Private Raining and Pouring

[Jackson Lesan]

Wearing: xxx | Tag: Ariadni​

The rain had finally begun to break.

For nearly a week, heavy clouds had blanketed Naboo beneath an unrelenting downpour. Rivers that normally wound peacefully through the countryside had spilled far beyond their banks, swallowing roads, fields, and entire farming communities beneath muddy floodwaters. Quiet villages had become isolated islands connected only by rooftops and the occasional stretch of higher ground. Broken fences drifted with the current. Fruit orchards stood half-submerged. The rich farmland that fed generations now fought simply to remain above water.

The High Republic answered as quickly as it could.

Emergency crews, engineers, and relief convoys poured into the affected regions, but the scale of the disaster quickly exceeded what local authorities could manage alone. The Jedi Order responded without hesitation. Knights coordinated evacuations, Padawans distributed food and supplies, and healers established temporary infirmaries anywhere dry ground could still be found.

Jackson Lesan arrived as part of that relief effort.

Officially.

The Republic rescue speeder beneath him had become a familiar sight across Naboo's river valleys over the past two days. Its cargo hold had carried stranded families, emergency supplies, medical equipment, and once, much to Jackson's amusement, a farmer who refused evacuation until every one of his fambaas had been rescued first. His robes were soaked despite every opportunity to dry them, his boots permanently stained with mud, and sleep had become little more than an afterthought between missions.

He didn't mind.

Helping people had always been the easy part.

The rest of his assignment remained known only to a handful within the Order.

Floods had a way of exposing more than foundations. They disrupted supply lines, concealed criminal activity, buried evidence, and gave those with darker intentions opportunities they might never otherwise possess. Whether the Council's concerns ultimately proved to be nothing more than cautious instinct or the beginning of something larger remained to be seen. Until then, Jackson had his orders: help those in need, keep his eyes open, and pay attention to what others overlooked.

A flicker of movement beside the river caught his attention.

A crowd had gathered near the remains of an old wooden bridge, their attention fixed on something below. Even from the cockpit, Jackson recognized the posture. They weren't waiting.

They didn't know what to do.

His hand eased the controls, banking the rescue speeder toward the riverbank. Whatever questions had quietly followed him to Naboo could wait.

Someone needed help first.

 

[Ariadni]

Jackson Lesan

The rain had finally stopped. Only then did I leave.

I’d told myself it was because the roads were safer now. Because the rescue efforts were finally reaching the villages furthest from Theed. Because there was simply more I could do once the storm had eased. They were all sensible reasons. None of them were the truth.

Every morning since the clouds had rolled over Naboo, I’d stood at the window of my room watching the rain trace slow paths down the glass. My hands always found themselves clasping together without my noticing. Rain wasn’t supposed to smell of smoke. It wasn’t supposed to carry the memory of burning cedar and incense. It wasn’t supposed to remind me of screams.

Yet somehow, it always did.

The storm had found its way into places my mind had carefully locked shut. Every crash of thunder became another section of roof collapsing. Every flash of lightning painted fire behind my eyelids. I’d wake convinced I could still feel ash settling in my hair, only to find nothing there except the rain tapping gently against the windows.

I knew I was standing in the Jedi Temple on Naboo. My body still remembered Vystia. I knew the difference, but my heart did not. So I waited. Waited until stepping outside no longer felt like willingly walking back into the day my world ended. Only then did I find my satchel. The leather still smelled faintly of lavender. I’d tucked a little sachet of dried flowers inside it days ago. Not because the medicines needed it. Because smoke still lingered in places no amount of washing could reach.

The weight of it pressing against my shoulder was comforting. It was a reminder. It helped me remember that I had once been someone who ran toward people in need.

Floodwater still swallowed the fields that should have been green, turning roads into rivers and rivers into something altogether unfamiliar. The currents carried branches, large chunks of what used to be houses, the occasional barrel, and things I tried very hard not to look at for too long. Everywhere I turned there were people trying to reclaim little pieces of their lives from the water.

It felt familiar. Not the flood itself. The need. The instinct to help. For the first time since arriving on Naboo, I hadn’t needed Aileni to coax me from my room. I’d left before sunrise of my own accord, carrying little more than the satchel filled with bandages, herbs, and whatever medical supplies the Temple had trusted me with.

Healing. Something I understood. Something that made sense.

The first pair of hands I’d wrapped that morning had belonged to an elderly woman who’d cut herself clearing debris from her doorway. After that came a little boy with a splinter buried deep in his foot, then a farmer whose shoulder had been pulled from its socket hauling livestock through chest-high water. Small things. Ordinary things.

