Ever since the Royal Architect, Dolce has kept a little time to study Mars. The odd gap in his knowledge troubled him. Not that he ever planned to go to war, not even when Beri was left far behind, but it was a perilous thing, being unfamiliar with a god. All the worse when you were well-behaved with all the others. Imagine the insult.

So he studied, so he prayed, so he learned, and little by little that gap shrank. What was once a yawning abyss became criss-crossed with firmer ground. Holes remained, but there were paths around, and he could work with that. Iskarot once told him it was an admirable quality for a student to have; the ability to see your own ignorance and not be overly bothered by it. To neither stumble into it blindly nor obsess over it, but to watch, and to wait, and be ready for when answers may come. In whatever form they may come.

In all of his studies, he never found a single prayer or ritual intended for the front lines.

But Dolce is not a soldier; he is only slightly higher than a civilian. There are official terms for those tasked with logistics and assistance to the officers, but unless Mars asks it of him he will not fetch that knowledge. It is all he can do to stay where he belongs, in the center of the column, by Vasilia’s side. He wears a cap, and it’s got a symbol of some kind on it, and he can’t tell you where it came from but he can tell you it means he’s not somebody who should be shot at. He marches. He bandages. He provides, water and rations. He waits for her return. And because he is precisely where he ought to be in formation, then it is easier for Vasilia to be where she needs to be in formation, and all moves as it should, to the glory of Mars. 

So he stands, so he waits, as Vasilia rises up alongside Dyssia. The artillery turns. 

His ears have not stopped ringing.

[Offering Hope to Dyssia’s next roll.]