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word. “Where is she?”
    “How should I know?”
    “You know where these soldiers are from.”
    “Somewhere near Leukos.”
    “I know that already! Where?”
    Filip stared at the cobweb in the corner of the ceiling. “I was first battalion. We wouldn’t have bothered with defenseless, insignificant people like you.”
    Adrek held up the button. “These men bothered. Where are they based?”
    Filip rubbed the ribbon between his fingers, contemplating what little honor he had left. “East of Leukos, not far. But they’ll bring the prisoners through the city and process them there. They might not even be brought back to the base at all.”
    “What will they do with her?”
    It took Filip a moment to remember who Adrek was talking about. “How old is your daughter?”
    “Barely two.” His jaw muscles tightened and bulged. “They won’t take her from her mother, will they?”
    He looked at Adrek’s hands, stiff fingers opening and closing, and wondered what it would take to get them around his throat. Despite the man’s overall leanness, his bare arms were well-muscled—perhaps he could snap Filip’s neck before Zelia could get help.
    “She’s weaned,” Filip said, “so yes, they will separate her as soon as possible. If she’s lucky, well behaved and reasonably cute, they’ll sell her to a wealthy barren couple to raise as their own. She’ll be too young to remember her former life, and she’ll grow up thinking she’s an Ilion.” He stopped, waiting for Adrek to beg for the alternative.
    “What if she’s not lucky?”
    “Depends how pretty she turns out to be. If she’s nice to look at, they might raise her as a house slave or a—” A twisted impulse of compassion prevented him from finishing the sentence. The thought of the children cowering in Leukos’s high-priced brothels turned his stomach. “If she grows up coarse looking, though—” Filip raked a disdainful gaze over Adrek’s appearance “—which seems likely, it’s off to the fields, or more likely the mines.”
    “Mines?” Adrek looked ready to vomit.
    “Children can crawl into little spaces that adults can’t. And they eat less, so they’re cheaper to keep. Best of all, they take up less room in the burial pits.”
    Adrek blinked rapidly. “The what? ”
    “Individual graves would be too labor-intensive, so they use big pits for the slaves.” He slammed the man’s gaze with his own. “Along with the other beasts.”
    Adrek roared and seized Filip by the throat. Filip forced his own hands to clutch the blankets instead of fighting him off. His right shoulder throbbed—from an arrow wound he just now remembered receiving.
    Adrek throttled him, slamming his head against the pillow while Zelia screamed and tried to pull him away. As the pain rippled through his neck, Filip realized the man had no idea how to kill a human. This death would not be quick.
    Instinct shoved honor aside. Filip’s body bucked. His right heel dug into the mattress, while the remains of his left calf scraped and squirmed. Stitches yanked loose, and he prayed that the warm liquid under his legs was only blood. Yet a vestige of purpose kept him from grabbing his opponent’s neck.
    Spittle dripped on his face from Adrek’s incoherent shrieks. Thumbs squashed Filip’s windpipe.
    “Adrek!” shouted a woman too young to be Zelia. “What are you doing?” Filip couldn’t see her behind the dancing black circles. The voice came closer. “He’s a prisoner of war. You’ll go to jail.”
    “I don’t care,” Adrek said.
    “You’ll care when Daria comes back.” The woman was panting, and Filip could feel two opposing forces struggle over him atop his bed. Everything was going dark.
    “She’s never coming back.” Adrek’s grip tightened.
    At last, Filip thought, and felt his body go slack.
    “Let. Him. Go.” Her voice, deep and commanding, had moved a few steps away.
    Adrek froze. His hands stopped squeezing but didn’t