Each one felt like placing another stone beneath my own feet. Each one felt like the swing of a hammer nailing a solid truth in the center of my mind. That perhaps… Perhaps there was still a place for me in this galaxy after all.

The shout reached me before I understood the words. Someone was stranded on the far side of what remained of an old wooden bridge. The flood had chewed away most of its supports, leaving only a narrow stretch still standing above the rushing water. Several people stood arguing on this side, none willing to risk crossing.

I didn’t think. I simply moved.

“Wait!” Someone called after me. Whether they meant to stop me or encourage me, I never found out.

The first few steps held. The old timber groaned beneath my weight, but remained stubbornly intact. Another step. Then another. I could almost reach them. Almost. A sharp crack echoed beneath my feet.

The world lurched.

For the briefest heartbeat I hung suspended between the earth and sky, my stomach somewhere far above the rest of me. Then everything disappeared. The river struck like stone. Every breath I’d meant to take, and the scream that was half way to my lips, exploded uselessly from my lungs.

Cold. So impossibly cold.

The current sized me before I even understood which way was up, dragging me beneath the churning surface. Water forced its way into my nose and mouth, stealing every attempt to breathe before it could begin. My arms flailed instinctively. Pointlessly. I’d never learned this.

Back home there had been lakes sacred enough that children were forbidden from entering them. Rivers were crossed by stone paths built generations before my birth. There had simply never been a reason. No one had ever taught me how to swim.

Panic arrived all at once. My robes wrapped around my legs like grasping hands, each sodden layer growing heavier as the river claimed it. The satchel I’d carried struck against my hip before the current tore it away completely, its contents scattering into the muddy water like frightened birds. The surface flashed somewhere above me. Too far. Everything burned.

My chest. My throat. The desperate, animal part of my mind screamed for air while the rest of me clawed helplessly at water that offered nothing to hold.

Move. I tried. Kick. I didn’t know how.

The river spun me over and over until I no longer knew where the sky had gone. A bitter thought slipped through the panic. Really? After everything? After the fire. After the monastery. After surviving when so many others hadn’t. This? I’d left the safety of the Temple because I wanted to help someone. I’d wanted, just for a day, to feel like the woman I’d been before Vystia burned. Perhaps I should have stayed hidden in my room. Perhaps grief had been trying to protect me all along.

The last of the air escaped my lungs in a stream of silver bubbles that danced lazily towards a sky I could no longer reach.

The light above blurred. Then dimmed. And the river carried me wherever it wished.​

 

[Jackson Lesan]

Wearing: xxx
Tag: Ariadni

These missions were simpler than the ones his Shadow training usually demanded. Jackson knew what needed to be done when he ran supplies or flew rescue operations. Helping stranded families reach dry ground, delivering medicine to isolated villages, and making certain the injured found proper medical care was far more straightforward than following scattered clues across a system or recovering dangerous artifacts before they disappeared into the wrong hands. There was little room for quiet observation or deduction. Someone needed help, and Jackson either reached them in time or he did not.

The storm itself had finally passed, but Naboo had not yet recovered from it.

The swollen river continued to surge through the valley, carrying broken fence posts, uprooted trees, pieces of shattered wagons, and whatever else the flood had claimed during the past week. Fields that should have been green disappeared beneath muddy water, while the banks had become little more than slick earth and tangled debris. The sky had begun to brighten for the first time in days, though the lingering drizzle and low clouds ensured the countryside remained cloaked in a cool gray haze.

His attention settled on the old wooden bridge.

Several villagers had gathered along one side of the crossing, their voices carrying faintly above the hum of the rescue speeder's engines. One figure had already started across before anyone could stop her. Jackson eased the controls forward, watching the bridge flex beneath her weight.

It failed before he could reach it.

The sharp crack of splintering timber echoed across the river as the center span disappeared beneath the current. The young woman vanished with it.

Jackson's grip tightened around the controls.

"She can't swim."

The observation came almost instinctively. There was no rhythm to her movements, only frantic attempts to fight against the river as the current carried her farther downstream. Every struggle exhausted her a little more, and the flood showed no intention of letting go.

He brought the rescue speeder down on the nearest stretch of solid ground and was already moving before the engines had fully settled into idle. Mud clung to his boots as he ran along the riverbank, keeping pace with the current until he spotted her again. The river forced her beneath the surface once more before finally driving her against a mass of branches that had collected along the bank.

