The jungle just beyond the clearing was quieter than expected. Damp vines sagged low, their weight pulling leaves into a droop, and the muddy undergrowth glistened where morning light tried to reach. Four figures moved through the brush: Goss, Hennick, Luan, and Fara, each carrying rough-woven bark-fibre baskets, vine-cord slings, and tools scavenged from chitin, bone, and shaped stone.
Eloin had sent them out early, wanting them far from the rising argument near the cistern. Raif had agreed, knowing full well the tension that clung to Daly like a second skin might spread if too many people lingered near it. Better to give others space to move, to breathe.
Hennick walked near the front, using a long stick to prod at mossy roots and tangled debris. Goss ranged wider, occasionally whistling softly between his teeth. Luan stayed in the middle of the group, silent and unreadable, while Fara kept to the rear, a short blade in hand and her eyes always scanning.
"Watch the edge of that root, it's slick," Hennick called back toward Luan. It was meant gently, habitually, like an older brother reminding a younger one not to trip.
"I see it," Luan muttered.
That was all.
Goss raised an eyebrow but didn't comment. Hennick fell quiet again, pushing a few fronds aside.
They moved deeper along a curve in the jungle path, weaving past a massive fallen tree draped in ferns. The canopy above thickened. What sunlight had broken through earlier began to fade.
"We'll sweep around and double back through the stone patch," Goss suggested. "More mushrooms near the wet bark if we're lucky."
Fara nodded. She didn't speak much either, but Goss noticed she always watched where they walked, always took note of which plants they passed.
"You've done this before?" he asked, gesturing toward a stand of knotted vines.
Fara gave a tight shrug. "Something like it. We used to run scrap lines. Not in places like this, though."
Goss kept his tone light. "You've got the eyes for it. Quiet steps, sharp turnarounds. You were someone's spotter, weren't you?"
She hesitated. "I watched. I listened. That was enough, most days."
He wanted to ask more, but she'd already turned away, ducking beneath a low-hanging branch.
A few paces behind, Hennick slowed again. He glanced back toward Luan, who was now inspecting a knot of bark near a large root cluster. "Luan, "
Luan didn't turn. "You don't need to talk to me like we're friends."
That stopped Hennick short. "I'm not, I didn't mean it like that."
"You didn't mean a lot of things," Luan said, voice low. "You just left."
The jungle felt heavier all of a sudden.
"I thought you understood why," Hennick said quietly.
Luan gave no reply. He moved forward again, stepping over a fallen branch, leaving Hennick standing in the silence behind him.
Goss looked back at them both, jaw tight, but said nothing.
They gathered what they could. Leaves. Roots. Fungi scraped from stone.
But the silence wasn't done with them.
Later, when Goss and Fara moved ahead to inspect a half-collapsed log heap, Hennick found himself walking beside Luan again. Not by choice, just the way the path narrowed, forcing proximity.
"You've grown strong," Hennick said softly.
Luan didn't look at him. "I didn't have much choice."
Hennick tried a weak smile. "Neither did I."
Luan stopped walking. "Is that how you tell it? That you had no choice?"
Hennick blinked, thrown off by the cold edge in the young man's voice.
"I thought I was doing the right thing," Hennick said. "For both of us. For the family."
"No," Luan said, turning to face him fully now. "You were doing the right thing for you. And you left me behind with the mess."
The forest pressed close. Birds called once and fell silent.
"I looked for you," Hennick said quietly. "After I left. I sent word, "
"Too late," Luan cut in. "You were gone when it counted. You don't get to rewrite that now just because we ended up in the same pit."
There was no shout. No blow. Just the truth landing hard and flat between them.
Goss called back then, voice light but echoing just enough to snap them out of it. "Found some reds on the slope. Get over here before I eat 'em all."
Luan turned and walked ahead.
Hennick stayed back a moment longer, staring at the earth like it might offer him answers.
