Page 207 of Reaper Said Mine

I stand with both hands on the table and read the names as they arrive.

Each one enters me.

Each one finds the hollowed place where revenge used to sit and leaves something heavier behind.

Theryki remains across the table. Her face is pale beneath the green of her scales. Skahar stands at my side, cane still, eye lowered. Krell wipes at his face once and hopes no one notices. I notice. I do not shame him.

“Draft the expanded coordination limits,” I say.

My voice sounds strange to my own ears.

Vakka looks up. “Lord?”

“Do it. Medical, convoy, limited pursuit, contested-lane sensors, emergency civilian access. Bring it to me before the next attack forces the same answer from my mouth under worse terms.”

Theryki inclines her head. “I will have my staff coordinate with yours.”

I look at her. “If your staff uses one civilian corpse to widen one clause beyond what I approve, I will consider the compact broken.”

“I understand.”

“No,” I say, and the command center chills around my tone. “You believe me. That is different.”

She holds my gaze. “I believe you.”

Good.

It is a small thing.

Small things are what remain when large dreams begin bleeding out.

Later, when Theryki has gone and the command center settles into its exhausted rhythm, I stand before the viewport while the Badlands drift beyond the glass. The casualty list waits behind me. The war map waits beside it. Coalition blue icons now sit deeper inside my territories than they did at dawn.

My independence is still mine.

Less than yesterday.

More than tomorrow, perhaps.

Skahar comes to stand beside me.

“You are thinking loudly,” he says.

“I am thinking that I wanted the Combine to bleed until they understood what they made.”

“And now?”

“Now they bleed us and call it proof.”

His cane taps once. “That is an old trick.”

“I should have seen it.”

“You saw pieces.”

“Ursa saw more.”

“Ursa looks at stories. You look at enemies. Both are useful unless mistaken for the whole.”