The fire was dead and the room smelled of cold ash and pine resin and the faint iron undertone that lived in Ironmoor's stone the way old blood lived in soil — not visible, just present, something you registered in the back of your throat before your brain decided what to do with it.
Dorian hadn't moved from the head of the table. His hands were still flat on the stone surface and he was looking at me with the particular quality of a man who had just discovered the ground had a different texture than he'd expected, and was deciding whether to adjust his footing or step back entirely.
"What three things," he said.
I'd thought about this. Not last night — last night I'd mapped guard rotations and eaten bread and done footwork in the dark. But on the ride here, six hours with nothing to lo
