Riordan hated to admit how much better he felt for spending a bit of time in the spirit realm again. Or maybe it was just this particular corner of the spirit realm, which made him uncomfortable in other ways. Still, he’d reclaimed some of the hope he’d been feeling before his run in with Heeren. Riordan counted that as a win.

He still had such little agency in his own life. Riordan struggled to maintain his composure, feeling pushed and pulled between all the forces in his life. The Department wanted Riordan under their control, to prevent a threat and to gain a tool. The Sleeping Bear pack wanted Riordan to train as a shaman, both to benefit the shifter community as a whole and to give a big middle finger to the Department and any other mages who wanted Riordan. Quinn wanted Riordan to preserve everything he’d learned before he died and to possibly save him from needing to die. Daniel wanted Riordan to be a friend, but also to give his life some meaning now that he was dead.

The tree spirit… mostly didn’t care. It simply wanted Riordan to exist. So long as Riordan existed, all else would flow from there.

Riordan admitted it felt damn good to have someone not placing more expectations him right then, even if it was the damned tree.

Mark and Daniel returned from their talk subdued but also calmer. The three of them represented a knot of trauma and tangled emotions that would take a damn long time to sort out. Riordan was glad that none of them were tackling the aftermath of this incident alone.

“Got what you needed?” Riordan asked Mark, though his glance at Daniel included his friend in the question.

“It helped,” Mark said sincerely, a shy smile on his young face. The kid was a freckled all-American good boy type, the sort that made Riordan want to growl at their cheer but also root for the home team. Especially if it put Mark’s proper cheer back in place.

Daniel shrugged, though he offered a smile of his own. “I like Mark. It’s nice to talk to more people too.”

Riordan snorted, remembering Daniel’s teasing conversations. “Yeah, you do like Mark. Your type, huh?”

Daniel gaped at him before sputtering, “Riordan Danger Kincaid! Behave yourself!”

Riordan blinked. “My middle name’s not Danger.”

“It should be,” muttered Daniel.

Meanwhile, Mark was blushing again. They had clearly embarrassed the apprentice, which Riordan felt kinda bad about but also kinda good. He liked that he had people to joke with like this.

“It’s not like that,” Mark refuted, still beet red.

“It’s not? Pity,” Riordan replied, trying to keep his tone light. “Daniel could use someone to flirt with besides me. After all, I’m apparently hot but not his type.”

“I’m straight,” Mark countered. And then abruptly frowned, thinking hard. “At least, I think I’m straight. I’ve never really considered it much.”

Daniel nodded, though he looked a little disappointed to Riordan. “Most people who are straight or mostly straight don’t think about it much. I mean, why would they? What they are feeling lines up close enough with what society tells them that they should be feeling. That does cause problems for some of the queer identites, such as asexuals, who assume that they are straight because, well, it’s not like they are feeling attraction for anyone else either. I had a friend who took a while to figure out that they were ace because they kept mistaking a desire to be friends with someone for a crush because it was the closest they came.”

The whole conversation still baffled Riordan. This wasn’t something that was talked about when he was a kid and just hadn’t seemed relevant in his adult life. Sure, when he’d been in the army, his fellow soldiers would joke around about sex or talk about loved ones waiting at home. Riordan assumed he’d feel that way about someone eventually, but he’d never gotten that sense of lust at first sight that most of the men mentioned.

Riordan felt lonely occasionally, but when he tried imagining himself with a wife, he just couldn’t see it. He always thought about his pack instead, that close-knit group of men and women and the sense of camaraderie it brought. About quiet evenings spent drinking with Qusay after a mission, talking about everything and nothing. About curling up in a tent next to his team, knowing he wasn’t alone.

Riordan didn’t want someone to keep his house, which is the image ‘wife’ evoked for him, but he wanted someone to share his life with. The little things, like watching the sun set or having someone to hold when things felt too tough.

Mark broke Riordan’s introspection by saying, “I feel silly for not knowing that stuff. I was home-schooled, especially since it became clear pretty early on that I’d be a shaman when I got old enough. Most shifters don’t talk about that sort of thing.”

