"Voss." She reached out with her free hand and laid it against his forearm. His muscles were rigid under her palm, trembling faintly. "Hey, look at me."
He lowered his hands. His eyes were red-rimmed, wet, and so achingly soft that her own throat tightened in response.
"She's perfect," Voss said, like it was a confession. Like it cost him something to say out loud. "She's-Fel, she's perfect."
"I know." She smiled, feeling her own eyes sting. "I made him, with a little help."
That startled a broken laugh out of him, half sob, half real amusement, and he leaned down and pressed his mouth to her hair, then to the baby's, so gentle it barely counted as touch at all.
His hand, the same hand that could crush bone, came to rest against their daughter's back, covering nearly the entire small body, and he held it there like he was memorising the rise and fall of that tiny breathing.
