The child slept.
Not deeply, not peacefully, but with the brittle stillness of someone whose body had exhausted every alternative. Her breaths were shallow and uneven, as if even rest were something she could not fully afford.
Noctyrr did not leave.
He told himself it was temporary. A matter of observation. Mortals were fragile, unpredictable things. If she worsened, it would be inefficient to discover it too late. That was all.
Time passed without markers. The mountain did not measure hours, and neither did he.
Eventually, the child stirred. Her fingers twitched against the stone, curling instinctively as if searching for something to hold. Her eyes opened again, slower this time, more aware.
She looked around.
The cavern ceiling disappeared into shadow. The air was still, heavy with an ancient presence she did not have the words to name. When her gaze finally returned to Noctyrr, it lingered longer than before.
She did not scream.
She did not recoil.
Her brows drew together in a faint, puzzled frown.
"You're… big," she said hoarsely.
The observation was delivered without fear, stripped of awe. It was merely a statement, as if she were commenting on the size of the mountain itself.
Noctyrr said nothing.
He watched her struggle to push herself upright. Her arms trembled immediately, strength failing her before she had risen more than a handspan. She collapsed back onto the stone with a soft sound, breath hitching.
He felt it then.
Not concern. Not sympathy.
Weight.
The simple, undeniable fact of her presence pressed against his awareness. A mortal's weight—measured not in mass, but in inevitability. Hunger. Cold. Injury. Time. Needs that would accumulate whether he acknowledged them or not.
This was why he avoided them.
"You shouldn't move," he said at last.
His voice was low, steady, carrying no warmth. It echoed faintly through the cavern, the words larger than the space between them.
The child froze.
Her eyes widened slightly, not in terror, but surprise. She swallowed.
"Sorry," she murmured, as if movement itself were an offense.
The word struck him harder than it should have.
He turned away.
The mountain offered no bedding, no food prepared for small hands. Everything here was stone, scale, and stillness. A place designed for something that did not weaken with hunger or ache with cold.
Noctyrr considered the facts with clinical detachment.
She would need sustenance. Soon. Warmth alone would not be enough. If he did nothing, the delay he had granted her would end within a day, perhaps less.
Intervention would extend that time.
Extension would lead to expectation.
Expectation would become attachment.
He had followed that path before.
Behind him, the child shifted again. This time, she did not try to rise. She merely curled in on herself, conserving what little strength she had.
"Am I… dead?" she asked quietly.
Noctyrr paused.
"No," he replied.
There was a long silence.
"Oh," she said.
As if that settled the matter.
He glanced back at her, just once. Her eyes were already closing again, the question having cost her more than she could spare. Sleep reclaimed her with quiet inevitability.
Noctyrr stood motionless.
The mountain remained unchanged. The world beyond continued its distant turning. Nothing had been decided, no vows made, no promises spoken.
And yet the weight remained.
A small, mortal weight, resting where it did not belong.