Ace was different from Sargus immediately.
Where Sargus pressed, Ace read. Where Sargus committed with aggression, relying on speed to survive it, Ace moved with patience. He had built his entire way of fighting around never needing speed alone.
Three Aspects, layered.
The first was defensive, generating a field that Alistair's Equalizer had to push through before every attack landed.
It wasn't visible, but Alistair felt it the moment his Rune Sword moved forward, a resistance that slowed the blade by half a second each time.
The second was kinetic. It let Ace reposition at angles that shouldn't have been available from the stances he was using, appearing at Alistair's flank from positions that should have left him committed forward.
The third Alistair couldn't identify.
However, he could feel it operating. Sequences that should have completed didn't.
Combinations fell one beat short every time, as if the rhythm of the fight itself was being interrupted before it could finish.
Alistair furrowed his brows.
He adjusted. Equalizer matching the defensive field first, then the kinetic output, then both at once.
The miscalibrated scan forced him to process each adjustment manually rather than trusting the Characteristic to handle it on its own.
'Every combination falls short. He's disrupting the rhythm before it completes.'
Alistair clicked his tongue, then adjusted again.
Ace didn't speak during the fight. His face showed nothing.
Alistair was reluctantly impressed.
Every movement was controlled. Every decision was made before the situation that required it arrived.
Alistair had seen that kind of discipline before, the kind that came from years of preparation rather than instinct.
It reminded him of watching Due work, in a way. Clearing problems before they had the chance to grow.
He swung through the defensive field again, feeling the resistance slow his blade.
Ace repositioned instantly, the kinetic Aspect carrying him to Alistair's left where no footwork should have taken him. The Rune Sword cut through empty air.
Alistair stepped back, then adjusted the Equalizer's output to match the kinetic layer.
It was exhausting, doing it manually. Before the miscalibration, the scan would have handled all three Aspects simultaneously.
Now he had to pick them apart one at a time, matching each layer while keeping his guard up against the others.
Regardless, he kept pressing.
Ace blocked the next strike cleanly. Alistair felt the defensive field absorb the impact, the blade stopping short of where it should have landed.
He pulled back and struck again from a lower angle.
Ace's kinetic Aspect moved him two steps to the right in a motion that didn't match any stance transition Alistair knew.
The third Aspect disrupted the follow-up before it could land. The combination fell apart one beat early, just as it had every time.
This wasn't the brutal efficiency of the Sargus fight, not the singular focus of walking through an army toward one man.
This was a slower and more careful process, with two people trying to find what the other missed.
The morning sun had risen further, casting long shadows across the field. The sounds of the broader engagement continued at the edges, steel and shouting, but Alistair's attention stayed fixed on Ace's movement patterns.
Due, managing obligations across the field at reduced capacity, was the one who saw it first.
"Your obligation isn't to the Duke," Due spoke across the distance.
Ace didn't reply. His eyes moved toward Due's voice for a fraction of a second, then he reengaged with a lateral strike that Alistair barely deflected.
Alistair didn't know what Due had read. However, the fight changed after that.
He felt it without being able to name it. The sequences Ace chose, the angles he created, the pattern of his retreats. They were building toward something, but not a victory.
An exit, for both of them, if Alistair followed it.
He followed it without knowing he was following it. Just fighting the fight in front of him and going where it went.
Eventually, Ace went down, but not fatally.
Alistair stood over him with the Rune Sword ready, Equalizer still reading Ace's output. Something in the way the fight had ended told him not to finish it.
Sovereign Debt didn't activate.
Seeing this, Alistair's eyes narrowed. With Sargus, Caldren had simply chosen not to spend it. This was different. This felt like the option wasn't even there, as if someone had removed it before the fight had even started.
Alistair looked at Due.
Due stood at the field's edge, watching. His expression did something Alistair couldn't read from this distance.
Whatever Due had seen in Ace's obligations, it was enough to make him go completely still, his hands frozen mid-gesture.
'He locked Caldren out,' Alistair thought. 'He did it himself.'
He didn't know how he knew. But something about the shape of the fight, the exit Ace had built into it, made it obvious.
Alistair was momentarily taken aback.
Following that, Ace got up slowly. Blood on his armor, but moving under his own power.
He didn't look at Alistair. He didn't look at Due. He walked through the formation's broken ranks quietly and disappeared into the chaos without a word.
Something had passed between them during the fight. Alistair couldn't put words to it and didn't try.
He watched Ace go, then turned back to the field.
Due's hands weren't steady.
Alistair could see it from across the distance. The settling gestures were interrupted by tremors, his fingers shaking between adjustments of his collar. The collar adjustments themselves were faster than usual, almost compulsive, as if his hands needed something to do between the tremors.
He'd been managing the compounding threads of the entire morning's combat, and he'd been quiet about it because Alistair couldn't do anything about it while fighting.
'He's been like this for a while.'
Due had been running at reduced capacity since the Expression activated and the permanent reduction hit. Alistair didn't know the exact numbers, but he could see the cost plainly in the way Due's fingers wouldn't stay still.
Hearing this kind of silence from Due was worse than hearing him complain. Due always talked when things were manageable. When he went quiet, it meant the math had gotten bad.
Alistair looked at him across the field.
Due looked back. His hands were shaking and his expression was calm, and that combination said everything about what the next hour was going to cost.
The formation was regrouping at the edges. Valve's signature had changed again in the Equalizer's reading, the raw weight from earlier compressed into something tighter and harder to read. He was still out there, still functioning.
Somewhere deeper in the formation, the fifth suppressed reading held its position patiently, as if it had nowhere else to be.
Alistair looked at Due's hands. Then at the formation. Then at the morning sun sitting fully above the horizon.
He started walking toward Due. Not toward the formation. Toward his partner.
Whatever came next, it started with the two of them standing in the same place.