The lunch is set up in the adjacent hall—long tables dressed in plain linens, pitchers of water and tea, trays of food Ashley and the kitchen staff prepared since dawn. No one calls it a feast. No one laughs too loudly. We eat because bodies still require it, because grief is easier to carry when you’re not shaking from hunger.
I move through the room with Ryker at my side, accepting quiet nods and brief touches to my arm. Condolences come in fragments. “He saved my brother once.” “He taught my daughter to shift.” “He always volunteered for the worst patrols.” Each sentence adds weight and shape to the name on the stone. Jax is no longer only the moment of his death. He is a thousand small kindnesses stacked into a life.
Halfway through the meal, Jax’s parents approach our table. The cro
