Aria’s POV
The two Maras didn’t trade blades. They traded stories.
We sat in a circle around Sen’s fire. No table between them. Just bowls, mint, and the space where a knife wasn’t.
The new Mara from downriver held her dyed hands open. The other Mara held mint.
“Start,” Old Jorin said. Not an order. An invitation.
Downriver Mara went first. She didn’t talk about the quarry. She talked about her grandmother’s hands.
“She dyed cloth blue,” she said. “Same blue Coren uses for maps. Said color was the first border we drew.
Not to keep people out. To show where we’d been.” She touched the green stitches on her cloth. “She taught me mint grows where fear leaves. She never saw the ridge quiet. But she waited for it.”
Upmarket Mara crushed a leaf. Let the smell sit between them.
“
