Nero noticed that Brother Edric never spoke about what the Divine Will currently wanted, or why it had not intervened more directly in a situation that had clearly escalated past what the early Church had been designed to contain. He noticed that the attrition figures Edric cited for historical engagements were always rounded, and that the doctrine explanation for why so many Templars died in their first years of service — that they were still "achieving unity with their Seals," which was a phrase that covered an enormous range of physical and spiritual violence without committing to any of it — was delivered with the confidence of someone who had repeated it enough times to stop hearing the gap between what it described and what it actually meant.
He did not say any of this. There was nothing to gain from saying it in a room where Brother Edric was taking notes and everyone else was either already thinking it or would not find his saying it useful.
