It stopped - no more clashes between us. Instead, hands steady, we kept everything from slipping away.
The last stretch felt like being trapped in something worse than anything before.
What made it worse wasn't just how brutal things got - they were, clearly - yet somehow he'd grown used to measuring cruelty in ways his past version never could. The real problem? Understanding too well. Now he spotted the pattern while trapped within it, a form of dread most will never face simply because they wouldn't notice even if it surrounded them.
Eastward units took the brunt first, just as expected. Though they faced fierce opposition, strength held unevenly - wavering, then tightening, then breaking once more - a rhythm Kael knew as well as shifting winds. Not ahead but trailing at a distance, allied troops stayed back, letting the frontline drain enemy power before moving through gaps left by that struggle.
Pressed against the frame, they became the thing keeping it wide. A human brace beneath the weight of what waited outside.
Should they drop, those at their backs pushed forward. When they stayed upright, the ones behind paused. Planning never made room for saving eastern fighters first, since whether collapsing or standing, their role ended once used. Victory wasn't their aim. Their bodies carried outcomes designed elsewhere.
Out of the old dread came a sharp kind of knowing, clear like ice. Through the fight he carried it, not strength exactly but something tighter - focus shaped by what once scared him. It didn't lift him up or weigh him down. Just aimed him truer.
Out here, space mattered like breath. He held the group at the edges of thought, like hills or dips in ground spotted through motion, caught by noise. To the left: Ysse, quiet in her work, never spilling beyond what she needed. Behind that, Orren, dragging an old injury but pacing clean, judging gaps without fuss. Then Bren - near enough to hear each footfall, two lengths back, just as spoken weeks before under smoke and ash, when Bren wore another face.
Eastward stretched the hallway. Noise grew louder by the second. Their escape arrived without warning.
Later came the pause, much like how pauses come in daily choices - eyes open, counting gaps, picking time when pieces fit together.
Midway through the third hour, just as commanders struggled with the crumbling left edge, pressure built at the center. With focus locked there, oversight of the east slipped away entirely. That gap appeared then - empty, waiting. Passage formed where none had been moments before.
Looking up, he faced the rest of them.
Nothing came out of his mouth. Still, everyone understood.
They moved.