Fic: fallen empires, The Walking Dead (4/5)
Title: Fallen Empires (1/4)
Fandom: The Walking Dead, HDM AU
Characters/Pairings: Ensemble cast & canon pairings with a dash of Glenn/Daryl later
Word Count: ~6,100 (this part)
A/N: Takes place after 2x7, so spoilers up through there. Contains speculation for future events. Some elements of the WD universe have been changed and everyone has a daemon. If you have any questions about names or forms, just ask! Sorry about the long long wait, everyone! I suck, yes.
Part One | Part Two | Part Three
“Babylon is fallen, is fallen, that great city.” -Revelations 14:18
Specters
Fire roars, leaping tall and wild up dry, brittle trees, spreading closer and closer. Smoke tears at them, blown by a sudden gust of wind, and Mei coughs, diving back into Glenn’s pack for safety. Her whole body shakes.
“What’re we gonna do?” Glenn whispers.
“We can’t stay,” Rick yells over the roaring fire. “We can’t afford to get stuck!”
And he’s right. Their building is concrete, for the most part, but the door and roof are probably flammable, and they can’t get stuck in a burning building, especially one with no windows. They’d suffocate.
“We gotta go!” Shane howls, turning and diving back into the building. Glenn hears him shouting all the way down the hallway.
Glenn, Rick, and Daryl stand frozen, watching the fire leap and roar closer and closer. The woods burn. Glenn stares, transfixed, and for a second he thinks he sees things in the flames: a great city with a tall, tall tower flocked by magpies, and the Specters pouring from holes in the air to chase and eat-
A young boy and a young girl, fingers tangled in daemon fur, and one daemon is the shadowy cat Kirjava and the other is the pine marten-
A woman flying high in the sky above the polar ice, laughing and playing in the Northern Lights, her fingers tracing through ribbons of light and a city hanging in the air-
“C’mon!” Daryl yells, grabbing Glenn’s arm and dragging him back, pulling him into the safety of the building. The fire flares closer and Glenn shouts, struggling to get loose.
“I can see the city,” he shouts, overjoyed. “Daryl, it’s right there, we just have to-”
“Easy, Short Round,” Daryl says, refusing to let go. “It ain’t real, Glenn, it ain’t real. It’s just a dream.”
“I see it,” Glenn breathes.
“We see it too,” Cahir says. “But it’s a dream, a hallucination. “C’mon.”
Reluctantly Glenn lets Daryl pull him away from the fire. Rick shoots him a concerned look but doesn’t say anything, because Shane and the rest of the group come crashing down the hall, wild-eyed with what they can carry slung over their backs.
“We gotta go, man,” Shane says urgently. “Right now.”
Rick nods. “There’s gotta be another way out of here.”
Daryl shakes his head. “No other doors. We gotta go out this way.”
“We’ll burn,” Carol whispers. She’s cuddling Brooklyn to her chest and he shakes like Meiri shakes.
“No we won’t,” Daryl says, going to stand beside her. Cahir blinks up at her solemnly. Carol looks down at him.
“We’ll go around the side,” Glenn adds, coming back to himself. Meiri creeps out onto his shoulder again, fur spiked nervously. “We can run to the Fort from there.”
“Can we make it?” Lori asks. The skin around her lips is drawn and her hand is protectively flattened against her belly. Cass winds around her ankles, eyes flashing, hissing and spitting at the smell of smoke in the air.
Glenn and Daryl share a look. “Yeah,” Glenn says. “We can make it.”
Rick nods encouragingly, pulling his family close. Leah, in snake form again, drops to El’s neck and curls up there tightly.
“Let’s go then,” Shane says. “Before we get stuck.”
Glenn reaches for Maggie’s hand, pulling her close behind him. “It’ll be okay,” he whispers. “We’ll get out of here.”
Her eyes are dull, hollowed out. “And go where?”
“The Republic of Heaven,” Mei says.
