Ilyra set the butt of her marsh-iron spear back into the rack beside the check table, walked around to the wooden stool Mina had placed for her earlier. Then she sat down across the oak planks from Seyun.
For five full minutes neither of them spoke.
By the medicine dresser, Mina quietly picked up her tray of soiled linen swabs and the basin of cooled marsh-root water, slipped through the dividing curtain into the front shop to wash the instruments at the stone sink. Then she left the two principals alone with the brass lamp and the open Account Book.
Outside in the apothecary lane, the ten-o’clock watchman passed by with his iron lantern clinking softly against his staff, calling the hour and the clear sky.
Seyun sat on the bench opposite Ilyra with his bandaged hands resting lightly on his knees. He didn’t try to fill the five minutes of silence with arguments or apologies. He had laid every page of his book open. He had read every clause on the flyleaf. And he had stood with his face to the wall. Meanwhile, she tested the mark with her own spear and her own wounded shoulder. Whatever decision Ilyra made now belonged entirely to her.