Several villagers had reached her first.

None of them seemed willing to step into the water.

Jackson pushed through the small crowd without breaking stride and dropped to one knee beside her. Her robes were soaked through, river water streamed from every fold of the heavy fabric, and strands of dark hair concealed most of her face. He brushed them aside just long enough to check for a pulse.

Weak.

There was still time.

He carefully rolled her onto her side and supported her shoulders as water escaped her lungs in a series of uneven coughs. She never opened her eyes. Her breathing remained shallow, but each breath came a little easier than the last.

Jackson reached for the medkit secured to his belt and completed a quick assessment the way he had been taught. Aside from bruises and a handful of scrapes from the river, nothing suggested a serious break or wound. The cold worried him more than anything else. He unfolded a thermal blanket from the kit and wrapped it around her before looking back toward the waiting rescue speeder.

"She's alive," he said to the gathered villagers. "She needs a healer."

Without waiting for someone else to volunteer, Jackson slipped one arm beneath her shoulders and the other beneath her knees before lifting her carefully from the muddy riverbank. The walk back to the speeder was short, though every step sank into rain-soaked earth. Around him, the sounds of reconstruction had already begun. Hammers echoed from damaged homes, relief crews unloaded supplies from transports farther up the road, and voices carried across the valley as neighbors worked together to reclaim what the flood had spared.

Jackson secured the unconscious woman inside the rescue speeder before guiding the craft back into the air. The nearest field hospital stood less than a few minutes away on higher ground where rows of white canvas tents overlooked the flooded valley. He brought the vessel down outside the medical encampment, climbed out as soon as it touched the ground, and carried her toward the waiting healers.

"River rescue," he called as he crossed beneath the nearest awning. "Unconscious, water inhalation, pulse is steady. She needs someone better than me."

Only after the healers moved to receive her did Jackson finally step back, allowing them the room and time to do what he could not. The river had nearly claimed another life that afternoon.

He intended to make certain it did not finish the job.

 

[Ariadni]

Jackson Lesan

Darkness had weight.

It pressed against me from every direction, thick and heavy, clinging to my skin like sodden robes that refused to let go. I tried to move, but every stroke of my arms found nothing to grasp. There was no river here. No current. Only something vast and endless that swallowed every effort whole. I kicked. Reached. Pulled.

Nothing.

It was like trying to swim through syrup. Or grief. There should have been panic. Instead, there was only exhaustion. The kind that settled somewhere deeper than aching muscles. Deeper than burning lungs. A weariness that whispered how easy it would be to stop fighting. To let whatever held me simply… keep me.

My eyes searched upward. There. A pale circle of light. Hung impossibly far away. Small. Distant. Fading. I reached for it anyway. It slipped father from my fingertips.

Again. Again. Every movement left me no closer than before.

Perhaps this was what dying felt like. Not falling. Not sleeping. Swimming forever toward a surface that no longer wished to be reached.

A voice echoed somewhere beyond the darkness. So faint I almost mistook it for memory. I couldn’t make out the words. Only the sound. Steady. Certain. The light brightened. Just a little. I reached again. The darkness pulled harder. My limbs felt impossibly heavy now. Even lifting one arm demanded more strength than I could remember possessing.

The voice came again. Closer this time. The light grew. Not brighter. Nearer. As though someone had taken hold of the sun itself and lowered it towards me. I wanted to tell them I was trying. I truly was. Another pull. Another impossible stretch toward the surface. Then?

Pain.

It tore through my chest without warning. My body convulsed around it, against it. The darkness shattered.

Water burned its way from my lungs in a series of violent coughs that left me gasping for breath I wasn’t sure I deserved. Every inhale scraped like broken glass. Every exhale brought another mouthful of river water onto the earth beneath me.

Cold. Everything was cold.

Voices blurred together above me. Hands. So many hands. One steadied my shoulder. Another brushed soaking hair away from my face. Someone wrapped warmth around me, but it struggled to find skin that remembered what warmth even felt like.

I tried to open my eyes. The world answered in little more than pale shapes swimming together beneath a canvas roof. My lips parted. No sound came. Not at first. Only another cough that left my ribs screaming. Eventually, I managed a whisper. It was hoarse and rasping. Trickles of water bubbling from the back of my throat with the one single word I could spew out.

“I’m…”

Alive.