The roar of the fire grows again, coming closer and closer. Flames lick one of the corners now, blackening concrete.
“This way.” Glenn tugs lightly on Maggie, following Rick and Shane as they lead the group around the building, away from the growing flames.
Smoke clogs the air and Glenn coughs, spitting out ash. T-Dog is the last person out and he urges the rest of the group faster. Everyone starts running, following the black and white dogs around and out into the undergrowth.
Glenn turns around just for a moment, and sees the fire howl, roaring up the side of the building. Trees wave madly, sparking, and the fire jumps ahead, already licking at their heels.
“Go this way!” Glenn shouts, pointing. The group moves in a diagonal, desperately trying to outstrip the heat.
Wood snaps and sparks flare, spreading the fire like an infection. Maggie stumbles and Glenn pulls her up.
“Jump in the pack,” Mei screams at Luke, and the cat does, awkwardly scrambling against Glenn’s clothes until he’s safe inside with her.
They run.
“Where’s the river?” Rick shouts. Glenn can barely see him, the smoke is so thick. He’s a blur of sooty skin and flashing pale eyes. El looks almost like a ghost through the ashes.
“Should be this way!” Daryl bellows back. He’s not letting go of Carol, fingers white-knuckled around her wrist. She leans into him. Cahir carries Brooklyn in his jaws, racing faster than the rabbit ever could.
They crash blindly through the woods, fire singing at their heels. The heat is almost unbearable and Glenn can barely breathe, choking on the smoke.
He sees a flash of movement-a walker-stumbling along, turning away from the bright warmth. It’s too slow and bursts into flame, flailing, still dragging itself along until the fire swallows it whole and crisps what’s left of its body.
They keep running.
“We’re not going to make it!” Someone-Andrea, maybe, or Jimmy, or Dale, or all of them-howls above the roar. They can’t outrun a forest fire.
“We’ll be fine,” Glenn screams back. “It’s just a little farther!”
Flames explode on a nearby log, racing ahead of them. Shane swears loudly and turns aside, leading the group at an even more extreme angle.
Trees are starting to fall behind them now, licked to the brittle bones, collapsing with a sigh and spraying fire into the air.
Maggie chokes and Glenn holds her tightly.
“We’ll be fine,” he repeats. “We’ll be fine, we’ll be fine.”
It’s hard to believe, dodging through the fire like they are, but Glenn can almost make himself believe it, if he tries hard enough.
He trips, nearly falling, and coughs on the kicked-up ash. Maggie holds him up and they keep going, dodging trees that are already blistering from the heat.
Glenn’s losing sight of the group through the smoke. He can still see El, ghostly pale, and Andrea’s Gazini with his stark white feathers, but all the others fade into the spinning ash.
We’re going to lose them!
Glenn pulls Maggie faster, pressing his hand over his mouth. Fire screams up trees and branches and burning leaves rain down, letting the flames swell.
El disappears-only Gazini and his white feathers, beating down smoke, lead them.
“This way!” Daryl bellows, up ahead through the smog. Glenn can’t see him-Cahir blends into the oily air. Glenn’s running blind, following a vague, hazy voice, and he thinks the smoke’s getting to his head because the world spins.
He stumbles again but picks himself up. He can’t see Gazini anymore but he can hear Nurya, hooting and shrieking somewhere ahead.
“This way,” he chokes, guiding Maggie. She squeezes his hand and runs beside him.
Somewhere to his right, Glenn hears Rick yell and El yelps, her growls breaking and mixing with the roar of the fire. Rick shouts again, hoarse, desperate.
“Shit,” Glenn says, and he sees T-Dog bound past. He reaches out and grabs his shoulder, pulling him back. “You don’t let go of Maggie,” he snaps. “You hold on to her and do not let her go, okay?”
“Okay,” T-Dog says, grabbing Maggie’s hand. Luke flashes out of the pack, jumping onto his person’s shoulder, his fur fluffed.
