The line was failing when Kest came back through the trees.
Vane knew it with the exhausted clarity that came once the body stopped bothering to lie.
Ashe had given ground twice in the last quarter hour. Both retreats had been controlled, both necessary, and both had surrendered pieces of the chokepoint they were unlikely to reclaim. Valerica's Event Horizon answered slower every time she shifted it, each pull of gravity carrying a delay that had not been there an hour earlier.
Nobody mentioned reserves anymore.
There was no point.
Everyone could see where they were going.
Vane drove the butt of Ryuken's spear into the earth, caught an Imperial blade on the haft, turned it aside, and used the soldier's momentum to send him stumbling into the man behind him.
Another rank waited beyond them.
Then another.
He drew a breath that did very little.
Movement stirred in the trees behind the line.
Vane almost ignored it.
Then Kest emerged.
