He looked up. Calm. A man who had learned patience the hard way.
“Yes, my queen.”
“Do you have family still down there?”
A brief pause.
“A cousin. She’s old now. I haven’t seen her in fifty years.”
“What’s her name?”
“Senna,” he said.
Nobody reacted. The witch herself didn’t move a muscle she’d told me earlier the name was common in those hills, and it was a test I’d built in on purpose. Marn hadn’t flinched at the coincidence. Hadn’t looked across the table. He’d just answered.
I moved on.
“Helsa.”
She looked up fast. Sharp-featured, wire-tense, the kind of nervous that hides itself badly.
“Yes, my queen.”
“Vael mentioned you rode south eight days ago. A hunt, she said. Where did you go?”
“To the boundary stone, my queen.”
“Eastern road or western?”
A pause. A beat too long
