Chapter 385 - 384: What Stirs Below
Location:Seven Peaks — Command Center
Date/Time:TC1854.07.05-10
Naida didn’t bring it to the council.
She brought it to Raven. Personally. In the command center after hours, with the formation-sealed doors engaged and the privacy wards active, and the particular expression of an intelligence chief who’d been sitting on something for weeks and whose professional judgment said this requires the Sect Leader and no one else.
"How long?" Raven asked, looking at the reports spread across the formation display.
"The first anomalous readings came in six weeks ago. While you were in the south." Naida stood at the table’s edge, hands clasped behind her back — the posture she adopted when delivering information that she wished she didn’t have. "I held it. You were dealing with the Confederacy. This required your direct assessment, and I wasn’t willing to brief it to the council without your involvement."
"You held intelligence on an active threat for six weeks."
"I held intelligence on an undefined threat for six weeks. Every scenario I modeled for premature disclosure produced worse outcomes than waiting." Naida’s eyes were steady. "The council would have demanded action. Action against something we can’t define produces casualties we can’t justify."
Raven looked at the reports. Naida was right. She usually was, about things that involved darkness and patience and the particular calculus of when to speak and when to wait.
"Show me."
***
The Sanctum.