His breath is warm, and very close. And then his mouth is upon her, his beard gently sharp, his lips very soft. Before she can fully understand what is happening, he sucks in his cheeks. She feels the splinter hold its place, and then the release as it works out of her skin. He spits the wood to the ground, and she feels the absence of his mouth like a wound.

He does not look at her as he holds out the kettle for her to pour over her hand, though there is only a little blood, tiny gemlike droplets that she sluices from her skin.

‘Thank you,’ she says at last, and he still does not look at her, but reaches down to scratch Ulf behind the ears. His hand is trembling, and her own feels unsteady as she lifts it to her face to examine it. Her palm is a little red where his lips gripped it, the tear where the wood entered tiny. It joins the other minute craters of her skin, their new topography carved by her toil. In Eren’s fingers, her own seemed bearlike and clumsy, but she is proud of them, looking at the evidence of their usefulness. They suit her.

‘Sorry.’ His voice is hoarse. ‘I didn’t think.’

‘It is no matter,’ she says, watching his slim fingers on Ulf’s matted fur, the way he combs the burrs from the dog’s pelt, plucking them delicate as lute strings.

‘Why are you here?’ she asks finally. His face is shadowed, bent to the dog. She wants him to look at her, fix her with his steady, clear gaze, but he seems determined not to. ‘Eren?’

‘I am staying here,’ he says, gesturing to the platform.

‘In the forest?’

‘It is good enough for the other dissolutes.’

‘You are no dissolute,’ she says hotly.

‘Please, calm. It is not good for you—’

‘For me?’ It is a shriek, she cannot contain it. Fury burns suddenly through her: for all she has witnessed, all she has borne. For the shame the joy at seeing him had provoked, for how now he will not even look at her. ‘Do not act like you care for me. You left me, like everyone else. All care is for what I carry, and there is none, there is no one left for me—’

She heaves, and inside her the baby stirs as though it heard and understood her. Eren is standing too, but the easiness of earlier is gone. He does not touch her, though his arms are held out in readiness in case she falls. She turns away, sucks in air in great, heaving gasps.

‘I care, Lisbet,’ he says, finally. ‘I never left.’

He is closer, so close she could step back and be pressed full against him.

‘I watched, after the Twenty-One ordered us gone,’ he continues. ‘I could have left with Frederich and the others, but I stayed to ensure you were safe. Until your husband or mother-in-law returned home. I saw Mathias and Ida’s children were still with you. I promise you, you were not alone a moment.’