“Stay calm,” Skot murmurs.
“I am calm,” I reply, because the lie is easier than explaining the precise shape of what I am feeling.
Verr steps forward, his boots striking the stone with unhurried precision, each movement deliberate, as though time itself adjusts to his pace rather than the other way around. Hestops a few feet away, and up close he is worse—not physically imposing in the way soldiers are, not overtly threatening, but there is something in the way he looks at you that suggests he has already taken you apart and is merely waiting to see if you will notice.
“Lyria,” he says.
My name sounds different in his voice.
I incline my head just enough to be respectful without crossing into submission. “Sir.”
His gaze flicks briefly to Skot. “Leave us.”
Skot hesitates—just enough to matter.
“Now,” Verr adds, and nothing about his tone changes except something invisible tightening beneath it.
“Yes, sir,” Skot says, straightening before stepping away, his glance toward me brief but loaded—warning, apology, something unspoken—and then he is gone, leaving me alone in the way that matters.
Verr studies me, not just my face but everything—the dirt on my hands, the set of my shoulders, the way I hold my breath.
“You returned to work,” he says.
“Yes.”
“Why.”
The question lands sharper than it should.
“Because it’s my work.”
“That is not an answer.”
“It is the only one I have.”
His head tilts slightly, as though adjusting his perspective. “You were exposed to something… anomalous.”
“Yes.”
“You survived.”
“Yes.”
“You understand that was not expected.”
“I gathered.”
A pause stretches between us, thin but deliberate.
“Most would be… unsettled,” he says.
“I am unsettled.”
“Yet you continue your routine.”
“Yes.”
“Why.”
