SAGE
If I hadn't been carrying Freda in my arms, I would have rushed Makeh without thinking.
I would have crashed into her, wrapped myself around her, cried against her shoulder like a child who had been lost too long and finally found home.
She didn't look like the kind of person who enjoyed physical affection. She had never been soft. Never indulgent. But I didn't care. Not in that moment. Relief and emotion burned too brightly in my chest for restraint.
Instead, I called her name. "Makeh." The sound carried everything I couldn't say.
Happiness flashed in my eyes as I hurried toward her, only slowing when I reached her. She smiled at me, that familiar knowing curve of her lips, calm and composed as always. Laura stood nearby, watching with barely veiled astonishment—though I suspected Makeh had already introduced herself to my second foster mother before I arrived.
"I see you are hale and hearty," Makeh said lightly.
