Worship in joy! He laughed with embarrassment as she tugged on his throat, staggering after the priestess with reluctant obedience. I fear my lack of grace would reflect poorly on your ritual, hemet!

And still he followed, through the ache in bones that still remembered what it was like to be starving. Much coordination had been restored to him thanks to hearty meal and proper care, yet the easy lope of a desert-born noble across sunwarm sand carried stiffness. It would take time and practice to remember the instinct. And as motivating as stubbornness could be in acts of restoration, he found himself self-conscious of the loss where another might so readily witness it.

He told himself it was only this, and not a deeper vein of less nameable insecurity.

At the edge of the water he pranced high-step in faint approximation of her energy, breathing in salt air and seaspray as gulls cackled overhead.