The Queen's Long Table

You unroll the scroll across oak older than the war itself. Queen Mereth reads, and her hand rises slowly to her mouth. When the tears come, they are silent — the tears of a woman counting her dead in an instant.

Her generals do not weep. Lord Vassek studies the ceiling. Marshal Doren clears his throat and speaks of morale, of pensions, of the dangerous folly of sudden truth. You feel the room tilt: the scroll is real, but reality, you learn, is something courts vote on.

Mereth's wet eyes find yours. "Archivist," she says, "tell me how we save this."