T-Dog doesn’t stop running, taking Maggie with him. She looks over her shoulder once.
“Go,” Glenn shouts. “Go, I’ll be okay, I’m right behind you!”
El’s yelping growls grow louder and Glenn hurtles toward them, ducking the heat, his hand still pressed flat over his mouth.
He can sort of see Rick and Shane through the smoke: Rick’s fallen, caught in something, and no matter how much he struggles he can’t get loose. El tears at whatever’s holding him down, eyes wild, but she can’t free him. Shane jogs closer, Kali a living shadow at his side, and he actually stops and stares down at Rick, not moving to help him.
Fear and anger begin to spark in Glenn’s chest and he runs faster. The fire’s snarling closer and Rick needs help, it looks like Shane’s gonna leave him there-
Rick throws out his hand, reaching for Shane. El yelps again, unnaturally loud, and says something to Kali.
Shane doesn’t move for a second, just staring at Rick’s outstretched hand. Kali makes to go from his side but then steps back, whining.
Glenn wants to scream out, to let Shane know he’s watching, to let Rick know that he’s coming, but the smoke dries out the words in his throat and all he can do is dodge a burning branch and tear through the smoke.
Shane grabs Rick’s hand all of a sudden, moving fast like a striking snake, and hauls him up. The other man yells and Glenn sees strands of something-barbed wire, it looks like-buried in his leg.
Shane pulls but the wire is still buried in the ground and it’s not going to give. Kali and El both rip at it but only get bloody teeth and torn muzzles for their trouble, and the fire roars ever closer.
Glenn finally reaches them, sliding to the ground beside the coil of wire. He doesn’t pause to think-he pulls the dead man’s pouch from his pocket and grabs the knife, bringing it up and hacking away at the wire determinedly. The knife presses into his hand uncomfortably but he doesn’t care. El and Kali help him, biting, stretching the wire.
Finally, after hacking at it for what feels like whole minutes, the wire breaks and Rick comes free. Shane grabs him and they’re off, racing away from the flames.
Glenn follows, watching fire lick over the wire now, turning it cherry red.
They run, tripping over branches, skirting anything burning. Farther away Cahir raises his voice in a howl, and then again and again, calling them. Shane half-drags Rick, holding him up, and they crash through the burning wilderness after the wolf’s howls.
Glenn gets ahead a little bit, struggling to breathe through his nose. Rick’s leg bleeds freely and he’s having a hard time putting weight on it. Glenn grabs his other side and together he and Shane get him moving faster and faster, towards the howling Cahir.
The fire swells behind them, hot and hungry, singing the tips of their clothes. Kali snarls, urging El even faster, her fur smoking faintly.
“This way!” Cahir howls. “C’mon!”
The three of them run, tripping over roots and supporting Rick, the flames snapping at their feet, and then, very abruptly, the forest runs out and they’re crashing down a dusty hillside, tumbling together and hitting cold river water.
Glenn coughs, hacking up ash and water, and staggers to his feet, wincing.
They’re all alive.
Sooty, singed, coughing heavily and bleeding, in a couple of cases, but alive, and Glenn would laugh if he wasn’t so lightheaded. Meiri sticks her cold nose in his ear, shivering, still half-in the pack.
“We made it,” she whispers.
Down here in lower ground, the smoke isn’t so bad and Glenn can breathe again, and he takes huge gulps of the cleaner air.
The fire reaches the hillside but can’t drop into the steep ravine. It spreads to the other side by fallen trees and what looks like an old rope bridge-the rednecks again, probably-but down here they’re safe.
“You’re an idiot,” Maggie snaps, half-tackling him. She’s soaked and shivering too. Glenn’s betting that everyone sort of fell into the river too.
“Sorry,” he mumbles into her hair, letting her crush him. “Rick needed help.”
