Command Dugout Three smelled of wet wool, tobacco smoke, and damp stone. A low-hanging lantern swung from an overhead beam shored up with split railway ties. It cast long, jittering shadows across an iron map table strewn with grease-penciled topographical charts.
Instructor Valerie Koslov stood over the map, her graying hair cropped close to the skull and her field tunic devoid of academy brass. Her hands, thick-knuckled and scarred by a lifetime of frontier beast-handling, were planted flat on the map of the Sunken Fissure.
When the dugout’s canvas flap was pushed aside, her cold gray eyes flicked upward. It took in Arthur’s mud-spattered boots, the hound at his flank, and the falcon settled upon his shoulder.
“You took your time getting down from the ridge, Cadet Vance,” Koslov said, her voice like gravel grinding under iron wheels.
“Met a septic muscle-sheath infection at the intake ramp,” Arthur replied, stepping into the shelter. Grimm followed silently, circling once before pressing his flank against the warm cast-iron stove in the corner. “Sergeant Corvo’s arm is cleaned out and dressed. He’ll keep the limb.”
Koslov’s eyebrow twitched upward, a rare crack in her iron veneer. “Corvo has been refusing the butcher’s knife for five days. You must have used a very persuasive argument.”
