The walls of the parish hall-turned-hospital echo with quiet groans and the rustle of nurses moving briskly between cots. It smells like antiseptic and smoke. Your hands shake slightly as you pull another fresh linen from the pile, streaked in red that isn’t your own.

Peter appears beside you—silent as always, steady as ever.

“You’ve got blood on your hands,” he says gently, eyes on the crimson blooming across your wrists and fingers.

You don’t look up. “Not mine.”

He nods once. “I didn’t ask.”

There’s no judgement in his voice. Just the kind of stillness you’ve only ever found in him. He takes the linen from your grip, replaces it with a mug of tea—lukewarm and clumsily sugared, but his.

You don’t thank him. You don’t have to.

You just sit beside him, legs aching, hands dirty, hearts louder than the bombs outside.