Even if Ishiah felt some amount of doubt over what good spending time with her brother's lifeless body could do for Lucy, he valued choice. That she was able to look at him with relative calm in her eyes and make the conscious decision to stay by her brother's body right then was enough for Ishiah to stand and wait some distance away. Close enough that the slightest disturbance would have called him back in a second, but that she had the time to speak her words without the peri overhearing.

And in that time, he looked back out over the familiar deserts, felt his breath grow shallow as he closed his eyes. The sun was still searing into his skin, and his throat longed for even the slightest trace of water. But throughout the nightmare as it played out, there was one thing Ishiah could center on as something almost positive. He stretched his wings out again, stretching them, fanning them, that important part of himself returned for a brief while.

"Whenever you are ready," he said to Lucy.