I didn’t really catch the jolt of happy from Cheek as his ‘Bwenny latched onto his mane and pulled him close, as he settled into her embrace with a rumbling, growling purr deep in his chest. I was caught off-guard by Tembovu’s wide eyes and the wonder that spilled from his mouth as his companion spoke to him--for the first time? And it was such a human moment that I wasn’t prepared for--something so honest and unscripted from something that was supposed to be so serious--it broke the small grin out of me that had wanted to form all this time, and a nervous sort of chuckle, too. “Yeah, they do that,” I told him, remembering how I had felt when Chico started talking to me. “And they don’t stop, either.”

It wasn’t a long moment to wait for his verdict--but it still left my insides wiggling uncomfortably, wondering and wishing and hoping and waiting for the blow if it was coming. But it looked like he had decided a thing before I had even come, because the way he walked around Sparkmarrow and collected me into his embrace like that was too easy to have been a scruple in his mind.

I tensed for a second--I couldn’t help it--how often do I let someone touch me like that? The only people to hug me--hold me--like that for the past year or so had been either Jiji or Lee, and those were two chapters of tragedy all by themselves. I barely knew Tembovu enough for that kind of a heartbreak, but nah, too late, he was holding me and I eased into it and a bewildered little laugh escaped out of me, my head swimming slightly at the fact that he didn’t want the sword I offered him. He had wanted me. And it had always been like that. And he was glad that I had returned.

And I wasn’t sure what I was feeling in that moment.

My brain caught up, though, when he mentioned Sparkmarrow. “Heh, yeah,” I mumbled, my words caught in the thickness of his neck, the cut of his chest.It was hard to focus, cuz the bastard was huge and I’d never been wrapped in an embrace like this before. It was nothing like Lee’s gentle, brittle hesitation; Tembovu was firm and hot, like that towering, flaming elephant he could burst from his body. “My, uh…Pa gave it to me,” I said, and I found myself belatedly wondering what that sort of thing would mean to him--if it would mean anything at all.