The friend Arion could not fix.
Orin
Orin built the bridge. Arion tried to help and damaged it. Before gods, pursuit and power, there is this smaller wrong—and a friendship that cannot be repaired simply by meaning well.
Orin's bridge matters because he made it. Before Arion becomes the subject of orders and predictions, he is the friend who intervenes in that work and causes damage. Orin has good reason to resist being treated as another problem Arion can solve.
That unfinished relationship gives the larger adventure a stubbornly human scale. Powers may change what Arion can do; they cannot tell him where Orin wants help, or whether he wants it at all. Coming back to a friend can demand a different kind of courage from facing an enemy.
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