BEFORE IT COULD BECOME A MOMENT

Cushions lined the walls of the twins' school-town house and the windows sat cracked half an inch for air. Val stepped in behind Dawn and found Mei and Xian already on the floor, living room cleared for training. No gate run tonight. Just Aura work.

"Inhale," he said. "Hold. Now reach."

Mei and Xian kept their cycles going. Dawn sat between them with her shoulders dropped and her lashes heavy, holding steady until her breath hitched wrong. Lines pulled tight across her forehead. The thread she'd been building unraveled while the twins kept breathing beside her.

Val moved behind her. His palms found the knot along her shoulder blade and worked it down with deliberate pressure, then her neck, each release letting her inhale sink lower. He kept his own output thin and even, a steady current she could follow, and talked her through letting the last stiffness go.

Her exhale lengthened. The hunch left her spine. Where she'd only ever brushed the edges of other fields, she caught one properly now and pulled it in. Heat from the still air joined her cycle. He cut his flow back. She mirrored the throttle and held.

Mei and Xian looked over from their corner without stopping their reps. Val stayed in the instructor's posture. Dawn climbed out of the trance pink-cheeked, hair slipping forward over one eye. She looked up at him once.

"Thank you."

She looked away before it could become a moment.

---

Later in the kitchen Mei needled her about breath control. Xian ruffled Dawn's hair like she'd won something. Dawn swatted at both of them and didn't dodge Val when he passed her a glass.

Drills thinned out. Chips went around. Sleeping bags claimed patches of carpet. Saturday night ended the way these nights usually did: four under one roof, voices dropping into sleep.