I hope we can trust Blanks.

“Lieutenant?” I asked timidly, knocking lightly on Blankenship’s open door two mornings later. “I, er, do you have a moment, maybe?”

The lieutenant looked up from whatever papers were in front of him, then glanced at the clock and nodded. “Come in.” He motioned me and Curry in and stood to pull over a second chair for us before closing the door. “Feeling better?” he asked as I gratefully took a seat, trying not to wince at the stiffness in my side, and I looked up at him, startled at how he’d heard already.

“Sir?” I glanced at Curry, but his eyes were fixed on the lieutenant.

“I just meant that Curry called you out sick the last two days,” Blankenship said, with a slight air of puzzlement.

“Oh,” I said. “Right. Yes… rather better, I think.”

He resumed his seat. “What can I do for you, constables?”

“Um.” We’d intended for me to explain things, very professionally and matter-of-factly, but now that we were here my heart was pounding so hard I didn’t know if I could get any words out at all, let alone think of what we’d agreed to say. “I—” I faltered uselessly, and then Curry stepped in and began for me.

“Bersk was loaned to the Sixth last week, sir,” he said. “We were hoping you might give us some advice about something that happened there.”

“Oh? Veatch does run the new guards a bit ragged, I hear,” Blankenship said with an expression of indulgent sympathy for us young ones, then looked a bit startled when this made my eyes well up.

“Sorry,” I whispered to Curry, mortified at what a foolish little milksop I must look like to our commanding officer, then crossed my arms to stop them trembling and hugged them to my chest. I hunched my shoulders, wishing this were all over. We had planned everything to say, and given it two whole days, and I still couldn’t get it out.

“Don’t be sorry,” he said. “I don’t know if there’s a more proper way to put it, sir, but another constable attacked Bersk in the locker room after her shift that day and it has us both pretty rattled. We don’t want to cause any trouble for the Fourth but it’d be better, we thought, if she didn’t have to see him again. Or be loaned without me.”

The lieutenant’s face shifted several times just during this short speech—from concern, to alarm, to anger, to grim seriousness. After Curry stopped talking there was a pause while he finished taking in this information. “Your explanation is very discreetly worded,” he said finally, in a careful-sounding tone. “Do I correctly interpret that to mean this attack was of a sexual nature?” he asked us.

In my peripheral vision I saw Curry turn to look at me for my approval to go ahead. “Yes, sir,” I said, so he wouldn’t have to say it, then cleared my throat, meaning to add something to that, except now I didn’t know what else wanted saying. I shut my mouth and looked down at his desk.

“I see.” The lieutenant nodded, then sighed. “I’m sorry, Bersk,” he said heavily. “I won’t pretend there’s anything I can say to remedy an experience like that. But I hope we can settle on some corrective actions that might prevent the guard losing such a promising young officer as you.”

Curry and I exchanged a look. I nodded. “I would prefer to stay with the watch, sir. I, um—but I would also prefer not to see the person from the Sixth again, if possible.” I shut up here, because my voice was growing too shaky for my taste.

“Of course.” Blankenship nodded, drawing in a deep breath through his nose. “I will personally ensure that you’re removed from the float list pending this investigation. Do you prefer me to conduct the initial IGD interview?” he asked. “Or would you be more comfortable if one of them began the complaint proceedings?”

I cast a worried look at Curry. If the Internal Guards got involved then Lydell would definitely find out.

“We weren’t sure, sir, if something so formal was the best way to handle it?” Curry said tentatively.

“Why is that, constable?”

Curry and I exchanged another anxious look. Neither of us spoke.

The lieutenant studied us with concerned sympathy for a moment before saying, “Guard officers love to brag about not ‘snitching’ on each other—and I know that’s the first thing everyone likes to fill the young constables’ ears with on their first assignments. That’s all fine—but not reporting incidents is for petty, minor infractions. The plain truth is I haven’t ever seen anyone mistreated by their peers for reporting something serious like this. You won’t be hounded off the guard for having the courage to make sure something so traumatic can’t happen to someone else. Such a person has no business carrying a badge, and officers know that. We’ll keep it as quiet as we can, and I think at worst, if a few people hear they might be a bit awkward with you simply from not knowing whether or how to express their support.”

“I thought maybe—” I squeaked, then cleared my throat. “I thought maybe… I hoped you might be willing to let it go and just not to send me to the Sixth again, or to other wards without Curry,” I said lamely.

He nodded. “I don’t think it’s at all fair to suggest you have a duty in this situation. Not in any way. But… at the same time, as a commanding officer I owe a certain duty of care to the safety of Watch Guard staff and officers. Clearly the Watch has dramatically failed you in this regard. So… preferring to afford all my respect to your discretion and privacy, if you still wish not to pursue it with IGD, I won’t press the matter. But I hope you might be willing to share enough to help me prevent such occurrences in future.”

“What do you want to know?” I asked uncertainly.

The lieutenant considered this. “I can’t compel you to tell me your attacker’s name. And if I could, I still wouldn’t feel right doing it.” There was a pause. “Let’s for a moment set aside the ethical question of what duty I might owe the Sixth to warn them that an incident occurred—and address the safety of you and the other guard officers here at the Fourth. Do you know whether your attacker is a permanent assignee to the Sixth, or on loan from another ward, or from the float pool?”

“Permanent,” I said, after a moment.

He nodded. “It won’t be hard for me to quietly ensure you don’t get sent to the Sixth again without drawing any notice. But with our geographic proximity, most of our loaned officers come from the Third and the Sixth. If we simply stop taking any loaners at all from one, that will raise questions. I’m also a bit concerned that if I don’t know who to specifically avoid, if that person later transfers to another ward then your attacker could be loaned here without me ever realizing it.”

These were all valid points, and I saw from the way he was holding his jaw, that Curry was thinking the same thing.