Page 117 of Nothing But Air

“You guys aren’t that quiet when you argue,” Marcus added. “I didn’t mean to overhear.”

“Yeah.” Teague kept coiling. “He fell. I couldn’t save him.”

“I’m sorry.” Marcus was quiet for a moment. “Grief makes you do crazy things.”

“Like nearly bringing down a cave on us?”

“Yeah. Sorry about that.” Marcus glanced toward where Eden was checking her pack. “But grief can also make us push away people we actually need.”

“It’s more complicated than that.”

“Usually is.” Marcus finished with his own rope. “But my grandfather’s letter—the part about real treasure being the people we love? He was talking about not letting fear or grief or pride keep us from what matters.”

Teague watched Eden laugh at something Kyle said. The sound made his chest ache.

“She ended it,” he said before he could stop himself. “Said she can’t be with someone who keeps pushing until they push too far.”

“Was she wrong?”

Teague thought about the jump. The gap. The choice he’d made without hesitation. “No.”

“So maybe the question isn’t whether she was right to end it.” Marcus started walking. “Maybe it’s whether you’re willing to change.”

He paused, glancing back. “My grandfather spent years trying to teach my father that. He never learned.” Something sad crossed his face. “I’m hoping I’m smarter than he was.”

As they shouldered packs and started hiking toward the coordinates, Teague found himself walking beside Eden. Not by design. Just the natural rhythm of their steps matching.

“That was something,” she said quietly. “What Marcus found.”

“Yeah.”

“Makes you think.”

He could see her weighing whether to say more. Whether to bridge the gap between them.

“Teague—”

“Later.” He cut her off—not ready. Not with Kyle and Marcus twenty yards ahead. Not when he didn’t have answers. “We’ll talk later.”

Her face shuttered. “Right. Professional.”

He winced. That wasn’t what he’d meant.

But the words were already out. And she was already moving ahead, putting distance between them.

They hiked toward the coordinates. Close but separate.

Everything was coming together for the mission.

Between him and Eden, nothing was resolved at all.

The fluorescent lights hummed overhead, casting that sterile blue-white glow that Meg had long ago stopped noticing in most settings. But here, in this cramped ICU room at Flagstaff Medical Center, the light seemed harsh. Wrong. It washed the color from Liam’s face. And made Nimue’s dark, messy braid look more gray than brown. Her friend held Liam’s limp hand. Her head lay next to his arm, their fingers intertwined, her eyes closed.

Meg adjusted the IV drip and studied Liam’s vitals for the third time in an hour. Heart rate steady at seventy-two. Blood pressure one-eighteen over seventy-six—textbook perfect. The propofol had cleared his system hours ago.

So why wasn’t he waking up?

She pulled out her penlight and lifted his eyelid, shining the beam across his pupil. It constricted. Sluggish, but responsive.