For a moment, Balthier gets that strange feeling of standing at the edge of a precipice, tempted to turn and run from danger and just as tempted to leap. The kind that's going to result in flying or falling utterly broken.

David could destroy him, he knows. Could be Wilhere all over again, and he doesn't know if he can get back up from that a second time. But he could also be -- something else entirely. A new path. A future he stopped envisioning; a future he can't picture because he doesn't understand it yet.

And scions, he knows he wants to jump.

He pulls David to him, kissing him hard, fueled by something deeper and more rooted than desire alone.