there's a niche in his chest where a heart would fit perfectly
A few days? A few days? It's a hell of an explanation in three simple words, and it has something painful clenching tightly in Nate's chest, his brows pulling together in abject worry.
"You were gone..." He doesn't want to say it, his throat constricting so tightly the word comes out a whisper, a squeak. "Months. We don't... we don't know exactly when you..." Again, this is something he can't actually say. As if the very act of putting words to the fact makes it more real, makes the scar ache that much more. "You've been gone since Longheat. And... it's Deepfrost now." They'd searched, high and low, as well as their own addled minds could manage. Finding her now has guilt rising. She'd been somewhere, obviously, had they simply missed her? Overlooked something?
Home at least will be a relief, a safe place to talk, to put together the pieces of the puzzle and hope they can muddle together some kind of sense. Nate skips the hand entirely, that slight connection not feeling like nearly enough. In a single quick motion, he scoops Ru up into his arms instead, letting her head rest at the juncture where his shoulder and Sunjata's meet. He doesn't know the thought that crosses her mind, doesn't know how unintentionally close to it he's come, he just knows that he won't let her walk a step further injured.
The house is thankfully close, the still unfinished garden and patio greeting them before the front door does, a barrier that Nate let's the attuned take care of, a silent Lock it? sent through the bond, some kind of paranoia boiling hot in his guts.
"You were gone..." He doesn't want to say it, his throat constricting so tightly the word comes out a whisper, a squeak. "Months. We don't... we don't know exactly when you..." Again, this is something he can't actually say. As if the very act of putting words to the fact makes it more real, makes the scar ache that much more. "You've been gone since Longheat. And... it's Deepfrost now." They'd searched, high and low, as well as their own addled minds could manage. Finding her now has guilt rising. She'd been somewhere, obviously, had they simply missed her? Overlooked something?
Home at least will be a relief, a safe place to talk, to put together the pieces of the puzzle and hope they can muddle together some kind of sense. Nate skips the hand entirely, that slight connection not feeling like nearly enough. In a single quick motion, he scoops Ru up into his arms instead, letting her head rest at the juncture where his shoulder and Sunjata's meet. He doesn't know the thought that crosses her mind, doesn't know how unintentionally close to it he's come, he just knows that he won't let her walk a step further injured.
The house is thankfully close, the still unfinished garden and patio greeting them before the front door does, a barrier that Nate let's the attuned take care of, a silent Lock it? sent through the bond, some kind of paranoia boiling hot in his guts.
NATE
