Page 51 of Warrior’s Mate

Kaiven's jaw moved once. "Agreed." They built the manifest together. It was the least romantic thing Maelis had ever done with a man and perhaps the most intimate. Kaiven knew weapons, defensible routes, personnel readiness, and what a security team could survive. Maelis knew which families had already lost members, which elders could not tolerate another forced march, which agricultural technicians were essential if surviving settlements needed food next season, and which people would volunteer to stay even when leaving was the wiser choice. Neither pretended the decisions were clean.

At one point Kaiven removed the name of a wounded security officer from the first-lift list. Maelis put it back.

"He can't walk."

"He can fire a weapon from a fixed position."

"So can half the farmers in this district."

"He's Brigade."

"He has internal bleeding."

Kaiven stared at the name.

"He'll object."

"Then sedate him."

"You have developed alarming confidence in military medical procedure."

"I work quickly."

He restored the name. The first scouting team reached the west produce basin thirty minutes later. Their feed showed abandoned loading machinery, two damaged pads, and no immediate Sargan presence. Maelis leaned closer to the screen as the scout moved beneath an overhead conveyor.

"Stop."

Kaiven relayed the command.

"What?"

"Pan left. Toward the sorting sheds."

The image shifted to marks sprayed across the walls—Sargan category codes, not Farseek emergency symbols. Kaiven swore. The captured civilians had passed through here. A scout entered the first shed and found empty restraint brackets along one wall, while discarded personal items littered the floor: a child's woven wrist cord, a work glove, two identity bands, and a broken pair of field lenses. Maelis's stomach turned.

"Don't show the shelter channels," she said.

"Agreed."

The scout moved deeper. A portable Sargan terminal still glowed beside the loading door.

"Can we retrieve it?" Maelis asked.

"Maybe."

"Do it."

Kaiven glanced at her.

"That was an order."

"How did it feel?"

"Disturbing."

"Good."

He sent the instruction. The terminal came back with the scouts twenty minutes later. It contained no full passenger list, but it held enough fragments to confirm the pattern. Captives were being tagged before transport. Skill classifications affected destination assignment. Children were recorded separately but cross-linked to family groups. Medical personnel received priority codes. Agricultural specialists did too. The Sargans were not raiding blindly. They knew what kinds of people a damaged world could least afford to lose.