Long after Risa had lapsed into sleep, Kirin lay awake. With the onset of exhaustion from his exertions, lust had long since faded and lingering pride had wavered into concern and confusion, leaving him tormented with remembered imaginings of a bloodied and broken Yoshimi. Caught in the limbo between wakefulness and sleep, he re-lived the floods of red heat, and a burst of unexplained exultation and subsequent weakness that had left him feeling bereft of a strange strength he hadn’t previously been aware of. Just the thought of it made his gut twist. In retrospect, his preoccupation with Risa had as much to do with comforting his own fears as reassuring the dejected athlete.
Now, in the deep silence of the dead of night, he heard an unspoken truth. Somehow, he had altered the course of Yo
