It’s the closest we’ve come to discussing that night since it happened. He followed me to Harlie’s Hope because I had water and food. But that’s not why he’s here now. Once Reed showed up and his horse was butchered, there were enough rations to easily last a moon. Asher could have stayed in Harlie’s Hope, pulling enough from the well each day to get by. But he followed me.

“I’m sorry about what happened at Powder Town,” I say. “You know that, right?”

He looks at me for a long beat. “I’m not sure what I know anymore, Delta. You were my pack. We used to be easy.”

“Nothing’s easy in the wastes. It never has been.”

“I know. That’s not what I meant.”

“What did you mean, then?” I can hear my voice rising, getting defensive, though I’m not sure why. He holds a finger to his lips, nodding at Harlie and Reed, still asleep near the bow. I adjust my grip on the tiller.

“Do you regret that we reconnected?” he asks a moment later.

“No,” I answer truthfully. “I wish it had happened another way. I wish I still had Bay, and that the General didn’t know about my brand, and that we started working together to get my pack out of Bedrock the very same day we met. But how could I ever regret running into you, Asher?” I steal a glance at him.

“Well, I got you into quite a bind.”

“Then you helped get me out of it. And I—” I stare at the horizon for a moment. It’s murky and muddled, like my thoughts. I wish words were easier.

“I missed you every single day since Alkali Lake,” I admit finally. “I thought you were dead. I thought you died alone, and I felt like it was my fault, because we left. But you’re here now. I don’t like what you did back at West Tower, but I understand how you thought you had no other options. Just like I thought I had no other option than to run from Powder Town once we could read the map. And I see now that the wastes turn us brutish and shortsighted. All any of us try to do is survive, and that means doing what feels right from moment to moment. I did what I had to. You did the same. And I forgive you.”

He raises a brow. “You do?”

“Yes. Is that so hard to believe?”

“You have a will like granite, Delta. You are the most stubborn person I know.”

“Well, maybe Bay started to soften me. And maybe that’s not such a bad thing.”

“I never said it was.”

“Oh, so you’re happy I’m softening up. You thought I was too strong-willed?”