Chapter 187: Bad News
Maggie leaned against the metal railing of the watchtower, arms crossed, her gaze lost on the ashen lands of the center. The dust kicked up by patrols settled back in dull swirls, like ash in a light already dead.
She had received the report an hour earlier.
Dylan had been captured.
By Pilaf’s troops, according to Alka’s cold, clipped words. Infiltration of a convoy. Interception of a message meant for the Marshal. Spotted. Caught. Interrogated.
And finally, charged as a spy.
Maggie didn’t move.
She could have screamed, smashed something, cursed the stupidity of that idiot who’d gotten himself into deep shit again. But no. She stayed there. Upright. Stillness as her only protest.
"Damn fool..." she finally murmured, barely audible.
She still remembered the day he had first shown up in her unit. That insolent look, that tone too casual for a cadet. She’d hated him at first. Like you hate a splinter—the kind of thing too small to justify rage, but just enough to keep you from closing your fist without thinking about it. And yet, he’d ended up carving out his place. Not just through skill—though that was part of it—but through his ability to survive, to slip out of trouble where others would’ve gotten their brains blown out.
"He’ll make it out, right?" Elisa would have asked.
But Elisa didn’t know yet.
Maggie sighed. A short, controlled breath, full of restrained tension. It was always the same: when a soldier fell, you had to deal with the living. And right now, it wasn’t Dylan who worried her the most.