“Nothing,” he repeats. “I obtained evidence I meant to present to the Arbitration Council that the Savage Legion was filling its ranks, not just with the condemned, but with minor offenders, and with people they simply snatched from the streets in the Bottoms. I also suspected the Legion was being used to dispose of those the state views as enemies, the dissident, anyone who speaks out openly against them. My being here proves that.”

“It’s exactly like the Professor said,” Evie implores the armorist. “He may have been mad, but he wasn’t lying about Crache.”

Spud-Bar is still staring into the microscopic crags and crannies of the whetstone, silently.

“Spud-Bar,” Evie pleads, “you know what’s going on here. You’ve always known. You think you’re beyond it because they allow you to travel to the cities and back, but you’re not. You will die serving this Legion. We all will, unless something is done, unless the truth is made known.”

“Crache don’t run on truth,” Spud-Bar says quietly.

Evie reaches out and cups her hand around the hand holding that whetstone.

Spud-Bar doesn’t look up.

“I know it’s easier to believe we all belong here, but I tell you, this man does not. He’s spent his life pleading for the people in the Bottoms, never asking nor taking from them. He’s here because he doesn’t want anyone else to suffer his fate. You must believe me, Spud-Bar.”

“And if I do?” Spud-Bar asks, still not meeting her eyes.

“Then I simply ask you to deliver a short message to the Gen Circus. That’s all.”

The armorist finally looks directly at her. Evie sees a deeper torment she never would’ve expected of the perpetually passive and dismissive Undeclared.

“Who are you? Really?”

“I’m a warrior, like you,” Evie answers. “And I fight for the people I love when they’re threatened, whatever the odds and however certain defeat. Because that’s what I was taught warriors do.”

Spud-Bar grins ruefully. “You ’ad better teachers than me.”

“Will you carry the message?” Evie presses, her desperation threatening to rip through the veil of the person she’s created to walk among the Savages.

Spud-Bar shakes their head darkly, but says, “All right, then. What’s the message?”

Evie looks at Brio once more, eyes urging him to seize the moment quickly.