Caldris waited.
He'd spent forty years making and receiving decisions. He knew what the process looked like from outside.
At minute fourteen, Aen lowered his weapon.
Not dramatically. Not a statement. Just the specific motion of someone who had reached a conclusion and was expressing it through the first available physical gesture.
He put it down.
Two others followed in the next thirty seconds.
A third stayed for a moment. Then followed.
Four operatives.
The remaining eight maintained position.
Caldris looked at the four.
At the eight.
At Mira Vale, who hadn't moved either way and was still reading.
At the formation.
He did the arithmetic.
Eight operatives and two ECD personnel executing a precision assault against a settlement prepared by six weeks of intelligence advantage and counter-doctrine framework built by a former corps operative and a mage who had fought a Tenth Seat demon lord and a demon lord who was not in any model he possessed.
Eight plus two.
