Lucien's group stabilized their settlement first.
That had been the real difficulty.
Breaking hostile control was one thing.
Controlling what came after was another.
The fighting itself had not lasted long. With the force Lucien brought, the purge had been clean and decisive.
But afterward, the streets filled with something more complicated than victory.
Fear. Confusion. Suspicion. Grief.
Lucien kept his Divine Sense active the entire time.
He did not rely on uniforms alone. He did not rely on accusation either. He looked at people directly.
The unbearable colors (those whose malice had already rotted into habit, those who enjoyed the oppression, those who had sunk too deeply into cruelty to be recovered) were dealt with immediately.
Others were spared.
Some had served the Exchange because they were weak.
Some because their families were held by threat.
Some because they had swallowed the poison and then made the smaller cowardice of obeying whoever kept them alive.
