don’t think it would be especially good for the group.”

“Maybe not. But the heart wants what it wants.”

“That’s my point. I’m not sure what, if anything, it wants. I’ve had a lot of big life-changing… stuff happen to me in the last, what, two weeks? I need to sit with and understand all that before I go and make other choices that I’m not even sure are on the table.”

“They’re on the table,” Tyrus says, nodding. “We independently came to the conclusion and then confirmed it with each other.”

“When? When has this,” I motion between them, “developed?”

They look at each other and Tyrus shrugs a shoulder. “A day or two after we met? The night I went drinking with him and Meg. There was a connection. And life’s short. Yesterday showed that.”

“Okay. But we’ve all been together almost the whole time since then.”

“Keira,” Jonas says. “I need you to know I respect you deeply. But we may be eating and researching and shopping and training and doing whatever it is we do all attached at the hip to each other, but you realize that his room and mine are right next to each other, don’t you? And there’s a connecting door? That generally makes for at least six bells when we’re completely independent of the rest of you.”

“And you from us. We don’t care what the rest of you get up to so long as when things are in the shit, we’re all professional and on our game. You want to draw out a long will-they-or-won’t-they with one or both of them, go ahead. It doesn’t seem especially fair to anyone, but if they want to participate, that’s their choice. You’re all adults.”

“Thanks, Tyrus.”

“And if it’s with him, be safe about it, right? That’ll put a real damper on the party if you end up with a little bun. So make sure to get one of those bracelets, okay?”

I feel my cheeks flush, and I have no idea what he means by a bracelet—though context clues make it easy to guess its function.

“I guess I’m glad you guys feel comfortable being so direct with me,” I mutter, rubbing at my hot face with cold hands. “Give me some of that breakfast, you’re going to burn it.”