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“During our last campaign, I received intelligence that her route had been compromised. I ordered her unit to withdraw.”

Kesta felt the shape of the story before he finished.

“She refused.”

“She believed the intelligence was false and that withdrawing would leave a civilian evacuation corridor exposed.” Dreven looked down at his hands. “She was right about the corridor.”

“But?”

“The threat was real too.”

Kesta remained quiet. Dreven's fingers closed slowly around the edge of the table, but his voice stayed controlled.

“I sent another unit to retrieve her against her order. They arrived during the attack. Avarra abandoned the evacuation position to help them because they were there on my command.”

Understanding settled heavily inside Kesta.

“She died?”

“Yes.”

“And the civilians?”

“Most escaped.”

His eyes lifted to hers.

“If I had trusted her decision, she might have remained where she had prepared defenses. If I had ordered her home earlier, perhaps she would have lived. If I had gone myself—”

“Dreven.”

His jaw tightened.

Kesta recognized the pattern because medics carried their own versions of it. If I had checked five minutes sooner. If I had chosen a different drug. If I had noticed the bleeding.

Every path through the past eventually led to the same impossible fantasy: enough responsibility could make loss reversible.

“You don't know which choice would have saved her.”

“No.”

“But you have spent years trying to make sure you never face that uncertainty again.”

His expression hardened defensively. Kesta almost let the point go. Then she remembered the gate. The claim. His instinctive movement when Sera’s probe hurt her.

“You can't protect people until no bad outcome remains.”

“I know.”

“Do you?”

The question landed between them. Dreven looked away.

After a long moment, he said, “Not consistently.”

The admission was so quiet that Kesta felt no urge to win anything from it. She reached across the table. Her fingers settled over the back of his hand. Dreven went still. The band remained cool. That mattered enough that both of them looked down at it.

Then Dreven turned his hand beneath hers until their palms met. He did not close his fingers. He waited. Kesta threaded hers through them. His expression softened. No heat flared from the band. No locator woke. Nothing imperial announced an interpretation of what happened between them. It was simply her hand in his. Kesta liked that far too much. Tavi ruined the moment by shouting from the rear room.