The last word never found its way into the world. My eyes slipped closed again, not from surrender this time, but from sheer exhaustion as distant voices continued to move around me. For the first time since the bridge had given way beneath my feet…

I could hear the river without feeling it trying to pull me under.​

 

[Jackson Lesan]

Wearing: xxx
Tag: Ariadni

The field hospital never truly grew quiet.

Even with the worst of the storm behind them, the steady rhythm of relief work continued beneath the canvas roofs. Healers moved from cot to cot with practiced efficiency, their voices low enough to avoid adding unnecessary worry to an already anxious room. Somewhere beyond the open flap of the tent, the sound of hammers carried across the valley as families began the slow work of rebuilding what the river had spared. Every so often another transport settled onto the muddy ground outside before lifting off again with fresh supplies or those whose injuries demanded more permanent care.

Jackson remained where he was.

The healers no longer needed him. They had taken over the moment he carried the young woman through the entrance, directing him toward an empty cot before gently but efficiently assuming responsibility for her care. He had answered their questions, surrendered the few belongings recovered from the river, and stepped aside without complaint.

Leaving should have been easy.

Instead, he found himself watching the steady rise and fall of her breathing.

He had told himself more than once that waiting served no purpose. She was alive. That much had been true before he reached the camp, and every passing minute made it more likely she would remain that way. The rational part of his mind understood there was nothing more he could contribute.

Experience had taught him that reason did not always quiet memory.

His master's face still visited him more often than he cared to admit. Time had dulled the sharpest edges of that day, but it had never erased the questions that followed it. Could he have arrived sooner? Seen something everyone else had missed? Changed the outcome by a matter of seconds? There were no answers waiting for him, only the lesson he had carried forward ever since.

If someone could still be saved, he stayed.

Movement drew his attention back to the cot.

The young woman's brow tightened before a fit of coughing shook her slight frame. One of the healers was already beside her, supporting her shoulders as water escaped her lungs. Jackson took an unconscious step forward before stopping himself. She was in capable hands. She had been from the moment they arrived.

Her eyes opened only slightly.

They searched the canvas above her without finding focus, and her lips parted as she struggled to force out a single word.

"I'm..."

The sound scarcely rose above a whisper before exhaustion claimed the rest.

The healer rested a reassuring hand against her shoulder. "Easy," the older woman said softly. "You don't need to speak."

The effort had been enough.

Jackson released a slow breath he had not realized he had been holding.

"She'll recover," the healer said as she adjusted the blanket around her patient. "The next few days won't be pleasant, but she'll recover."

Only then did Jackson feel the weight settle from his shoulders.

The healer looked up as she continued checking her patient's breathing. "Is she a friend of yours?"

Jackson glanced toward the satchel resting on a nearby table. It had survived the river better than expected. The contents had been carefully laid out to dry, neatly wrapped bandages beside small jars of herbs and simple medical instruments. Nothing about it suggested carelessness. Everything had its place.

"No," he answered after a moment. "I saw her fall."

The healer followed his gaze and smiled faintly.

"Then she was trying to reach someone who needed her."

Jackson nodded once.

"So was I."

There was nothing left for him to do.

He offered the healer a quiet nod before turning toward the tent flap. Outside, Naboo remained soaked beneath retreating clouds, though patches of blue had finally begun to break through the gray. The flood had taken more than the river ever had a right to claim, and there would be more villages to reach before the day was over.

This time, at least, he was leaving someone behind because she no longer needed saving.

 

[Ariadni]

Jackson Lesan

Voices returned before the world did. Soft, measured. Comforting in a way only experienced healers seemed capable of being. I knew those voices. Not the people behind them. The cadence. The quiet certainty. The gentle way instructions were given without ever sounding hurried. Even before my eyes opened, I recognised the language of a place devoted to healing. For the first time in what felt like an eternity, I wasn’t afraid.

The scent reached me next. Clean linen. Crushed herbs. Alcohol. A trace of damp earth drifting in through the canvas walls. Not smoke. Never smoke. A slow breath found its way into my lungs. It hurt. Every inch of my chest protested the effort, the ache settling somewhere behind my ribs before blossoming outward. I winced instinctively.

“Easy.” The voice comforted me again. I recognised now that it belonged to an older woman.

Warm hands steadied my shoulder as another coughing fit stole what little breath I’d managed to gather. River water burned my throat all over again before finally relenting. When I opened my eyes, the world was a little more than pale blurs swimming in and out of focus. Canvas overhead. Flickering fluorescent light. Figures moving quietly between rows of cots.

A field hospital.