As soon as he says it, Lori’s at her husband’s side, helping Shane lift him from the water. Rick is still conscious, holding on tight, but his face is gray and drawn. Glenn can’t see his injuries but he was stuck pretty good. The wire, when Glenn cut it, had been slick with blood.
“What happened?” Daryl says, sloshing towards them. He’s bleeding from a cut on the side of his face and Cahir limps a little.
“He got caught in some barbed wire,” Glenn says quickly, already rummaging around in his (thankfully dry) pack. They can’t do anything for Rick until they find some dry, not-burning land, but some painkillers could go a long way.
“Some kinda hunter’s snare, I think,” Shane adds darkly.
There’s a few Advil left in a bottle and Glenn hands them over. He has some antibiotic they took from Hershel’s too, and Lori snatches it up.
“’m okay,” Rick gasps, struggling to his feet. He takes the Advil but refuses the antibiotic. “Later. Let’s get outta here first.”
“And go where?” Dale says, tapping his rifle nervously. Nurya settles on his shoulder and her feathers are blackened. “Look around us!”
The river and the ravine are fire-free but the rest of the forest burns, smoke billowing high above them.
“There’s nothing left! We can’t go back to the compound and we sure as hell can’t wander through that to try and find Fort Benning and the Republic of Heaven!”
“Now hold on,” Shane says, once he’s sure Rick can stand up without falling over. “Ain’t the Fort close to some river or other? Rick?”
“The Chattahoochee,” Rick mutters, holding tight to El’s fur. “Stayed there with the Scouts, ‘member?”
Shane nods, turning back to Dale. “I’m gonna bet this is the Chattahoochee. If it ain’t, it’ll spill into it anyway. We just gotta follow it ‘til we get close enough.”
“Which way?” Dale challenges.
“Downriver,” Daryl says immediately. “This way.” He points.
Dale shakes his head, still unconvinced. “We have no tents, no food, barely any medicine. Rick can’t walk-”
“I’m fine,” Rick snaps, taking a few hobbling steps to prove his point.
“-and we’re exhausted. You think we can make it today?”
“We have to,” Daryl says.”
“We can,” Glenn adds, stepping forward. “It’s only just morning, we have all day to make it to the Republic. We don’t even have to walk that fast. And we can rest on the banks, if we have to.”
“I’m with Glenn,” Carol says quietly. Brooklyn is cradled in her arms again, his long ears twitching. Everyone turns to stare at her. “We can’t just stand here and do nothing. We’ll die.”
Glenn nods.
“And that’s dishonoring everyone we’ve lost,” Maggie says, locking eyes with Carol. “My dad would kill me if he knew I was just gonna give up.”
Carol looks right back, unwavering. “Exactly.”
“So let’s move, people,” Daryl says, clapping his hands. He and Cahir take the lead almost immediately, prowling ahead, and the rest of the group strings out behind him.
“Take the fucking pills,” Shane mutters, bouncing the antibiotics in his hand.
“Please, Dad,” Carl adds, and Glenn sees Leah take a shape he’s never seen her take before, a little golden brown weasel. She, despite her size, fluffs up and hisses scoldingly at El from Carl’s shoulder.
Rick nods and accepts the meds, and Glenn turns away, satisfied that his family will keep him from doing anything stupid.
Maggie takes his hand and they walk together, Luke and Meiri blinking peacefully from their people’s shoulders. “Don’t run off like that,” she says.
“Seriously,” T-Dog adds. “Don’t. She was just about ready to charge after you.”
Glenn smiles, that warm feeling spreading in his chest, killing some of the fear. “Sorry.”
Maggie rolls her eyes and holds on tighter, and together they make their way downriver. The water’s cold, but after the blistering heat of a forest fire nobody minds. Rick seems to get his legs under him pretty quick and he walks without anyone’s help but El’s, though Lori and Carl keep a close eye on him. Every now and then they see a walker stumbling above the ravine, burning, but none end up in the river so they keep wary eyes on the edges and move on.
