The question was rhetorical.
The commanders trembled. The particular, full-body, involuntary, animal-level trembling of men who had been confronted with a predator and whose bodies — before their minds — had decided to submit.
The threat filled the room.
The aura — the killing intent, the particular, oppressive, suffocating, weight-of-a-lion presence that radiated from Viktor's body — pressed down on the tent. Every man felt it. The commanders, who had fought demons and monsters and men, felt it. The guards, who had stood at attention through sieges, felt it. The particular, ancient, blood-deep recognition of being in the presence of something that was higher on the food chain.
They saw the patriarch inside him.
