Marcus Stormwind called at noon, and he did not make me wait.
He appeared on the main wall of the operations floor in a flight jacket rather than a suit, standing in what looked like a hangar office with a window full of grey aircraft behind him. He had the squint of a man who had spent forty years looking into wind, and he did not pretend to be anything other than what he was: someone who had lost, and knew it, and intended to lose well.
"Nightingale," he said.
"Guild Master."
"I watched the replay four times." He rubbed his jaw. "Your Vice Guild Master stopped four hundred tonnes of my aircraft in the air like she was catching a dropped cup. I've flown for forty years. I've never seen anyone do that."
"Neither had your pilot, I imagine."