The fire rages, gulping down the dry, brittle earth. Outside of Atlanta there hasn’t been real rain for months, since even before the outbreak, only short five-minute cloud bursts that don’t do much of anything. Even those have been pretty rare, and now the fire spreads, out of control.
It’ll take rain to stop it, Glenn realizes. There are no firefighters anymore, no National Guard to watch over them. The fire will spread until the rain or the wind stops it, or until there’s nothing left to feed it anymore.
He shivers and tries not to think about it.
At about noon, the ravine sort of evens out and becomes flat again, though the fire still licks beside them. Everyone soaks some spare clothes and presses them over their mouths, and they keep going until the ravine builds back up.
No one really talks, just like before. It’s too hot, they’re too tired, they’ve had another close brush with death and they’re all thinking how close it had been, and still will be, in a world ruled by the dead.
Glenn doesn’t think about any of that. He has decided that, no matter what happens, no matter who he loses, he will not stop living.
That, he thinks, is the heart of the thing.
They have to keep going. No matter what happens, they have to keep moving, on and on and on until they die.
On his shoulder, Meiri nuzzles against his neck, warm and solid. “You see,” she whispers. “We’ve got it now. Finding the Republic’ll be easy after all of this.”
“Yeah.”
They move on.
In the river they start to see bits of civilization: an overturned canoe, a few roughly-made graves, a hollowed-out cabin, an empty campground, abandoned cars.
“We’ve got to be close,” Daryl calls back, slogging on. The fire roars merrily on all sides above them, spreading freely through the dry land, but at least it’s not hordes of walkers. With any luck they’ll all have burned.
“That would be nice,” Meiri says, curling her tail around Glenn’s neck. “Don’t you think? If all the walkers burned?”
“That would be nice,” Glenn says, thinking about it. If all the walkers died in the fire, they wouldn’t have to worry so much anymore. They could find a place and settle down, or just keep going for the Republic of Heaven, or do whatever the hell they want, because without the walkers it’d be fine again.
They keep walking. Around them the fire starts to die, pushed back by the wind. The air clears again and Glenn takes a deep, experimental breath. The air tastes like old fire, but he can breathe without choking.
“We should be close,” Daryl calls back. “It should be right through the woods there.”
And sure enough, rising out of the brittle, blackened trees is a wall and a fence and behind that some low-slung buildings, all clustered together.
It looks empty.
There are no guards, no military men strutting back and forth. The walls are scorched and written on, in spray paint and probably blood.
OVERRAN, it reads. NOTHING LEFT.
THERE IS NO REPUBLIC OF HEAVEN
THE CITY OF BABYLON-
TURN BACK
GO NORTH
THE CITY OF BABYLON IS FALLEN-
OVERRAN-NOT SAFE
THERE IS NO HOPE
IS FALLEN-
Meiri curls around Glenn’s shoulders gently, turning his face away. “Don’t look,” she says. “Don’t look, Glenn.”
He swallows. His chest is heavy, like he’s taken in too much, and he curls his fingers around the dead man’s pouch and that sliver of knife.
“C’mon,” he says, and leads his friends to the open gates.
Fort Benning is a wreck. It was overrun, that much is clear-walker bodies pile together, taken down, and empty takes and guns sit useless, half-buried by the dead.
Most of the walkers have left the area, though. There’s a few shuffling around-Daryl takes care of them quietly-but most have gone on, looking for new settlements to overrun, fresh meat to eat.
No one talks as they pick their way through the dusty cars and tattered, flapping tents. There’s nothing to say.
It’s empty. Another hollow shell, like the CDC, like the farm. They’ve been through this before-broken promises mean nothing now.
Near the center of the base, protected by overturned guns and rotting bodies, is a single low, squat building, THE REPUBLIC OF HEAVEN painted over the door in crude, blocky letters.
