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behind comes growling, but I ignore it. They’re in shock. Attacking would focus their minds, and these are minds best left unfocused . Part of me wonders how I know that, and the rest doesn’t care. I have been in enough battles to trust my instinct.
    ———
    Climbing the slope takes longer than I like. The shale slides beneath my feet, and one of the moons vanishes behind a cliff. It’s the largest, and the loss of light makes the climb more difficult.
    Of course, I could just plough my way up. But I’m trying to be subtle.
    ‘Franc . . . ?’
    I keep my voice low. No one answers, so I slow slightly and head for where I remember her being.
    ‘You there?’
    The fire is straight ahead of me. A flickering glow, mostly hidden by the slope and the fact it is built in the mouth of a cave. She should be here. Franc is not the type to retreat.
    ‘Sir . . .’
    ‘Franc?’
    ‘Man down, sir.’
    I find her enemy first. His throat’s open to the bone, and a savage cut above his nose has ruined both his eyes. He stinks and shit glazes one leg. A dagger juts from his gut; it looks as if Franc lacked the strength to drag it upwards.
    My corporal’s state isn’t much better.
    ‘Stay still.’ When she looks at me, I see pain.
    ‘Sorry, sir,’ she says. ‘Even Haze can’t fix this.’ Her hand flaps weakly towards her jacket.
    Moonlight shows blood on the leather of her coat, but not what the coat is covering. Franc tries to stop me as I begin to lift the edge.
    ‘Too late,’ she says.
    ‘Yeah,’ I say, slapping away her hand. ‘We’ve done that bit.’ She wants to know if it is as bad as she thinks.
    It’s worse.
    Franc has the ribs of a stray kitten, the tits of a kid and a jagged rip below one of them that shows me her heart beating. It pumps slowly, shuddering between beats. The scout didn’t just stab her, he opened her chest.
    ‘Yeah,’ she says. ‘Told you.’
    ‘Franc . . .’
    ‘It’s in your eyes.’ She smiles, bitterly. ‘You’re not as hard to read as you think.’
    ‘I don’t . . .’
    She looks at me.
    ‘Want to talk about that?’ I say, changing the subject. My finger traces a puckered scar, one of a dozen that run from her hipbone to where her body hair would start, assuming she had any.
    Franc shakes her head.
    ‘It might help.’
    Her laugh brings blood with it. ‘How?’ she demands. ‘How the fuck could it help?’
    ‘Tell me who did it and I’ll kill them.’
    ‘Is that a promise?’
    ‘Yeah,’ I say. ‘Guaranteed.’
    ‘Then you’re a fool . . .’ At my look, her mouth twists. ‘Yeah, I know. You’re a fool, sir .’ Realizing I still don’t understand, she says: ‘I did them. Well, mostly. The others came free, but that’s family for you.’
    ‘And I can’t kill your family because . . . ?’
    ‘I’ve done it already.’ She glances at the knife in my hand, splattered with blood from the creatures below. ‘You know,’ she says, ‘now would be a good time to make good on that promise.’
    ‘ Franc . . . ‘
    ‘You did it for Corporal Haven.’
    She names a trooper I have forgotten, from a battle that barely registers.
    ‘You’re sure?’ That is a question I’m not meant to ask.
    Her scowl tells me so.
    Unsheathing one of Franc’s blades, I grip her shoulder with my hand and touch the tip of the knife to her heart. ‘Ready?’ I ask, because Franc deserves the final say on this.
    She nods.
    ‘Sleep well,’ I tell her. ‘And a better life next time.’
    A soldier’s prayer. My prayer. And so I jab the blade through beating muscle and shock her heart into stillness.

Chapter 6
    FRANC WEIGHS NEXT TO NOTHING, AND SPILLING HER BLOOD barely increases the mess. As I stamp my way up the slope, the second of the three moons disappears behind a cliff and a dozen extra stars appear, as the night grows darker.
    I don’t know if our attackers carry home their dead. I don’t care. We do. We are the Aux. I don’t give a fuck if we’ve only been in