—It's bad this time, isn't it?

Efrideet never signs her notes. Only she and Saladin use this cipher, this particular set of dead drops.

From the settlement where she has retreated, she's kept her eyes on the City. Has read of the Almighty, the Traveler's rising from the City, the Witness. Each time, Efrideet stops herself charging off. They have hands enough. Her single pair will not tilt the balance.

>>It's getting worse.

So Saladin says. Efrideet has noted the troubles for herself. The Light remains steady, but the stars act strangely. The rules of Earth seem turned on their side.

—What can these hands, and only these, do?

This is the only question she ever asks. She asks it of herself; she asks it of Saladin. Hundreds of years of pointing and shooting in the callus of her grip, hundreds of years of lightning in her fists. Violence sings in her, electric, and she is alive in it.

And yet, for peace to last, it must be built, and it cannot be built with a gun. Efrideet would fight forever if she must, but what she dreams of is peace.

If she wishes it, she must build it. So she has stayed with her commune of pacifists. There are many fights waiting in the world, in the Last City, but none require only Efrideet's hands, only Efrideet's way with sharp-edged things.

A younger Efrideet would have left already, to throw herself on the first fight. But the City is, truly, in good charge. She trusts that. And she is better off doing this thing that only she can do: putting it down. Finding what she can build.

And the Light, oh, the Light is beautiful. Someday they will not need its violence.

>>Hold to your tools. Fight on.

Saladin views even the making of peace as a fight. He's not wrong, either. Patience has come slowly to Efrideet. To stay where she is, to not charge forward into battle, is as hard a striving as the greatest of fights.

—Call, if you need me.

In some ways, it's Efrideet's own escape clause. She doesn't have to stay here. She doesn't have to do the hard work of creation. She doesn't have to change.

>>I won't.

He will, though. And she will come when she is needed. Someday it will not be to fight.