“You’re fucking kidding me,” Shane says.
Glenn kind of agrees.
This is the Republic of Heaven? This short, stubby little building?
Something twists in his chest, and he wants to laugh. He feels like someone’s played a joke on him, a very cruel but funny joke.
“Look, Mei,” he says, his voice edged with hysteria. “It’s the Republic of Heaven. Everything’s gonna be okay now, right? Everything’s gonna-”
The world spins underneath him and he chokes on dusk and smoke, laughing and laughing-
“Glenn,” Maggie shouts, and he feels her hands under his ribs, holding him up, and for some reason that’s fucking hilarious and the laughter spills up from this throat and he can’t hold it in.
Meiri screams at him, in his head, his heart, her claws digging into his neck, but he barely feels her there, sinking to his knees and howling with laughter.
“It’s funny,” he gasps, fingers curling in the dirt. “Don’t you get it? This is the Republic of Heaven.” And he throws his arms wide, at the bodies and the empty base and the burning forest.
This is it, he thinks. This is all we’ve got left.
He remembers his dreams, running and running in the darkness, and he thinks yes, yes we are.
His chest hurts.
“Glenn,” Daryl says, and his hands are strong on Glenn’s shoulders, hauling him to his feet. Somewhere Cahir presses against Glenn’s legs, denim blocking the pain of breaking the taboo, leaving only a warm, solid weight. “C’mon, breathe, you idiot, you stupid fuckin’ dumbass, breathe-”
Glenn chokes, sucks in air through his nose. The wild laughter fades to giggles and then to just hiccups, shaking his shoulders. He becomes aware of Maggie’s hands, curled around his waist, and Mei’s claws buried in his neck, sharp enough to draw blood.
Gradually, his breath evens out and he lifts his face, blinking away tears.
Everyone’s looking at him, with varying degrees of concern. Lori pulls her son and Beth close, refusing to meet Glenn’s eyes. Shane’s face is dark, thoughtful, his hand on his gun. Rick, alone out of all of them, looks Glenn in the eyes, and his face is still, but El pins her ears to her head and whines softly, sadly.
“Thanks,” Glenn tells Daryl, unsteadily. His legs feel like jelly and he leans on Maggie and Daryl heavily, unsure if he can support himself.
Daryl just grunts, shouldering the weight.
“Glenn,” Meiri whispers, burying her face in his neck. “Oh, Glenn.”
“I’m okay now,” he tries, and feels her tears prick his skin. “It’s okay, Mei, I’m fine, I just needed-”
“To let it all out,” Rick says helpfully, tugging one of El’s white ears gently. “We get it. We’ve all been there, haven’t we?”
Gratitude swells in Glenn’s chest and he nods. “I’m okay,” he promises. “Just tired. It’s been-It’s been a long couple of days.”
The tension in the group bleeds out at that, because it’s true. It’s been a long, long few days, and it’s looking to be longer still, because there’s nothing here.
This one building can’t be the Republic of Heaven. It just can’t.
“Should we make camp here?” T-Dog asks, rubbing a hand over his head. Soot flakes off his skin. “Is it safe?”
Shane and Rick lean together, arguing in fierce whispers, but they pull apart again without breaking into a fight.
“We have a choice?” Rick says unhappily. “It’s almost dusk, we can’t make it back to the compound by nightfall. And besides, the fires are still burning out there. All it would take is the change of the wind and then we’re stuck.”
But we are stuck, Glenn wants to say. We have nowhere else to go.
Where do they go from here? They have no gas, no food. The forest is on fire, for God’s sake, there’s literally nothing left for them here.
He thinks of the images he saw in the fire, and the ones sketched in the dead man’s book, and he wants to go there, to that city in the sky, so badly it hurts-
“Close the gates,” Rick says decisively, speaking to T-Dog. “Shane, Daryl, sweep the base, check for any walkers we might’a missed. If you see any, kill ‘em quietly. We can’t afford to run again. We should be safe from the forest fires in here, and if we’re not… If we’re not, we’ll deal with it. I want guards on the wall at all times-I’ll take first watch.”
