Dorothea felt short of breath. Iree had returned her grip with twice the force, and her fingers were buzzing with numbing needles.

“You’ve come to a decision, right?” Iree stated more than asked. “Whatever it is, I want you to remember that we’re willing to lend you our support.”

“That’s what I’m relying on, actually.” Dorothea took a breath, finding courage in Shark’s presence behind her. “I will help you win this war,” she offered. “I will heal your injured and dead. Anything you ask of me within my power, I’ll do it. In return, Sirpo will receive a contract for continued Sacerian protection at the war’s end. Our nations will become allies like we were before.” Please don’t say no, she prayed. Please be an offer you can’t refuse.

Iree’s eyes flashed with triumph. “With you on our side, we’d be unstoppable. I’d be an absolute fool to say no.” She shook Dorothea’s hand, bobbing it up and down once. “You have yourself a deal, Atlin.”

Fearful anticipation made Dorothea’s stomach drop. “We’ll have to discuss my limitations.”

“Of course.” Iree put both hands on her hips, breaking their connection. “Give me an hour. No, forty-five minutes. I need to gather some things and make a plan.” She spun around before whipping back just as quickly. “You all wait in the dining hall. Rhys! Tell some jokes. Entertain them.” Then she was gone, hair streaming behind her like streaks across a sky mottled by a bloody sunset.

Dorothea almost had to laugh. Only forty-five minutes for Iree, and she had moped all night and morning before coming to a decision. The girl wasn’t commander for nothing.

“Are you sure about this, Dorothea?” Rhys asked. “You know what joining us means.” He paused. “Don’t you?”

How could she not? They were going to kill Ghurians. Even if Dorothea wouldn’t necessarily do any of it with her own hands, she was more complicit than ever. The soldiers she healed would enact violence in her stead. Even after the Ghurians had obliterated a people who had done nothing but uphold their neutrality, Dorothea didn’t hate them. At least, she was trying not to.

“It means,” she said, “that I can help put a stop to this. People won’t have to be afraid anymore. So, even if I’m scared, I should… I need to do this.” Her mind kept going back to the same conclusion: deliberately putting her life on the line was better than dying for nothing.

Rhys’ frown didn’t fade, but he seemed to accept the answer. “Knowing you have reasons of your own is reassuring. That’s better than you making this choice based on grief alone. But let me ask you this.” He wiped his hands on his jacket and furrowed his brows further. “Does your magic take a toll on your body?”

So he didn’t know. There had to be some Sacerians who did somewhere given that a few generations of Atlins had served in the Sacerian army, but that had been several decades ago too. Living in Equin, Dorothea had gotten used to everyone knowing exactly what the consequences were. It would hurt to have to go through telling the Sacerians only for them to not care about anything beyond using her.

Her hesitance agitated Rhys further. “Well?” he pressed, sounding concerned.

“They need to know, Thea,” Shark said gently. They looked at Cerid, who was hovering and fidgeting. “I think they’re coming from a good enough place.”

But that’s what scared her more. “I know that. I’ll explain when Iree gets back. For now we should just do as she asked and go to the dining hall.” Dorothea smiled, trying to ease the tension. “And Rhys, if you recall, she also wanted you to tell us some jokes.”

“Go ahead!” Shark cackled as they tossed their usual arm over Dorothea’s shoulders and started jauntily leading them off. “Make us laugh!”

Rhys sighed, defeated. “Why don’t you do it, Cerid?”

Cerid jumped, and his cheeks flushed when Shark drew him in with their free arm.

“Lost in thought there, buddy?” they teased.

He hesitated. “If Miss Dorothea’s presence here makes the Ghurians more likely to attack… But there is no safer place either.” He nodded as if having confirmed something for himself. “It is as Commander Nobelis says. You will be well-protected here.”

Shark grinned at Cerid. “See, Rhys? That’s how you treat a lady whose nerves are rattled. Nice and reassuring. Now Cerid. Tell us your best joke.”

“Errr…”

Rhys rolled his eyes at Shark, but Dorothea caught him glancing at her. Since she had his attention, she took the opportunity to ask a question. “You’re friends with Hollyhock, aren’t you, Rhys?” It was the most inconspicuous way she could think of to pry.

He shrugged. “Yes. We’re cousins, actually, so it’s natural we’re close. And he and Iree have been good friends for a long time, so we’ve always been in the same circles.”

