When he’d been a prisoner on Laconia, he’d been able to hold himself together. To rise to the occasion, plan, scheme, and even suffer with a resolve that he couldn’t find now. After he’d escaped, he’d felt euphoric. Calm and whole and returned to the life he’d given up hoping for. But the honeymoon faded, and the version of him it left behind was scarred and broken. He didn’t feel weak. He felt annihilated. Years were gone. Years of prison and torture, which had been bad, and of pretending to be an honored guest while the threat of death invisibly followed one step behind. The dancing bear
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