Given how old the average shifter could be, despite appearance, they could be culturally slow to adopt new things, for better or for worse. Especially since their communities were traditionally isolated from the faster paced human world. Soon that separation would be impossible, as humanity spread into more and more regions and the internet allowed for instant transfer of information, but tradition took a while to shake.

Daniel shrugged. “I was a gay college student until just recently. I went to a bunch of groups and talks on this because it was relevant to me and to the people I most easily befriended. Queer folks tend to be drawn to each other since they have some shared experiences, even if that experience is just the practice of thinking critically about our own identities. Whatever you are, you are at least far less judgmental and threatened by my gayness than a bunch of human men I’ve met.”

Mark seemed surprised by that. Riordan wasn’t. Then again, he’d spent the last twenty years living on the fringes of human society, getting hit by the prejudices against those who were ‘other’ because he didn’t have a home or a clear place in society or match the appearance of a proper citizen.

People could be cruel to those who were different. They could also be achingly kind. The potential for both was humanity’s blessing and curse.

“I don’t see what the big deal is,” Mark finally said. “Kissing you didn’t hurt me any and it made you happy. That seems like a good exchange.”

Daniel pouted in a clearly exaggerated manner. “Is that all my kisses rate? You wound me! And I don’t even get a chance to kiss you again to show you that I can do better.”

Mark shrugged. “You can kiss me if you want. Human contact feels good sometimes.”

Daniel stared, shocked out of his joking exterior. Tears glinted at the corner of his eyes. “Fuck,” he muttered, “I didn’t think being called human and having someone offer to touch me would hit like that.”

While Riordan hesitated, trying to process how to help his friend, Mark just acted, moving to hug Daniel tightly. Here in the spirit realm, a ghost was a solid presence, if unnaturally cold. Daniel practically melted into the hug, burying his face against Mark’s shoulder and sobbing.

As abjectly uncomfortable that display of emotion made Riordan feel, he always knew Daniel desperately needed to break down and let some of that out. He’d have held Daniel himself if it was needed, but Mark was a naturally caring and kind person, the sort who would definitely make a great pack shaman one day.

Plus, Riordan suspected that having someone else need Mark was good for the kid too. Being needed might remind Mark that there was more to life than lurking threats and being strong or weak.

The crying died down fairly quickly, though neither Mark nor Riordan rushed Daniel. The ghost pulled back, rubbing at his eyes, and whispered, “Thanks. I think I needed that.”

“Any time,” Mark said automatically and then frowned. “Or it would be any time if I could see you.”

“You might be able to see Daniel for a while after this,” Riordan offered absentmindedly, already ushering all of them back towards the stone circle. He could open the gateway from anywhere here--it was located inside him, after all--but using the circle felt cleaner and made the process easier. At least the damned gateway hadn’t been moved with everything else inside him.

“What do you mean?” Mark asked.

Riordan shrugged and led them into the circle. “I brought Frankie here by accident once, when she was trying to explain keyed gateways to me. I was locked to this space in the spirit realm by the ritual, so we ended up here. She was able to see Daniel once we got out. I think it faded after a bit, but it’s hard to tell with Frankie. I don’t know if it'll happen. It could have been a side effect of the ritual at the time.”

That caution didn’t slow the hopeful look on Mark’s face. Riordan decided to speed things up. Better to get them all out and then they could see if Mark could or couldn’t see Daniel.

Riordan ran through the gestures to open the gateway, even though they were even less needed on this side. He could have willed it open here without much effort. Still, he was supposed to be establishing good habits, like limiting the amount of accidental casting. He might as well practice his mindfulness about it.

After the spirit realm, the random corner of Michigan forest that the gateway spat them out at, hovering over their unconscious bodies, barely felt real. The physical realm lacked certain layers of sensation and existence that were present on the other side, all the things Riordan could sense that went past the visual representation of the place.

Riordan glanced around, confirming that both Mark and Daniel were safely with him, and slipped back into his body. He’d grown stiff from laying unconscious on the ground and Riordan stretched his neck and shoulders with a soft pained groan. At least his shifter healing would relieve the tension before he damaged his muscles.

Mark blinked awake next to him, looking rather owlish for someone who was a porcupine inside. And then Riordan saw the moment his eyes settled on Daniel and stuck there.

“Oh, I can see him,” Mark said softly and all three of them grinned.