"You may have to," he said, drooping against her. "I, I don't think I can walk right now."
She looked at him in surprise, her eyes softening immediately. "What's the matter?" she asked in concern, putting a paw on his face gently.
"I'm tired, Jesmind," he sighed. "It took everything I had to do what I did. I just don't have any more strength. Not even to walk."
"Then I'll carry you," she said firmly.
"I'm too big for you to carry."
"The day I can't lift something as light as you is the day I call myself a human," she snorted, standing up. "Watch out, cub, I need to pick him up," she told Jasana, who was still clinging to his neck. She let go silently, staring up at him with teary-eyed concern, and then Jesmind scooped him up with one paw under his legs and the other under his back. He sagged in her grasp, nothing but dead weight to her. Even his tail dangled limply under him. "Jasana, grab your father's tail and throw it over his legs. I don't want to trip over it," she ordered crisply.
"Yes, mama," Jasana complied, grabbing his tail and tucking it up around his leg carefully.
"Well, come on," Jesmind said, looking at the surprised humans. "I'll take you three to the Sulasian Rangers. They're gathering all the survivors so they can get some food and clothes for you."
"I appreciate that, madam," the man, Dory, said sincerely. "I think if my wife turns any more red, she's going to start bleeding out of her cheeks."
" Dory!" the woman gasped.
"Sorry, dove, but I can't help but find it funny," he grinned at her. "About right now, finding something to laugh about is about the only thing we can do."
"Humans," Jesmind snorted. "Come on, then. We're going this way."
Tarrin had never been carried quite like that before, and he found it to be strangely secure. To be carried in his mate's arms like that, to have her scent wash over him, it filled him with a strange sense of peace. Jesmind's scent had always stirred feelings of safety and security in him, a residual effect from the time when she was his bond-mother, and it could still invoke those feelings, even after all that time apart. He let his head rest against her shoulder, letting her be the one to protect him, carry him somewhere safe, where he could rest.
It wasn't very comfortable in her arms, but he was tired. Her scent made him feel secure, and his weariness was a force that could not be challenged inside him. Tarrin succumbed to the combination of those things, and felt himself slide down into sleep.
It was the sound of rain that awoke him. It pattered steadily against canvas, the canvas roof of the tent, the tent in which he was placed. He climbed back into coherence easily, his nose making out the scents of Kimmie and Jasana, and he felt Jasana laying against him. He took a mental stock of himself in those first moments. He still felt tired, but it was nothing compared to the utter exhaustion he had felt, an exhaustion so severe that it caused him to fall asleep in Jesmind's arms. He was absolutely starving, too. Judging by how he felt, it was the day after that eventful night. It had to be day, by the amount of light present inside the tent. When he stirred, he heard instant activity. The sound of flapping canvas, then Kimmie's voice. "He's waking up!" she called hastily.
"Papa? Are you awake, papa?" Jasana called urgently, pushing at his shoulder with her paws.
"I am now, cub," he grunted, opening his eyes and struggling to sit up. Jasana climbed up into his lap and put her arms around his neck, hugging herself to him. Why was she being so… affectionate? From what he remembered, from the moment she'd found him, she'd had her paws around him. It wasn't that he didn't like it, it was just that it wasn't normal. Not for her. She was a very tactile child, always liking to touch people, but this was a bit extreme, even for her. "I'm alright, Jasana," he told her directly, putting an arm around her, then pulling her loose of her grip. "See?"
She smiled at him, a gloriously happy smile, then went right back to hugging him about the neck, putting her head against his shoulder.
"Don't fight her, Tarrin," Kimmie told him with a chuckle. She was sitting by the tent flap, with a book in her lap, a strange book that was bound with some kind of leather that Tarrin had never scented before. "She's not going to let go of you for a while."
"I see that," he replied, sitting up fully and pulling is legs in. "Where are we?"
"A tent not far from the camp of the Rangers," she answered. "We thought it was best to give us some distance from the humans." She closed the book and set it aside. "You've been asleep all day."
"What time of day is it?"
"Coming on to sunset," she answered. "Things have been happening, Tarrin. Fae-da'Nar left at noon. Sathon wanted to wait for us, but when it became apparent that you needed days to recover, he gave up on it and started out with the others. Thean and me stayed behind," she smiled. "To help Jesmind watch over you and the cub."
"They left?"
"They had to," she nodded. "You know how tight the timing's going to be. They couldn't afford to wait. Not even for you."
"I guess. Actually, that makes things a bit easier." He bounced Jasana a bit, putting a paw on her back and moving her so her knee was digging in to his more sensitive areas. "The only thing I'm going to have to explain to them now is how we got to Suld first."
"I told Sathon that we were moving on to Suld. I told him we'd be there to greet him when he arrived, but I didn't say how," she grinned. "I think he suspects you know a way to use magic to get there fast, but I wouldn't tell him. He got pretty annoyed with me about it."
"You know something, Kimmie? You're actually a mean little girl, do you know that?"
"Of course. I am a Were-cat, after all," she said with a wicked little smile.
Tarrin looked at her, then laughed.
Jesmind blew through the tent flap right about then, kneeling by him so fast her knees skidded on the floor of the tent, putting a paw on his shoulder and inspecting him with her eyes. "Are you alright, my mate?" she asked intensely.
"I'm fine," he said, yawning widely, showing his formidable canines. "Just a little tired yet, but that'll be gone by tomorrow. Why all this worry over me? If you've talked to mother, then you know that this is a normal side-effect of magical exhaustion."
"Well, excuse me for caring," Jesmind said icily.
"It's not just you. It's this, and her, and everything," Tarrin said, bouncing Jasana meaningfully. "What happened?" he asked. "Something had to happen to make you all act like this."
Jesmind looked at Kimmie, who nodded. "Well, when you were using your magic in Torrian, it, well, it affected Jasana."
"Really? What happened to her?" he asked curiously. He sat patiently as all three of them started babbling at once, then he calmed them down and had them tell him their impression of the events one at a time. Jesmind first, then Kimmie, then he heard what Jasana had to say.
"And I felt you wrap yourself all up with magic," she was saying, getting into the core of the story after about ten minutes of talking about stones and books and where they were staying. "When I felt that, I felt it reach out and grab me. I did what you did when I did that to you, pushed myself away from it, but when that happened something else reached out and grabbed me, like the magic without anyone moving it. It scared me, but when it got me, I could feel you, so I didn't push it away right at first. I could feel what you were doing, and it scared me, cause I could feel how hard it was for you to do it. I was afraid it was going to hurt you. I wanted to try to make it stop, but I couldn't do it," she said in a small voice, lowering her eyes. "The magic inside me was fighting with me. It didn't want to do what I was telling it to do, the way you tell it to do things. I never knew it misbehaved like that," she fretted. "It always does whatever you tell it to do, every time you tell it to do it. Why wouldn't it listen to me?"