Their daughter met them at the capital gate before the company had even finished dismounting. She broke free of Niken's hand to run the last stretch of road at a dead sprint, and Sekar swept her up with a relief so total it briefly erased every ache the ride home had left in her body. Rama held them both a moment later, Surya's crystalline arm catching the girl's eye over her mother's shoulder, small brows drawing together in the deep frown she wore when something puzzled her past the point of easy questions.
"Your arm is funny," she told the captain, with the blunt honesty only a four year old could get away with, and Surya, exhausted and hollowed out from the journey, managed something close to a real laugh for the first time since the cavern.
"It is that," he agreed. "I'm still deciding how I feel about it myself, little one." He flexed the crystal fingers slowly, watching the light slide over them.
