The tin cup struck the oiled floorcloth with a dull, hollow thud.
Inside the wind-tent, the sudden sound seemed to cut through the warm air like an iron blade. Voss looked up from his tool sack, his thick eyebrows knotting together, while Yseld’s hand went fully still upon the shaft of her climbing staff.
Kezra Venn froze with her wooden metal pen hovering an inch above her route ledger, her good right ear turned toward the physician.
Paxa Sel didn’t look angry. Her thirty-six-year-old face, weathered by fifteen winters of traveling between mountain villages to set bones and stitch wounds, was calm, solemn, and unsparingly lucid. Her dark eyes reflected the steady blue cone of the spirit-lamp flame with an unblinking, analytical clarity.
“Say it without the poetry, Kezra,” Paxa said, her voice quiet, low, and perfectly level. “Strip away the clever phrases. Take away the words about turning an enemy’s greed against himself. What are you actually planning to do?”
Kezra swallowed against a dry throat, lowering her metal pen to the board. “I’m planning to use the authentic royal survey-corps name of Empty Choir to certify the Horizon exchange.”
“No,” Paxa said, leaning forward across the small stove, her gaze locking onto Kezra’s eyes. “You’re planning to lie.”