The realisation settled over me slowly. I’d survived. Again. A strange sort of guilt followed close behind. Someone else had almost certainly paid the price for it. In time, in effort, perhaps even in danger. The thought made my stomach twist.

Movement caught the corner of my eye. Someone stood near the entrance. Tall. Already turning away. I couldn’t make out a face. Only the outline of broad shoulders disappearing toward the light beyond the canvas.

“Wait…” The word dissolved into another coughing fit before travelling more than a few feet. The figure never turned. Perhaps they hadn’t heard? I looked instead towards the healer beside me.

“Who…” Breathing suddenly seemed like an unexpectedly complicated task. “Saved me?”

The healer's expression softened. “The young Jedi who carried you in?” Her eyes drifted briefly toward the entrance. “I'm not sure. But he waited until he knew you’d wake.”

I turned my head as far as my aching muscles would allow. The tent flap stirred gently in the afternoon breeze. Beyond it lay only sunlight, and the muddy path leading down towards the river.

“Oh.” A silence settled over me. Not empty. Thoughtful.

I let my gaze drift towards the small table beside the cot. My satchel rested there. Drying. Someone had carefully unpacked every jar, every bandage, every herb, laying them out one by one so that they might be saved. A lump rose quietly in my throat. He had not only saved me. He’d saved the things I’d hope to use to save someone else.

“I never…” I swallowed, my throat felt gritty and dry, despite still being drenched in river water. “Got to thank him.” The words were almost too quiet to hear.

I wasn’t sure whether I was speaking to the healer, or to myself. ​

 

[Jackson Lesan]

Wearing: xxx
Tag: Ariadni

The healer smiled kindly.

"You still can."

She finished straightening the blanket before resting her hands lightly against the foot of the cot.

"He left for Theed a little while ago. We've been burning through supplies faster than the transports can bring them in, and he volunteered to make the run." A faint smile touched the corners of her mouth. "He'll be back."

***
​

The return journey from Theed passed more quickly than the first.

The transport had left the city laden with crates of medical supplies, preserved food, clean water, blankets, and replacement equipment destined for the growing network of relief camps scattered across Naboo's flooded countryside. It was the sort of work that rarely found its way into the histories of the Jedi, yet Jackson found little reason to resent it. Every crate unloaded spared someone another hungry night. Every bandage delivered meant another wound could be treated before infection claimed it.

Even so, his thoughts wandered.

Not often. Never enough to distract him from the work before him. Yet whenever there was a quiet moment between loading a pallet or checking a manifest, his mind returned to the field hospital.

Had she awakened?

The healers had assured him she would recover. He believed them. Still, belief was one thing. Seeing it for himself was another.

The transport settled into the muddy clearing outside the camp with a familiar hiss of repulsors. Jackson joined the volunteers unloading crates until every last shipment had been carried where it was needed. Only after the final manifest had been checked and the last pallet disappeared beneath the canvas awnings did he allow himself to glance toward the medical tent.

His feet carried him there almost of their own accord.

Along the road back from Theed, he had paused only once. Near the edge of a field where the floodwaters had finally begun to retreat, a cluster of small white wildflowers had forced their way through the soaked earth. Against every expectation, they had survived. Jackson had gathered a small handful before continuing on his way, though he couldn't have said exactly why.

Perhaps because they deserved to keep growing. Maybe someone who devoted her life to healing others might appreciate the reminder that life had already begun reclaiming what the storm had tried to take.

The familiar scent of herbs greeted him as he stepped inside the tent.

His eyes instinctively found the cot.

 

[Ariadni]

Jackson Lesan

Rest had never suited me. Not when there was work to be done.

The healers had won the first few hours through sheer persistence, insisting my lungs needed time to recover before I so much as considered leaving the cot. They had neglected one rather important detail. Nobody had forbidden me from helping while sitting down.

Bandages rested on my lap, folded into neat, familiar squares while little pots of herbs sat drying on the table beside me. One of the younger volunteers had returned my satchel after everything inside had been carefully cleaned and salvaged. I’d thanked them more times than necessary.

Busy hands left less room for troubled thoughts.

Every now and then another healer would pass my cot, quietly stealing a folded bandage or a prepared poultice before offering an approving smile in return. It wasn’t much, but it was something. Something was enough.

The sound of boots disturbing the damp earth outside drifted through the canvas walls. I barely noticed. Field hospitals were never quiet places. Every few moments someone entered or left, bringing with them another story the storm had written across the countryside. Only when the flap lifted did I glance up.

Recognition arrived before memory managed to catch up.

