It was easier to focus on him. Always was. He would feel the way Neria tried to place that attention back on him, perhaps lapse into the easier task of seeing to his own emotions and not her own.

Neria went very still.

Once more, she didn't meet his gaze. And then, she pulled away very slowly, with great reluctance. She did not move very far from the circle of his arms, just enough to pick at the tunic and pull it up and over her head. Pulled away, the branded whorls that ran from her left shoulder and over her breast, hidden by the band around her body, would be obvious. A parting mark from her time in the dungeons.

That wasn't what she wanted to show him.

Over her heart was the imprint of a skeletal hand. And in the palm were Murphy's clan markings in the shape of jaws. It thrummed with divinity, burning, and seemed to have its own life to it.

Neria did not look at it. Slowly, her eyes met Kell's. She said nothing.