---
"Was that torture," Kobb asked quietly, not quite looking at her.
"That was imagination maintenance," Edda said. "Torture is loud. What I did was tidy."
"And if they had not listened," Myr asked.
Edda tucked the gray-wrapped tools away and stood. "Then we would have done something no one at the next campfire could bear to describe. And we would still have slept. Because we have work."
She did not say she hated the cruel parts of her job less than she hated leaving cruel men available to practice. She did not say she would prefer to fold blankets and not knives at the end of a day. She simply checked the road, felt the tether purr like a cat who had decided not to scratch today, and set them marching.