“I see.” Iree, huh? Hollyhock not wanting people, well, women, to get too close to Rhys had something to do with Iree. Probably? Regardless, since Dorothea was to stay in Sacer now, she wanted to be cognizant of how everyone related to one another and where she fit in so she wouldn’t step on anyone’s toes.

Rhys seemed confused. “Why do you ask?”

Dorothea looked away, scowling at the smirk Shark directed towards her. Shark was teasing her, but it was hardly subtle how handsy they were being with Cerid. “Oh, I was just…wondering.”

“Hm.” Rhys tilted his head. “I think I might have some funny stories after all.”

“Oh, do you now?” Shark raised their eyebrows.

“Be nice,” Dorothea chided, though she couldn’t stop a small giggle at Shark’s goofy, goading grin. “Please go on.” She smiled encouragingly at Rhys.

He cleared his throat. “Well then…” He told a story that concerned when a very tipsy Rhys and Iree, along with someone named Dale, had gone around with eggs stolen from the barracks’ kitchen and hurled them from the roof at unsuspecting townspeople and many soldiers in the middle of the night. Hollyhock had brought up an entire extra crate and joined them, with Cerid himself being one of the victims.

It was surreal to see them laugh sincerely. Cerid was one to let a snort slip loose if he laughed too hard while Rhys put a hand to his heart and got teary-eyed. These stories were humanizing ones, ones that made her more comfortable with the people she was going to fight with now. They weren’t just killers. But if that could be said for them, what of the Ghurians? She couldn’t conceive of them outside of the people who had taken Equin. She couldn’t hold her fear back.

Trying not to betray these thoughts, she laughed with the others. Rhys continued: what restaurants were good in town, which ones weren’t so much. When to go to eat to arrive between rushes, what bars had the best specials, which bartenders to look for if she wanted especially good service. She should go to some of these places with a friend. Or it could be a date, he added offhand, gesturing between Dorothea and Shark. That was the second time that day they’d been referred to as a couple, and it finally clicked.

“Thea, they think we’re…” Shark said, still chuckling over Cerid having been bulls-eyed in the face with an egg.

“Yeah,” she said, and, when they looked at each other, they devolved into hysterics until Shark was on the ground. Dorothea tugged at their arm but was gradually being pulled down instead. Cerid avoided the same fate, having ducked out of Shark’s grip when the latter had begun to fall.

“I’ve never been so amused and grossed out in all my life!” Shark howled. “Help me, Theaaa!”

“I can’t even help myself,” she gasped through hiccups of laughter. “How could I help you?”

Rhys and Cerid watched with disturbed bewilderment. “Geez,” the former sighed. “Cerid, help me help Shark up, please.”

Dorothea bent over with her hands on her knees, taking slow breaths. “Gods, I haven’t laughed that hard in a while.” Her and Shark… It was too strange to even think of.

“Same. Same,” Shark agreed, grinning after being lifted up like a doll with a hold on each of their arms.

“So I take it the two of you are not…” Cerid trailed off when Rhys held up a hand.

“Let’s not get them started again. I think it’s obvious.”

“Is it? If not lovers, then what do you call people who hold hands and sleep in the same bed, or so I am told, and care for each other so clearly?” Cerid sounded like a puzzled child.

“It’s complicated,” Dorothea and Shark said at the same time, then covered one another’s mouths to stifle giggles.

“Like children,” Rhys said softly. He wasn’t sharing in their mirth, instead watching with a fond yet forlorn kind of nostalgia. Dorothea was starting to become irritated by his shifts in mood as well as her own curiosity towards him.

Shark smirked good-naturedly. “Based on the stories we just heard about you, friend, you ain’t exactly in the best spot to call us kids.”

“At least I’m only like that when I drink too much,” Rhys retorted with a small smile, “whereas you’re like this all the time.”

Shark’s eyes lit up. “Speaking of drinking, you should see Thea drunk. She gets really—”

Dorothea slapped her hands against their mouth. “And that’s enough of that.”

“I wasn’t actually going to say it…” Shark rubbed their cheeks when she removed her hands.

She hugged their arm by means of apology. “Yes you were.”

“You got me. I totally was.”

“Then you got what you deserved, now didn’t you?”

If their life and Sacer could stay like this, gentle and companionable, maybe it wouldn’t be so bad.