Fafnir noticed my silence and took a step closer, his voice softer this time. "I didn't mean to throw you off. I just… wondered. You've given everything to our cause. But you didn't start here. You had a life before."
I finally looked at him, my voice quiet. "That life feels like it was someone else's now."
"But if you had the choice?"
The silence returned, not because I didn't have thoughts, but because I had too many.
And I didn't know the answer. Not yet.
I looked ahead, at the storm that waited for us.
"I don't know," I said honestly. "Part of me wants to say yes. That I'd go back in a heartbeat. But another part… the part that's still standing here beside you? That part doesn't want to leave until this is over. Until I know I didn't come here just to survive—but to make a difference."
Fafnir nodded slowly, a flicker of understanding in his expression. "You already have."
