Intermission 8 Page 37

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“Of course my wife and daughter both noticed something was wrong.”

“Like I said, though, I was Champion for close to three years. All of this was happening a lot slower than it takes to tell it. You can’t blame them for not realizing the severity of the problem.”

“I think Saffron assumed I was bored. That I wasn’t feeling challenged.”

“I couldn’t tell her the truth.”

“She’d done just as much to get me where I was as I had. What would she think?”

“That I wasn’t the man she married any more? That I’d lost my drive?”

“Would she be horrified, and blame herself for her part in it? She knew what sorts of things I did, but she was at least one step removed.”

“Would she hate me if she knew the full, horrible truth of what I’d done for us?”

“God, which would be worse?”

“Yasmin didn’t understand any of it.”

“All she knew about what I did was that I was a “big important Empire warrior man” of some kind.”

“And now, all she knew was that daddy was sad and tired all the time.”

“And that it got worse when I was ordered to the field.”

“She would always tell me that I could say I wasn’t feeling well and stay home.”

“Of course that wasn’t true.”

“Imperial Champions can’t refuse the Emperor’s call.”