His jaw tightens, the implication landing before I finish the thought. “For what?”
The answer arrives before I need to give it.
A runner stumbles through the inner line, his steps uneven, his body pitched forward like he’s outrunning something he can’t escape. He nearly goes down before he reaches me, and I catch him by the arm, forcing him upright as his breath breaks in sharp, chaotic bursts.
“My lord—” he manages, his voice cracking under strain.
“Speak,” I say, my grip steady enough to hold him still without shaking him.
“The supply group,” he says, swallowing hard as his eyes flick toward the northern edge of the tree line. “They didn’t return.”
My focus narrows, not gradually but all at once, the noise of the battlefield flattening into something distant and irrelevant.
“Which group?” I ask, my voice quieter now.
He hesitates.
That’s all I need.
“Say it.”
“Lyria’s,” he says, the name coming out fast, like he’s trying to outrun the reaction he expects.
The space around me shifts.
Not visibly.
But enough.
“Where?” I ask.
“North edge,” he replies, forcing the words through a tightening throat. “Signs of engagement. Tracks. No bodies.”
No bodies.
Which means?—
“They took her,” I say.
It isn’t a guess.
The runner nods quickly, relief and fear tangled together in the motion as I release him. He stumbles back, putting distance between himself and whatever just settled into the air around me, while Kareth steps closer instead, reading the shift with a precision that doesn’t require explanation.
“We hold,” he says, his voice low, deliberate, forcing structure into the moment. “We maintain pressure here, push them back, and then we?—”
“No,” I say.
The word cuts cleanly through the rest.
He stills, his expression tightening as he turns fully toward me. “No?”
“We’re not pushing anything,” I reply, meeting his gaze.
“She knew the risk,” he says, the edge in his voice sharpening now. “We all did.”
“Yes.”
“And you abandoning this line doesn’t change that.”
