“You okay?” Emilia asked, gently patting Hyr on the back as they heaved. Nothing was coming up—which was definitely good, considering Emilia had landed them on their soon-to-be willbrandsmith’s front steps, but she still felt bad. “First spark?”

  “Second,” the syn croaked out.

  “I assume the first one was this morning,” Conrad noted, peering around the area, looking very might like—despite his slightly odd clothing—he belonged. Clearly, the man had either spent enough time with sub-30s from the Penns to pick up some of their habits—lazy posture, confidence, curiosity, air of perpetual boredom and arrogance—or his home also had that sort of vibe.

  “I am okay,” Hyr assured her as they straightened back up, towering over her, and—

  “Did you shorten yourself a bit in the raid?”

  Red seeped over the northerner’s gently brown skin. “Not on purpose. I grew recently, and put my height in wrong. There was… much teasing, over it.”

  “You really are very tall,” Conrad commented, looking Hyr over properly, now that they were both standing—and not running away from awkward conversations—while Emilia rang the doorbell. “Can you even have sex with kyrfa’Nur’sa? There aren’t many people outside of Nur’tha that… big.”

  “Some of the people from The Atrium are,” Emilia said, glancing back at an increasingly red Hyr. Her eyes raked over them, their cheeks reddening further when they noticed. Seriously, the logistics that would be involved…

  “Most kyrfa’Nur’tha marry within the north. There have been a few marriages to outsiders since the war, but they are… few. I do not believe they have difficulty in… that regard. They certainly do not have difficulties producing children.”

  “Word to the wise,” Conrad laughed, leaning in to peer up at Hyr as the intercom lit up, not indicating someone was trying to speak, but that someone would come answer the door soon, “if you can’t say sex you shouldn’t be having any.”

  Emilia tried not to laugh—and she almost succeeded!—except Hyr decided to glare at Conrad, the slightest of pouts pulling at their mouth, and well…

  “Are you doing a mean laugh?” a little voice asked, the door having opened to reveal a small girl, still in her pyjamas. “That sounds like a mean laugh. Mama says you shouldn’t laugh at other people’s expense.”

  Big green eyes peered between each of them, nearly hidden behind a mop of unruly blonde curls, looking so much like her father and yet so very different.

  “You should not laugh at stranger’s expense,” Hyr said, solemn and confident as he squatted down and fucking stars, how had she never noticed how huge the northerner’s thighs were!? Actually… now that Emilia thought about it, the clothing Hyr had worn in the raid was significantly different than their current outfit.

  Within the raid, the syn’s clothing had been traditional, leaning into the support class of Nur’tha warwear with slightly more flow to each piece. The whites and greys of the raid had been looser, flowing off him like water, although not quite so loose as to impede his movements. They had been a contrast to Zyrex and Hetexia’s own clothing, which on top of being more revealing, their arms and large sections of their chest bare, had been much more form fitting.

  What Hyr now wore… well, it was still in Nur’tha colours, favouring blues, whites and greys, but the style was definitely not from the Nur’tha of the war, and her Censor assured her it still wasn’t a style found there, rather it was clothing meant to slide into Baalphorian style, as though anyone could mistake the tall man for anything other than a kyrfa’Nur’tha—or a syn, if they knew the synat’s braiding styles well enough, which most people didn’t. The syn’s light blue sweater hung loose around them, and they’d tugged the sleeves up at some point—probably due to the heat that suffused the outdoor spaces of campus and was becoming increasingly difficult to keep out of the buildings as well. Sil’s room hadn’t been hot, per se, but it had definitely been edging into too warm territory.

  The sweater itself was long, cutting off mid-thigh, which was probably why she hadn’t noticed just how tight the northerner’s light grey pants were. Now, as they discussed with the girl how they were okay with Emilia laughing at them, because they knew she meant no harm by it, she couldn’t help but run her eyes appreciatively over their lower body.

  “You know, I bet if you ask nicely, the little syn will let you touch.”

  Emilia sucked in a harsh breath as Conrad’s voices wound its way through her, transferred by his energy. “That is both creepy and cool. Can I learn?” she whispered, unwilling to interrupt the cute conversation happening at their feet.

