Seyun didn’t clench his teeth, and he didn’t hide the tremor in his right collarbone behind a stoic mask.
He kept his left wrist anchored on the iron bedframe and his right index finger steady against the four-beat hum of Pera’s bronze metal ring. He spoke aloud—clear enough for Mina across the mattress, Pera on the pillow, and Vaska Ren on the stair to hear every word.
“Daro Kesh’s seventh-dawn echo has arrived in Place II,” Seyun said. His voice was tight with the effort of holding his Returning Step steady. Meanwhile, the cold pressure behind his right collarbone demanded an answer. “It’s a Deeper Bronze question. My right return channel is taking the load now. The old burn seams on my palms have split open.”
On the mattress, Pera didn’t flinch away as she had at midnight. Having found the warm signal in her left foot, her gray eyes stayed fixed on Seyun’s face. Meanwhile, her chest held its two-beat lead over the wire. “What does that mean for my rib plug, boy? Speak plain.”
“It means two things,” Seyun answered without omitting a single risk—remembering the bitter lesson of Oran’s wrestling lodge, where hiding the injury-warning and turning to stone rules from Mina and Daro had nearly turned his allies into unwitting instruments. “First, if I try to suppress the echo fully while holding your metal ring, my right chest channel will inflame within ten breaths and my hand will shake on your wire. Second, if we abort…
