Serena was quiet for a moment. Then, unexpected, involuntary, she laughed. Short and raw and very tired. "You know I tried to kill you in this territory," she said.
"You tried to kill me in the Old Growth," I said. "Different location."
"I aimed a crossbow at you."
"Kael stepped in front of it." I paused. "He took the bolt in the shoulder. You remember that."
She did. I could see her remembering it, the specific memory of that night in the Growth, the bolt going where she'd aimed it and not landing where she'd aimed it, and what that meant about Kael, which had apparently hit her in some way she was only now able to process at human speed.
"He chose you," she said. Not bitterly. Just as a fact, the kind of fact you've had weeks to absorb.
"He did," I said. "But that's not why I came
