Darrow lights a fire in Mars’s captured castle, hiding his contraband by pretending the matches came from Minerva. June is freed to cook a feast, and Darrow’s tribe pretends starvation to bolster their image, but the meal only reveals squalor and deepening rifts. Roque warns that the Proctors are testing their ability to administer justice, not war, and insists the House cannot move forward with Titus lingering in the cellars.

Discussing leadership, Roque argues Cassius cannot command respect after his humiliation; fear, not fondness, rules Mars. Antonia and Pollux hover near Darrow to bask in his ascendant authority, while Sevro and Thistle watch, amused. Darrow wants Cassius to succeed for personal reasons but hears Roque’s hard truth: the House will not fear Cassius.

Darrow confronts Titus, who has been beaten by Minervans. Titus taunts him, but Darrow asserts that the game is about civilization before war. Pressed about killings in raids, Titus admits trying to murder foes before medBots arrived and condemns Darrow for hoarding matches and iodine. He claims others feared Darrow and Sevro, leaving him isolated even as he postured strength.

When Darrow cites Titus’s “friends,” Titus spits on the idea and calls the Golds cannibals. Asked about the slave rapes, Titus recounts a prior atrocity against “her,” justifying retaliatory assaults. As Titus speaks, his vocabulary and perspective slip—“bloodydamn,” “slingBlade,” and framing Golds as “their own”—and Darrow pieces it together: Titus is a Red hidden among Golds, reframing Titus’s hatred and crimes as vengeance born of trauma. Darrow now faces a charged decision about justice, identity, and leadership.