Item: movement orders. All Surit had to do was give the word. In a few days’ time, they’d be back under Cavalry authority. Of course, there would be explaining to do. His senior officers might see Surit as a hero for breaking away from—he couldn’t ignore the evidence—what was shaping up to be an Archer coup, albeit one that would never succeed. Or Cavalry might court-martial him. They probably would, in fact, for losing Tennal. But he would be back under the command of his home division, and he would know he’d done the right thing.

Back in his room, he pressed his forehead against the window. Coolness spread from the reinforced glass. He opened his eyes and stared blankly at the view of Archer Station that Tennal’s wild maneuvering had gotten them: the bustling city, the soaring towers, the pure sky.

Like a constant rumble of thunder in the back of his brain that hadn’t stopped since he’d read Marit’s words, Surit thought, They lied to me about my mother.

Marit hadn’t tried to take over the sector. She had died avenging her soldiers who had been taken for experiments.

Surit wasn’t responsible for every injustice in the world. He’d signed up knowing he couldn’t even be responsible for every injustice in the army itself—Marit had told him that. She’d written it in a letter to Elvi, early on in her career. The army doesn’t work, she’d said. It’s not fair. It’s not equal. You have to let things go, over and over and over again. But it’s mine, and it’s important, and I’m doing what I can.

And if Marit had followed her own Lights-lost advice, she might not have died.

He raised his head away from the widow glass. He’d spent the past two weeks just getting on with things. But in the silence of the room, and in the sudden absence of his daily duties, he finally acknowledged that ever since he’d first seen Marit’s shattered wreck of a ship, his guts felt like they’d been ripped out with a fishhook, and he’d been bleeding out slowly ever since.

He looked at his escape plans. What was he going to do?

His job, of course. He always did his job.

It took him half an hour to put the final tweaks to the last permission forms. The Note needed refueling. That could be done on the way out. It was time to go into the office and tell the others.

But as he turned, the door chimed.

Surit opened it. It was Tennal’s officer friend, Captain Fari. There was a ranker behind him.

“Did you want Captain Halkana?” Surit said. “He’s gone to—”

“No,” Fari said. “Actually, Lieutenant, I came here for you. We’d like to ask about the travel permits you’ve issued.”