I don’t say it like it’s a good thing. I don’t say it like it’s not.
Varek listens without interrupting. He doesn’t rush in or try to solve it before I’ve finished.
“I’m not saying we start moving people again,” I add quickly. “That’d be stupid right now. Too risky. But food’s a different story.”
He glances at me, his attention locked in.
“I’ve got contacts,” I go on. “Not rebels. Not directly. People who owe me. People who can move things without drawingattention if it’s done right.” I pause, turning slightly towards him as the idea locks into place the more I verbalise it. “We get a message to them. Quietly. Ask them to step in where they can. Keep people fed, at least until things settle enough for movement again.”
Varek is quiet for a moment after I finish, clearly thinking. “You trust them,” he finally says.
It’s not a question.
I nod. “Yeah. I do.”
Another beat passes before he inclines his head slightly. “It’s a sound strategy.”
Something in my chest loosens at that. Not because I needed his approval, but because he listened. Actually listened.
He didn’t override it or reshape it. Nor did he take it out of my hands.
“Yeah?” I say, a little lighter.
“Yes,” he replies. “It mitigates risk while maintaining support. It is… efficient.”
I huff a quiet laugh. “Look at that. I’ve impressed the warlord.”
“You have done so before.”
He says it is matter-of-fact, but there’s something warmer threaded through it.
I glance at him sideways. “Have I?”
“Yes.”
I look away again, clearing my throat slightly, more than aware that my neck is heating at his praise. “Right. Well. Don’t get used to it.”
“I will not.”
That almost pulls another laugh out of me.
We walk in easy silence for a few minutes after that, the path curving slightly as we move along the edge of the settlement. Thesounds of Dathanor hum faintly behind us—movement, voices, life continuing in that steady, constant way it always does.
I glance at him again. There’s a lot I know about Varek now. A lot I didn’t before. But there’s still gaps—big ones—which bothers me more than it used to.
“What were you, back home?” I ask.
He looks at me. Not surprised, exactly, but something in his expression shifts—subtle, but there. Interest. A quiet kind of approval, like I’ve finally asked a question he’s been waiting for.
“I was of the war-caste,” he says.
“Yeah, I gathered that much.” I bob my head since that absolutely tracks. “You’ve got the whole ‘terrifying in a fight’ thing down.”
A flicker of amusement crosses his face, brief but real. “But that was not my primary function.”
That gets my full attention. “No?”
He shakes his head slightly. “I was trained in strategy. In diplomacy. In long-term conflict resolution.”
