Their commanding officer didn't sound like a thirteen-year-old boy.
His voice was loud and while it broke and cracked, it wasn't because it was attempting to go through six different octaves in the course of a single word.
It was because he had to break off to cough.
The voice wasn't high and sweet like a child's voice. It was rough and raspy and it dragged from his throat like a marlin-shark being harpooned and pulled into a fishing boat, bleeding and fighting the entire way.
It was smoke-rough. Heat-damaged. Not like a child kept back away safely behind the walls of a palace. It sounded like every veteran everyone had known or had been.
Like a frontline firebender, who got caught up in the thick of the war and the battles and the people. In the soot and smoke of burning villages and burning flesh and all the ruin the aftermath entailed.
It sounded like ash and scorched ground as it cracked and caught in his throat.
The thirteen-year-old crown prince didn't sound like a child.
Voice smokey and burning, their commanding officer sounded like kindling.