  The Free Colonier shrugged. “Maybe. Not everyone can do it.” He gave her an assessing look before raising a light-brown eyebrow and flicking his eyes between Emilia and Hyr in silent question.

  Yeah, there had been enough questions about things she didn’t want to talk about today—or at least that morning. Quota met, thanks.

  “But,” she said, interrupting the conversation between Hyr and the girl instead of answering him, “if I ever tease you over something you don’t like, you have to tell me!” Planting her hands on her hips and widening her stance, Emilia glared down at Hyr. “It’s only fun to tease someone if they’re okay with it. So if Hyr doesn’t want me to tease them, I’ve gotta stop.”

  Conrad, rudely, stifled a laugh behind her. Hyr just stared up with her softly while the girl…

  “You’re Papa’s friend,” she said. “The one he let touch him like Mama, me, Uncle Helix and Ava.”

  “Yup,” she agreed, relieved that the girl hadn’t just said like Mama. They had done nothing of the sort together, thank you! “I’m Emilia—Emmie, if you like,” she added, introducing each of the Free Coloniers as well before accepting the girl’s name—Mia, although she’d already known that. While she might not have visited her friend in a long time, she did at least know the name of his kid—kids; he’d recently popped out another one, Ava—and was regularly gifted images of the little family by Rafe.

  This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.

  “Is he here? I need a favour.”

  The little girl sighed, long and drawn out and sounding very much like she was dozens of years older than her seven years. “Yeah… he’s here…”

  She sighed again and ushered them inside, leading them down several halls lined with photos of the four-person family. Pictures of Mia’s parents in their youth and during the war lined the halls as well. Younger versions of herself stood alongside Mia’s father in many of them, spreading over the decades they had been friends, each of which both Conrad and Hyr stopped to inspect.

  “Have they never seen little photos of you?” Mia asked, scrunching her nose at the two Free Coloniers, Conrad commented on this photo or that all the while.

  “Most people haven’t. I don’t share what I have with most people.”

  “Why not?”

  “I’d have to answer questions about how I still have them.”

  “How? Oh… the Flaming? Papa said there were a few of you who didn’t get hit.”

  “That’s right,” Emilia said, wondering if The Flaming was covered so early in school—it wasn’t according to her Censor, so she must have been told by her parents as a way to explain how they had more pictures of their youth than most. That said, the girl’s mom’s photos were significantly more degraded—most likely, she’d been near the edge of The Flaming’s range, unlike herself and Olivier, who’d been in a bunker at the time.

  The little girl nodded, saying that most of her friends didn’t have anything even remotely similar to her parents. “It’s the worst for Jane’s sister, though!” the girl said, because apparently being a friend of her father’s—even one she’d only heard of and seen in photos—was enough for her to open up.

  “Oh?” Emilia prompted as they began to move, trusting the Free Coloniers to catch up—and trusting Hyr to know when they needed to move. The girl’s mom didn’t need to wander in on two strangers in her house, after all.

  “Mhm! Well, Jane’s sister is actually her parents’ friends’ kid. They died during the war, so Jane’s parents took her in. I don’t think she has anything of them, except one of your pictures!” Mia skipped ahead, pointing up at a photo from the last big party of their gap year—not that any of them had expected it to be so, several years still left in their freedom when the war began.

  Dozens of faces now dead smiled back at her. Dozens more that she hadn’t seen in forever.

  Jane…

  “Janie Van der Froom?” she guessed, eyes catching on the shy little girl—well, woman, by the time this photo was taken—who had tagged along on so many of their adventures when they were younger.

  “Yeah! You knew her?”

  “I did… she was… one of my friends. Not as close as other friends—she was really shy, and had all the common sense the rest of us were lacking, so she was often sensible enough to say no to coming with us.”

  “Were you a bad child?” Conrad teased, slipping his arm around her waist as he and Hyr caught up. “Ooh, there’s your crazy black knot friend,” he laughed, pointing to Samina, who was obviously very drunk. Next to her, her twin brother was just as drunk, while behind them, Malcolm was trying to get them to cooperate. It hadn’t worked, and he’d been pushed into the swimming hole by her treehouse a few minutes later.