“I’ll take second,” Glenn says, ignoring Shane’s sharp glare. Rick, bless him, nods agreeably.
“Third,” says Andrea, and it goes like that until everything’s set and safe.
They’ll spend the night here, in this shell that was supposed to be Heaven, and in the morning, they’ll move on.
“I’m okay,” Glenn tells Maggie, as the sun slips into the burning trees. “Really.”
Maggie and Luke give him flat, disbelieving looks, but she lets him pull away after kissing her on the cheek, racing after Daryl.
“Be careful,” she shouts after him, and he waves. Meiri clings tight to his shoulders.
“You shouldn’t lie to her,” she says sternly, digging in to keep her balance.
Glenn shrugs. “What am I supposed to tell her?” That I’m scared? That our last hope is ashes?
It’s funny. To think that an hour ago, he was full up of hope, of determination. He was ready to live, come what may, and this empty promise obliterated that.
But it’s only natural, he supposes. There’s only so much you can take, and this, and this-
“Hey, Daryl! Wait up!”
Daryl and Cahir slow, though Shane and Kali do not.
(“Screw them,” Meiri says, bristling.)
“What?”
“About what happened,” Glenn starts, because he doesn’t know how to say thank you, you kept me from going completely insane-
Daryl shakes his head. “Shut up, kid,” he says. “You don’t owe me nothin’.”
“No, really-”
“Fuck off,” Daryl says. “Go back to your girl. I don’t need you out here.”
Meiri growls and anger starts to coil in Glenn’s gut, but he knows this is what Daryl does, isn’t it, the emotionally-stunted asshole, and he throws his hand out-
He lands on Cahir’s shoulder, and the spark of fur on skin blows the breath right out of him.
He’s touching Cahir. With his bare hand. He’s touching another person’s daemon.
His first thought is oh god the taboo. His second is this feels good, and then Daryl mutters something soft and sharp, and lifts Meiri clean off Glenn’s shoulders.
Another jolt, bright-white, flares in Glenn’s belly and he can’t breathe but that’s okay, that’s okay because he can feel Daryl’s hands in Mei’s fur and it feels amazing.
They stand there like that for a long time, and the sun sparks golden in Cahir’s eyes, in Mei’s fur, and after a while Glenn can breathe again so he does in deep, even breaths, matching Cahir, matching Daryl.
“What,” he breathes.
Daryl doesn’t say anything, but Meiri is warm and solid in his hands.
Cahir whines, shifting, and Glenn can’t help but smile and scratch, laughing as the wolf leans into him.
“What about the taboo?” he wonders, looking up at Daryl. “Did it just-does it matter anymore?”
Daryl’s face is unreadable and he puts Meiri down. “Cahir,” he says, voice rough. “Cahir, c’mon.”
The wolf whines, enjoying Glenn’s touch, but Daryl says his name again, and he goes.
“Daryl?”
Daryl doesn’t answer, just pulls his daemon to his side and jogs off after Shane, his shoulders tense.
“What was that?” Meiri asks, awed, and Glenn shrugs. He lets her climb back onto his shoulders and she settles there, warm and content.
They’ll sort it out later, the whole taboo thing.
But for now, they go back, swinging around to meet with the others. No one has any food, but that’s okay with Glenn, because they’re all alive, if a little banged up (Rick sits atop the wall, and won’t put his weight on his bad leg).
Maggie curls an arm around his waist, pulling him close. She smells like ash and water.
“It’s going to be okay,” Glenn says, even though he doesn’t feel it, knows it isn’t true. “It’s gonna be just fine.”
She pulls him tight, her daemon purring softly, desperately, and they sit beside the dying fire, waiting for sleep to come.
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