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His expression didn’t change, but a muscle jumped along his jaw. “That is not what I am doing.”

“Then what are you doing?”

The word came sharp and immediate, like a salute. “Serving.”

I watched his face. “There it is again.”

“What?”

“Duty.”

His expression tightened, the skin around his eyes pulling taut. “It is duty.”

“I know what it is.”

“You say the word like it’s a flaw.”

“I’m saying you use it as an answer to everything.”

“It is often the answer.”

“No.” I leaned forward until the space between us hummed with the low light. “Sometimes it’s just the shield you pick up so you don’t have to hold anything else.”

He went completely still. Not like a man at rest—like a weapon on safety.

“Explain.” His voice was low, stripped of all inflection.

My throat felt dry. I ignored it.

“You told me you had a unit.”

A short, sharp nod.

“You told me people died under your command.”

Something in his face didn’t break so much as thin, like ice over moving water. For one second I saw straight through to the weight beneath.

There.

That was it.

The thing he carried.

I dropped my voice until it was almost a breath. “And you survived.”

Silence.

That much I knew.

Not the details.

Not the numbers.

Not the sound it made.

Only that there had been others, and now there was him.

“You think that means you owe something.”