Fara worked efficiently. She didn't complain, didn't question, but now and then she would glance at Goss, sharp and curious.
"What happened here?" she finally asked. "Before we came."
Goss exhaled through his nose. "A lot. We fought off half the jungle. We lost someone and... we're still figuring it out."
Fara nodded slowly. "There's something… off about this place."
"You'll get used to that," Goss said. "We all did."
He watched her for a moment longer. There was something in the way she stood, how her arms crossed tightly when she wasn't moving, how she flinched at every distant cry of a bird, that stirred something in his memory. But it stayed just out of reach.
As they regrouped, Goss noticed the faint shake in Hennick's hand when he passed over a pouch of dried leaves. He didn't comment. The man looked like he was swallowing more than just words.
Fara crouched beside a tree root, running her fingers along a strange cluster of pale mushrooms. Her brow creased. "Did you mark this spot before?"
Goss shook his head. "No. That's new growth. Could be rotback spores."
She stood again, eyeing the surrounding soil like it might shift beneath them. "Does the jungle always change this fast?"
"All the time," Goss muttered. "That's what makes it dangerous."
Fara nodded once, then looked over her shoulder toward Luan, who stood staring off at nothing. "He yours?"
Goss blinked. "Luan?"
"No," she said. "The older one. The one who keeps trying to apologise without saying the word."
Goss smiled faintly. "Hennick. He's a good man. Just lost the timing somewhere."
Fara didn't respond, but her eyes lingered on Hennick for a few more seconds before she moved to help repack their findings.
Goss caught a flicker of something, her stance, her squint into the trees. A posture he'd seen before. Protective. Unyielding. A shadow of someone else. Someone who had died not far from where they now stood.
He rubbed his thumb across the handle of his stone knife. Still, the thought wouldn't settle.
Before they turned back, Luan lingered near a tree with thick roots. His back was turned, but his posture had changed, less stiff, more slumped, like the weight of the conversation had finally pierced through. Hennick approached again, slower this time, not speaking.
"You think it didn't tear me up?" Luan said suddenly, voice low and raw. "When you left, I kept telling myself you'd come back. That maybe you'd find a way to fix it. But you never did. You moved on. I had to carry everything."
Hennick said nothing. There was no version of himself here that could undo that.
Luan finally turned, eyes wet but fierce. "If you want to talk to me, don't do it like I'm some lost kid. Don't act like it didn't matter. Say what you mean."
It was the closest thing to an invitation Hennick had heard from him. He opened his mouth, but nothing came.
Ahead, Fara had paused. Her gaze swept between the two men, her brows furrowed. "You two always like this?" she asked, voice sharp but not mocking.
Hennick blinked, startled. Luan gave a short, bitter laugh.
"Not always," Hennick said. "There used to be better days."
Fara tilted her head. "Hope you find your way back to 'em. You both look like you need one."
She turned and walked off.
Goss, a little farther ahead, watched the exchange with narrowed eyes. When Fara caught up, she kept her eyes forward and said, "You think they'll figure it out?"
Goss shrugged. "Hard to say. People break in different ways."
She looked at him sideways. "You always talk like that?"
"Only when I'm thinking."
Fara smirked faintly. "Huh."
She didn't press him further, but her eyes lingered on Hennick and Luan as they fell behind again, as if cataloguing something not quite said aloud.
They headed back before the light changed.
The jungle didn't chase them this time. But it watched.
As they neared the edge of the clearing, the tree canopy began to thin. Light filtered through again, dull and white like smoke.
Luan didn't speak. Hennick didn't try again. The space between them held everything neither had said, and everything that couldn't be taken back.
Goss shifted the weight of his basket and glanced at Fara once more. She hadn't asked another question, but her expression hadn't softened either. She looked like someone waiting to decide.
Behind them, the jungle stayed still. But something deep in the underbrush clicked once, quiet, precise. The kind of sound predators make when they're patient.