Your research is a joke, she nearly says, but this is an emergency, and she is built for action. “Your research will not matter if you are dead,” she says instead as they reach the main floor of Phosyne’s squalid chamber. “Take some of it with you, if you must, but you are going to take shelter, and you are going to wait for my return.”

And the woman has the gall to try to climb back up to the window.

Now she shifts her hold to Phosyne’s collar and drags her to the door. “You may not be able to see sense,” Voyne hisses, “but I will be cursed if I let you throw away your life.”

She ignores Phosyne’s wailing all the way down the stairs. Past her liege’s room, down to the lowest level, where terrified farmers and servants are already massing. She shoves Phosyne into the press of them. “Keep her here,” she demands of an older woman whom she thinks she recognizes from the kitchen. And then she allows herself to stop caring, and plunges out into the yard.

A flash of golden hair passes by her, half-recognized and then gone in another breath; some serving girl, guiding younger boys to safety, making her job easier.

This is no Carcabonne. Not the battle for its release, nor the state she found its halls in. But the fear, the fear is so thick in the air she can taste it. Little blood slicks the stones of Aymar, but more will soon, if salvation does not come.

And yet she is exhilarated all the same. The waiting is over. The moment is here.

Constant Lady preserve her, but she should have her armor now. Even if it weighed her down as she did exactly what she is doing now, herding the frightened innocent to some semblance of shelter. At least she would feel more herself. At least people would know to look to her for aid.

But perhaps there is a mercy here—without her armor, she is much less obviously the queller of the riot. Some, no doubt, fear her less when she doesn’t gleam. And despite her silent pleas, there is no Constant Lady here. There are only people, as there always have been. Voyne must be their intercessor.

The yard empties, the panic contained within the walls farthest from the bombardment. She doesn’t think all of the enemy’s strikes are hitting home; if they are, the walls are holding well. Adrenaline filters out the collisions that are too soft, too distant, not relevant. That still leaves several that hit, one after the other, that crumble an interior wall into the lower bailey yard. Smaller chunks skitter and fly to all corners. It’s not safe to remain.

This is the held breath before the battle. She would do well to make use of it.