Valkor
She arrived with the look she wore when she had something.
I recognized it the moment she came through the door — had learned to recognize it over months of watching her work, the specific quality of attention she carried when a thread had emerged, and she was already three steps into tracing it. It was different from an alarm. She was not alarmed. She was engaged, moving with the particular focus of someone who believed they were bringing information into a room that did not yet have it.
I knew, before she spoke, what she was going to say.
"The session is done," I said, when she came in.
"I know." She set her bag down and looked at me directly. "Tell me about the northern distribution manifests."
The silence that followed lasted exactly as long as it needed to. Not long. I wa
