That had happened at the last war council meeting he’d attended, which was probably why he hadn’t been invited to any more war councils. The vamps and mages had taken heavy losses in that battle, and hadn’t appreciated the sly grin that Adra had deemed appropriate. The meeting had halted early, after a lot of shouting, and Adra and I had ended up out in the hall where I tried to explain it to him.

“They are soft,” he announced. “We took more casualties in one day of your mother’s depredations in the hells than your side has known in this entire war—a great many more! I have seen her mow down entire armies, and use their power to crush others, yet they cry over a few thousand men!”

“It wasn’t a few thousand,” I said, feeling more than a little angry myself. “It was closer to ten if you include the vamps, which was a quarter of the entire force assembled for the war—”

“Then they must assemble a larger one. And stop mourning our victories as though they were defeats. Did they think there would be no casualties in this conflict?”

“No, but not in these numbers. The Senate and Circle have had a treaty for hundreds of years. They’re not used to this—”

“Then they had best get used to it,” Adra said bluntly. “Those of us who battled the gods in the past knew exactly what to expect when—” he broke off, possibly because I’d just crossed my arms. Which I guessed he interpreted correctly, because he sighed. “Oh, very well. In the interests of preserving peace in our ranks… how is this?”

“Auggghhh!”

He frowned, which was a considerable improvement over whatever the fuck that had been.

“Not good?”

“No! No! Don’t ever do that again!” Damn, that face was going to haunt my dreams.

“Then what?” he sounded exasperated. Dealing with humans and their fanged cousins was clearly a trial.

I glanced around, but nobody was in view. “Like this,” I said, and attempted to look sad and respectful at the same time.

“Yes?” Now he sounded impatient.

“Like that.”

“Like what?”

“Like the face I just made—”

“You did not make a face.”

“Yes, I did—"

“You did not. You always look like that. Are you always in mourning?”

“No! And I do not always look like that.”

The fake gray eyes squinted at me in obvious disbelief. “Try it again.”

I tried it again.

“You see?” he gestured at me. “No change.”

“There was a change! Look,” I made a happy face. “See, that is happy.”

“Yes, your mouth moved.”

“And this is sad—”

“Yes, your mouth moved again. Upwards is happy; downwards is sad. I already know this. But your mouth was in neither of those positions before.”

“There are other things to an expression than mouth movements.”

“Such as?”