In the Ravine of Unfinished Forms two days ago, when Osen Tal’s own hired pursuit guards cut the hemp climbing rope above his head. Then they left him dangling over three hundred feet of jagged limestone, the senior steward had not made a sound as Seyun and Ilyra hauled him back onto the ledge. Daro Kesh tied his wrists and promised him he would answer before the living roll of the Hollow Summit. Then, Osen had merely tightly packed his thin lips and cited his duty to the valley’s balance.
Yet at the sound of his granddaughter’s name spoken quietly by the white-haired woman inside the dark iron needles, Osen Tal flinched as if someone had struck him across the mouth with an iron rod.
The color drained from the steward’s weathered cheeks. That left the network of small winter-broken veins across his nose standing out stark and purple in the starlight. He took half a step backward before his heel touched the raised lip of the stairwell door.
“How...” Osen’s voice cracked on the single syllable. He swallowed hard, his Adam’s apple working against the high wool collar of his coat. “I never brought family records into the upper shrine. I never spoke her name to a judge.”
