The smoke led them downhill through thin trees where the frost still clung stubborn as old scars. Rafi felt the hush's absence more painfully with each step: no pulsing hum behind his ribs, no shadow voice to hush back the growl of his stomach or the ache in his blistered feet.
The braid girl stumbled once, knees buckling in a patch of black ice hidden under pine needles. Rafi caught her under the arms before she hit the ground. They paused there — two half-feral shapes stitched together by the memory of something older than words: trust born in darkness.
When they moved again, the trees thinned into the ghost of a road — a logging trail no one bothered to keep cleared anymore. Someone had pitched a canvas tent near a dead stump, its flap quivering with the promise of warmth. Smoke rose from a rusty barrel turned into a fire pit.
Voices drifted through the crisp air: low, unsure, human. For a heartbeat, Rafi's legs locked. The hush had taught him to fear humans more than monsters. People asked questions. People gave you rules to break and punished you for breaking them. The hush never needed questions — only your softest parts to feed on.
The braid girl pressed her knuckles to his spine, urging him forward. He shivered but obeyed.
A man in a parka spotted them first. He swore and nearly dropped the mug he was warming over the barrel fire. Another figure — a woman in layered scarves and ragged mittens — turned, wide-eyed at the pair of children crawling out of the woods like ghosts left behind after a bad story.
No one spoke at first. Rafi and the girl stood at the edge of the clearing, hunched and filthy, looking like two smears of dusk dragged into daylight. He heard the man mutter something to the woman about more runaways, more lost kids.
Someone offered food — dry crackers, broth in a dented camping cup. Rafi felt the braid girl stiffen beside him, mistrust coiled tight as wire in her throat. He took the cup first, lifting it to her cracked lips. She sipped only when he did.
Questions came then, of course. Who are you? Where are your parents? Did you run from the shelters?
Rafi didn't answer. The hush still lived somewhere deep behind his eyes, whispering no words, no truths.
But when the braid girl finally looked up, eyes shimmering with a thawed ache, she rasped something they both understood, even if no one else did: they weren't alone now. And maybe, this time, that was worth every word they'd kept buried.
A hand touched his shoulder. He flinched. The warmth didn't bite — it stayed warm, stayed kind. The first gentle thing that hadn't wanted anything back in a long, long time.
Around them, dawn brightened the frost. Rafi closed his eyes, seeing the hush behind his eyelids, but feeling the light on his face. It didn't burn. It only reminded him he was still alive.