The din in the banquet hall nearly lifted the dome off the Lord's Manor.
The noble knights of the Dawn Territory had shed their bloodstained armor and changed into casual clothes, and were now drinking heavily around the long tables.
One knight jumped onto a table, raised his cup high, and bellowed a battle song of his own making, drawing a chorus of cheers.
"To the Gray Marsh Fief! To the Redleaf Wall!"
"To Baron Veylin! Those long-legged octopuses are probably hiding in some ocean trench crying right now!"
His face flushed, Baron Kru pushed past a drunken colleague and approached the man at the center of the banquet with a brimming cup of wine.
Veylin sat alone at a small table. There was no wine cup before him, only a stack of parchment covered in numbers.
These were the casualty reports and supply expenditure lists the quartermaster had just delivered. The oil lamp cast shadows across his profile, setting him apart from the revelry around him.
"Baron!" Kru's booming voice successfully drew the attention of those nearby.
"I simply must toast you! To be honest, when those monsters broke through the first wall, I thought I was done for!"
Veylin looked up from the parchment, his eyes utterly calm.
Instead of accepting Kru's cup, he slid a list toward him.
"Baron Kru, three of your knight guards were killed, and seven were seriously wounded. Here are their names."
Baron Kru's raised arm froze in midair, ripples spreading across the wine in his cup.
The drunken merriment and smile quickly drained from his face. The noise around him seemed to vanish.
He slowly set down his cup and picked up the flimsy sheet of parchment. Every name on it had once been a living face.
"...Of course," he said, his