Broad shoulders. Mud-stained boots. The calm sort of presence incapable of hurrying, even when the world demanded it. The river. The bridge. The voice. The impossible light reaching down through the darkness. He was looking toward the cot I had been resting in, and something about that touched the very depths of my heart. Warmed it more than any attempt from the blanket or the healer's hands.

“Oh…” The word escaped me before I’d realised I’d spoken.

For a heartbeat I simply watched him. Suddenly uncertain whether I ought to stand, wave, or apologise.

Apologise? Why was that always my first instinct.

Instead, I set the bandages carefully aside and managed a small smile. A real one. A true and genuine thing that illuminated my face and pressed fine lines into the corners of my eyes.

“You’re back.” My gaze drifted towards the flowers in his hand, lingering there for a quiet moment before lifting to meet his eyes again. “They survived.”

It wasn’t really a question. There was something oddly comforting about that. After everything the flood had taken, something so small and fragile had endured anyway. My fingers tightened gently around the edge of the blanket draped across my knees.

“I…” I hesitated. The words suddenly feeling far too small for what they were trying to carry. “Thank you.” The smile softened, touched by equal parts gratitude and embarrassment. “For pulling me out, I mean.” A quiet laugh escaped me then, no louder than a breath. “I’ve decided that rivers and I are not… especially compatible.” The humour was dry, tentative, but genuine.

A tiny piece of the woman I’d been before Vystia had burned.

“I don’t think I’ve properly introduced myself yet.” I rested one hand lightly against my chest. "I’m Ariadni.”
​

 

[Jackson Lesan]

Wearing: xxx
Tag: Ariadni

The familiar scent of antiseptic and crushed herbs greeted Jackson as he stepped beneath the canvas awning. The field hospital was no quieter than when he had left that morning. Healers moved steadily between rows of cots, volunteers carried fresh supplies to overflowing shelves, and patients spoke in hushed voices while the work of recovery continued around them. The crates from Theed had already begun disappearing into practiced hands before he reached the entrance.

His eyes found her almost immediately.

The sight of her sitting upright stopped him just inside the entrance, not because she was awake, the healers had assured him she would be, but because she was working. Bandages rested neatly across her lap, folded with practiced precision while one of the passing healers quietly borrowed a finished stack without either of them interrupting the rhythm. Small jars of herbs stood drying beside her satchel, each one arranged with the same quiet care he remembered seeing when the healers unpacked it.

Even recovering, she had found a way to make herself useful.

Relief settled over him so naturally he almost failed to notice it. The question that had followed him all the way to Theed and back finally had its answer. She was alive, she was healing, and she already seemed more concerned with everyone else than herself.

Only then did she look up.

Jackson wasn't prepared for the smile that met him. It softened the lingering weariness in her face and reached her eyes so completely that, for a brief moment, he forgot why he had come into the tent at all.

"You're back."

His gaze followed hers to the small cluster of white wildflowers still clutched in one hand. He had almost forgotten he was carrying them.

"They were growing outside Theed," he said, lifting them slightly. "The water's already started to recede."

His explanation sounded inadequate even to his own ears.

When her attention lingered on the flowers and she quietly observed that they had survived, Jackson looked down at them for a moment before meeting her eyes again.

"So did you."

The words escaped before he had the chance to weigh them.

Then came the thanks.

Jackson shifted his weight, suddenly finding the muddy ground beneath his boots much easier to look at than the woman offering him gratitude.

"You don't have to thank me." A faint crease formed between his brows as he searched for a better response and failed to find one. "I wasn't going to leave you in the river."

The moment the words left his mouth, he realized how absurd they sounded. Of course he wasn't going to leave her in the river. That had never been a possibility in his mind.

When she laughed, the tension in his shoulders eased.

"I'd probably avoid bridges for a while too," he replied, a small smile finally finding its way across his face.

Remembering the flowers, he crossed the remaining distance and held them out to her.

"I thought you might like these." He glanced down at the blossoms before looking back at her. "They reminded me that things come back. After everything... it seemed worth remembering."

Silence settled comfortably between them before she rested one hand lightly against her chest.

"I'm Ariadni."

"Jackson."

He inclined his head in acknowledgment before his attention drifted back to the growing stack of bandages resting in her lap. One of the healers passed by, quietly lifting several from the pile before continuing on to another patient. The corner of his mouth tugged into the faintest hint of a smile.

"You know," he said, his eyes returning to hers, "most people try resting after nearly drowning."