Part Fifty-Nine — The Quiet Before

　Two weeks passed without further sign of anyone from Eris's past, and the sharp, watchful tension we'd all been carrying began, slowly, to ease back toward something like normal — not forgotten, never quite that again, but no longer sitting at the front of every conversation.

Maybe it really was nothing. Maybe she was wrong, just this once, about a face in a crowded market.

Or maybe whoever it was is simply better at patience than we've given them credit for.

　I didn't voice that second possibility often, not wanting to keep the fear alive past its useful purpose. But I didn't stop watching the treeline, either, same as I never quite stopped watching it after that first merchant's warning, years and a whole lost family ago.

　We took on lighter work during those two weeks — Silver-rank jobs close to the city, nothing that took us more than a day's travel from Roshan, a deliberate choice on all our parts even though nobody said so outright.

　"You've all been staying close to the city on purpose," Eris observed, one evening, more perceptive about it than any of us had given her credit for. "Because of me."

　"Because of all of us," I corrected, gently. "If something's actually hunting one of us, staying tight and reachable just makes sense. Nothing wrong with being careful."

　"I don't want to be the reason everyone's lives get smaller," she said, quiet, old guilt creeping into her voice.

There it is. Same shape of guilt I've carried myself, more than once, over people getting hurt because of what I am.

　"You're not making anyone's life smaller," Lyra said, firm, before I could answer. "You're the reason we're being sensible. There's a difference. I'd rather be sensible with all of us intact than reckless and short one member of this group."

　Eris didn't answer that directly, but something in her posture eased, the guilt not gone but at least acknowledged rather than carried entirely alone.

　It was on an ordinary evening — the kind that had started to feel, again, genuinely ordinary rather than fragile — that Eris mentioned, almost offhand, that she planned to meet me at a particular inn across the city the following night, after finishing a separate small errand of her own.

　"Nothing urgent," she said. "Just picking up some supplies from a shop that keeps odd hours. I'll meet you there once I'm done, rather than dragging everyone along for something that boring."

Reasonable. She's more than capable of handling an errand on her own, these days.

　"Sounds good," I said. "We'll grab a table, wait for you there."

　I didn't think anything more of it, that evening — just an ordinary plan, for an ordinary night, the exact kind of small independence Eris had been steadily, proudly reclaiming for herself over the past months.

She's not the same person I found half-dead in that clearing. She's someone who plans her own evenings now, makes her own choices about which errands are worth doing alone. That's a good thing. That's exactly what I wanted for her.

　I had no reason, that evening, to think anything about the plan deserved a second thought.

"Do you wish me to accompany her, regardless?" Anti-Subconsciousness asked, quiet, later that night, once Eris had already retired.

Do you think something's actually wrong?

"I have no specific data suggesting imminent danger," it said. "However, given the earlier sighting and the unresolved nature of that thread, additional caution costs little relative to the potential benefit."

...You're right. Better safe.

　I almost said something to Eris the next morning — almost suggested Ace shadow her discreetly, just in case, just to be thorough about a caution none of us had fully let go of despite the quiet weeks.

　I didn't.

　She'd been so proud, reclaiming these small independences. I didn't want to hand that unease back to her over what was probably nothing.

She can handle an errand. She's handled far worse than an errand, in this life and whatever life she'd have kept living if I'd never found her.

It's probably nothing.

　The day passed ordinarily enough — Lyra and I taking on a small guild job together, Ace splitting his attention between us and a nap he seemed determined to perfect the art of. Eris left for her errand in the early evening, waving off my offer to walk her partway with an easy, confident smile that I let convince me everything was exactly as fine as it looked.

　"I'll see you at the inn," she said. "Don't wait up too anxiously. I know how you get."

　"I contain multitudes," I said, "including the ability to wait patiently. Mostly."

　She laughed, familiar and warm, and headed off into the crowded evening streets alone, same as she had a dozen times before without incident.

She'll be fine. She's more than capable. This is exactly the kind of ordinary evening we've been slowly getting back to.

　I settled into a table at the agreed inn that evening with Lyra and Ace, ordering food, expecting Eris to walk through the door within the hour, same as always.

　She didn't.

Probably just running late. The shop probably kept her longer than expected.

　An hour passed.

　Then another.

Something's wrong.

　I didn't yet know how wrong.

　I only knew, sitting there with the food going cold in front of me, that the quiet, ordinary weeks were over, and that whatever came next was going to cost more than any of us had properly prepared to pay.