Rhys. So he'd been hiding it. Of all the idiot complicities —

She has had few dealings with the Senior Enchanters, kept her eyes on those more likely to be approved for travel. But if she understands what it says, can she fully blame him? Knowing how this came to be would have been a dangerous business. There'd have been no one to trust with such news.

And the Captain, Of course she wouldn't have been told.

Wren is furious, and she is tired. In the old days, she could throw herself into that: keep plunging headlong at the source of woe until she has answers. Until quiet words are had to let it lie, leave it be.

But the old days are gone. Her people are gone. The quarry’s here; and it is strange, and dead, and at once not — and there’s not a single reason left to chase.

"If you harm anyone here," She doesn’t bother to finish the threat. Stillness comes at last. Or perhaps that’s the wrong word for it, for this flat ache. Perhaps when Dolentius visits her tonight, it will know to call despair by its proper name.

Wren shakes her head. If she has empathy of Cole's situation, it is not for this alien thing, but for the boy that it was once drawn to. A short, painful life reduced to human error; transformed into only another line item of the Order's shared failures. He deserved more of them.

A new thought that begins, as she looks at last away, as her palms finally uncurl.

"I will need to bring this to the Seekers."

But she knows — and perhaps it will know — that she doesn’t plan to do that either. She should tell Reed, but she won’t.