  “Not so much a bad child. Bad teen and young adult, definitely. Not so great adult, either…”

  “You should not lie,” Hyr said from their position directly behind her, close, but not quite touching. “You are doing your best.”

  “That’s what Papa says too! That Emmie is doing her best, and we should give her all the time she needs!” the child added, craning her neck to nod sagely up at Hyr and… and those might have been little stars in her eyes.

  Apparently, Emilia wasn’t the only one who noticed, given the muttered comment about the little girl having a crush on you that came out of Conrad, thankfully in Brylish. They’d just had a conversation about teasing people, and it wouldn’t have been very helpful to have to chastise the man about teasing the girl over crushing on a very kind person—it wasn’t every day someone came down to a child’s height to talk to them! Emilia had far too many memories of adults lording over her, eyes sharp, tongues sharper as they demanded she behave yet again, as though any of the situations her young self ever found herself in were her own fault.

  Hyr’s fingers brushed over her shoulder before they pressed their palm to her nape. The fact that they could tell something was off with her internal monologue, her thoughts spiralling to places she never wanted them to end up… it was disturbing—uncomfortable—to be seen so easily by someone she barely knew. Yet, it was also so comforting—a quiet blanket of safety—that she’d so rarely had the opportunity to feel so completely, so quickly in her life.

  “You’re lucky,” Emilia told Mia solemnly as they began to move again. “Your papa is one of the best people I’ve ever met.”

  Sighing, Mia admitted that not everyone thought so. “Mostly… just people who still like his parents,” she said, when Emilia asked—perhaps with a tad too much edge in her voice—just who didn’t like her father. “They still think he shouldn’t have left. That he should have sucked it up.”

  Hyr’s hand, which had floated down to catch her hand as they moved, tightened, more energy swirling through her because this time, she really was about to go off and kill a few people. It would have been easy to blame Payton’s knots, but honestly, Emilia knew herself well enough to know that even without the knot, she would have been considering offing a significant portion of the Penn’s upper crust. It wouldn’t be a great loss.

  As a result, Hyr’s energy was less effective—or perhaps they were purposefully making it less effective. It was one thing to pull her emotions back where they would have been, without the knot messing with her, it was another to influence her genuine emotions and anger. How they could tell the difference, she had no idea, but it felt like they could tell—it felt like Hyr could always tell exactly what was up with her.

  “Your papa sucked it up as best he could for a long time. It was never good enough, and I’m not sorry I took him away from this place.” Stars knew why he’d moved back, shortly after getting married once the war ended. Probably because he knew any kids he had would be better supported here, despite his own questionable time in the school system. Unlike when they were younger, however, and his shitty parents had the money and power to make their will—their desire to force their child to suck it up—the priority of the teachers, now he was the one with that influence.

  “Me, too!” Mia cheered, skipping to a stop in front of the workshop’s door. “Papa is happy because you helped him! He says that a lot: that we should find ourselves the sort of friends who will tell him and Mama off, if needed. Someone who isn’t afraid to tell the entire world to fuck off!”

  Conrad choked, laughing as he asked the girl if she should be swearing. According to her, she could swear if needed or proper for the sentence, and how else do you articulate the sentiment of telling the world to fuck off without saying fuck off?

  This time, it was Hyr and Emilia’s turn to laugh as the man was left speechlessly watching the girl open the door for them before disappearing back down the hall.

  “Precocious, that one…” he said as they entered the workshop, the sound and smell of willbranding immediately filling Emilia’s senses. “One of my nieces is like her. She’s older, but fuck if that child isn’t a handful."

  “One of the ones I met?”

  “She doesn’t like the family enough to raid with them.”

  Emilia looked at her friend, wondering if he’d say more, but he didn’t, still intent to keep his secrets about his family and origin, but then, they were stepping into the main portion of the workshop, one of her oldest friends blinking out of the Virtuosi System.

  “Emmie.”