She had looked directly at the possibility that she bore some responsibility for what had broken, and she had turned away. The turning had cost her the last available softness.
No examination. No pause. No path back toward the questions Thomas had not had the strength to press further.
Only the war, now. Clean and total and sealed with the permanence of a vow made in a hospital room while her son's pulse beat faintly against her palm.
Miles away, behind the walls of Nightshade, Dakota slept without knowledge of what had just been decided. Sheltered. Her breathing was easy. Held by the man her mother had formally and finally named her enemy with her included.
The line between them had been drawn.
Not yet in blood. But in something equally permanent, and considerably harder to unmake.
Luna sat motionless beside the bed.
