The Outcast Theory
Aldric composed and calculated and making no dramatic movements was, counterintuitively, more concerning than an Aldric who panicked because composed and calculated men with thirty years of institutional knowledge and nothing left to protect had a specific kind of freedom that was worth taking seriously.
"He won't do anything overt," Caius said. "That's not how he operates. His entire method has been institutional rather than personal; he uses systems, processes, and the machinery of the academy's administration. With that machinery suspended, he doesn't have a mode of action that fits his pattern."
"His pattern," Zara said carefully, "was built on the assumption that nobody knew what he was
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