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Shamir feels naked and exposed, standing out in the open when there's ample cover mere yards away. She has to force herself to stay put, a beacon to return to, as Catherine jogs back down the gentle incline of packed dirt. Thunderbrand bounces at her hip, its sunset glow oddly peaceful for once, in comparison to the fires still gnawing at Remire Village's corpse. Shamir keeps her eyes trained on Catherine, while all her other senses cast out--listening, feeling, waiting for anything that might require her to spin her attention on a razor's edge, to keep them both alive.
"Nice shot," Catherine says without preamble, as soon as she's within conversational range. Just as abruptly, her expression shifts, lightning frustration streaking across her eyes. "I don't know how that bastard managed to survive what both of us threw at him. I should've cut his head clean o--"
A rattling cough rends its way out from Catherine's lungs, forcing her to turn her head aside to try and catch it in the crook of her arm. Shamir steps closer, alarm spiking through her despite herself.
"What did he do to you?" she asks tersely. Already, a dozen possibilites are unfolding in her head--she doesn't need to be a mage to know that any abnormalities after fighting one are an instant red flag.
"Smoke," Catherine croaks with a dismissive flap of her hand. She sucks in a labored breath before another cough wracks her frame. Shamir's hand darts to a narrow skin of water hanging by the quiver on her hip, and without even looking, she wrenches out the stopper and hands it to Catherine. Catherine takes a shallow swig, then another, forcing herself not to drink too much too fast. Shamir turns away, already looking for a spot where the air is clearer. "Clearer" being a relative term, of course. She wills herself to focus on doing something that's actually productive, instead of hovering and cooing over Catherine. Why she's even fighting the urge in the first place is beyond her--Catherine can take care of herself, and Shamir isn't the coddling type.
"Thanks," comes Catherine's voice from behind her. It's followed by a smaller, whuffling cough, one that doesn't sound nearly as bad.
"We should move," is all Shamir offers by way of a reply. The feeling that she shoud add something else, something more sentimental, nibbles at the edges of her conscience. If she has the right words for that something, though, the moment will be long past before she can dredge them up.
"Just a moment."
This makes Shamir turn back around at last, when she knows she's been avoiding it. Catherine's giving her a look that's clearly supposed to be meaningful. Partners they may be, but it takes a moment for Shamir to translate the emotions she's learned to read on Catherine's face. Halting as it may be, knowing that they've begun to communicate without needing words makes something stir in Shamir's chest.
(Then again, it might just be the smoke slinking its way into her lungs.)
Catherine steps closer, a request and an invitation all in one. Shamir allows the sphere of her focus to soften and narrow until it encompasses nothing more than the two of them. This is her assent to the silent debrief--if there's no eye in the storm, they'll carve one out for themselves.
Which one of them leans in first? If Shamir cared to pay attention, she knows she could tell. She doesn't care, though, not as she presses her forehead against Catherine's. Catherine closes her eyes, and maybe it's a gesture so trusting, so foolhardy, that enables Shamir to let go of a breath she hadn't realized she'd been holding.
It should feel disgusting. They both smell of sweat, woodsmoke, and the odor of battle that runs like an undercurrent, a morbid jumble whose contents even Shamir hesitates to accept as too familiar. Already, strands of Catherine's flyaway hair are sticking to Shamir's skin. But when Catherine reaches out her free hand, Shamir's is there to take it. She curls her gloved fingers over Catherine's and squeezes. Catherine matches her grip, just tight enough that her pulse feels like it's beating beneath Shamir's skin. They stay like this for a handful of heartbeats, drawing from one another something that neither of them can quite put a name to.
"Alright," Shamir breathes, pulling away. Back into the storm.
"Alright," Catherine echoes. It could be a question, too--but if it is, it's one Catherine already knows the answer to.
They begin to pick their way back through the rubble-strewn path, hugging the line of trees to their right. The way they fall into step with one another isn't entirely natural. It's not so much that one of them has learned to match the other's pace, as it is that they've learned to meet their paces somewhere in the middle.