"You're telling me the murder case can override everything."
"I'm telling you it's the single most significant factor in your evaluation. More than the bond incidents. More than the cascade risk." He closes the file. "If they think you killed that boy, you don't leave. Ever. That is not my decision. That is policy."
Permanent placement. Like RJ. A room. A bolt. A slot for trays.
"Is there another option?" I say. "Besides transfer. Is anyone proposing something that lets me stay?"
"Lumi has submitted a proposal. Supervised bond management. The Board will consider it." He shrugs. The shrug is small and carries the weight of Montana.
"And the murder case."
"Is separate from placement. But it informs it." He stands. "You have seventy-two hours. No unauthorized movement. No containment interference. No bond events that require documentation."
"You're asking me to be invisible."
"I'm asking you to be strategic." He pauses at the door. Something almost human moves across his face. "You stopped a breach tonight. The sensor readings support what we saw. But the Board doesn't care what we saw. They care what the evaluation says. Make sure it says what you need it to say."
He leaves. Sven and Cal stay.
The office is quiet.
"He's trying to help," Cal says.
"He's trying to cover the institution."
"Both things can be true." Cal sits on the edge of the desk. The recovered feral closer to the surface than usual. "What you did tonight — the Board can either see it as a threat or as the answer to a problem this system has never solved. Lumi will argue for you. Stone will argue for you. I'll be in that room saying what I saw."
He leaves.
Sven walks me back. Across the compound. The ice has thickened. My breath makes clouds. The mark on my wrist makes warmth.
Red House. My door, the new bolt in place.
Sven opens it. I step in. He starts to close it.
"Sven."
He pauses.
"The way he walked with you. After I told him to. No chains. No restraint poles. Just walking." I hold his gaze. "Has he ever done that before?"
"No," he says. "He hasn't."
The door closes. The bolt slides.
Chapter twenty-three
Leo's been wrong all morning.
I can feel it through the bond before I see it — his warmth running hotter than usual, a low fever-pitch hum that sits in my right wrist like a warning light. When Stone walks me to the yard for my reduced outdoor time, Leo is already out there, and the wrongness is visible.
He's pacing. Not his usual prowl — the post-shift confidence, the fluid stride. This is tight. Agitated. His hands keep flexing at his sides and his jaw is clenched and every few steps his shoulders roll in a way that isn't voluntary. His body trying to rearrange itself under the skin.
Stone sees it too. His pace slows beside me.
"He's fighting it," Stone says. Quiet. Not alarmed — observational. The voice of someone who has watched this happen before.
"Fighting what?"
