She heard him through the wall that evening, rearranging the entire perimeter watch schedule based on something Voss had mentioned about scent patterns. He'd taken the information, cross-referenced it with terrain data she didn't know he'd memorised, and redistributed personnel, aka snow team and what was left of leaf team, in under an hour. The beastmen who left the study looked like soldiers who'd been given orders they actually understood.
Felicity pressed her palm flat against the wall and felt something warm and aching bloom behind her sternum.
This is what he was built for, she thought. And he was wasting it on pride and jealousy and a war with Victor that neither of them could afford to win.
The thought made her chest hurt in a different way. She pulled her hand back and pressed it against her belly instead, where four tiny heartbeats pulsed in counterpoint to her own.
