Titus’s POV
The Man was an i***t.
I paced the perimeter of the mind, claws clicking against the steel floor of the cage he had built for us. It was a strong cage, woven from discipline, trauma, and ten years of practiced denial. But the bars were rattling today. They were shaking because the Man was shaking.
He sat in the high-backed leather chair, staring at a map of the northern border. He was trying to calculate supply routes. He was trying to think about logistics, about Volkov, about the chessboard of the Council.
But he was failing.
Look at her, I commanded, slamming my shoulder against the mental barrier.
No, the Man thought back, his mental voice tight and strained. Focus. The terrain near the river is unstable.
The terrain in this room is unstable, I snarled. You broke the
