Jude smirked. "Please don't give anyone ideas. Last time someone said something like that, I ended up getting married twelve times."
Zoey chimed in as she passed, "And somehow survived. That is godlike."
Laughter rippled around them. Real, spontaneous laughter. Not the strained kind they'd used to cover fear. Jude took the plate, kissed Susan's hand, and joined the others in the center of the clearing, where they began to eat together without ceremony. For the first time in months, there was no looming task, no survival drill, no patrol to send out. Yet Jude felt the tension building in himself again, like a pressure under the skin.
After breakfast, he called them together. No one questioned him. They formed a loose circle, sitting or kneeling or standing, facing him.
"We need to talk," he began. "What we saw at the mountain, it wasn't a god. It wasn't even a monster. It was a system. Broken. But it's not the only thing out there."