His cheek is rough with grit, flexed raw under her touch.

I hope not would be a dishonest thing for him to say, but the lines are there, wry around his mouth and in the tilt of his nose after her.

“I will miss you,” is true, and more important in the scheme of the rapid and unexpected exits Rifters sometimes make from this plane. Farewells are a luxury. His ability to deliver this one without the sentiment squeezing in his throat is in large part owed to the time he’s had to lie there thinking about it, and the dozens of ways this might’ve gone worse.

Those things, and all the elfroot. He turns loose the last button on her shirt while she’s still leaned over him.

“Please don’t take my horse.”