The corner table was empty now.
Roald's stomach tightened.
A chair scraped softly across the boards behind him.
"Is this taken?"
The voice was calm. Unremarkable.
Roald turned. The man stood beside the table with a wooden cup in hand. Travel-worn cloak. Mud dried along the hem. Not a merchant. Not a soldier.
"No," Roald said.
The man sat.
For a few moments, he drank in silence.
The inn breathed around them — low voices, the crack of the hearth, a serving girl scolding someone for dripping grease.
"You're not used to the bread here," the man said at last.
Roald looked up. "What?"
"You're chewing it like it might fight back."
Roald flushed slightly. He swallowed. "It's hard."
"It's milled finer in the north."
Roald stilled.
The man took another drink.
"And they let it rise longer. Less rush."
Roald stared at him.
"You've been north?"
"A time or two."
"Where?"
The man shrugged faintly. "Rivers. Marshland."
"That's half the north."
"Yes."
Roald narrowed his eyes. "You don't sound like you're guessing."
A small pause.
The man's gaze dropped briefly to Roald's hands.
"You still hold a spoon like that," he said absently.
"Like what?"
"Thumb high. Resting the handle against the knuckle."
Roald looked down at his hand.
"That's how everyone holds —"
"No," the man said softly.
Something in his tone made Roald stop.
The man leaned back slightly.
"Boat children hold utensils like that. Keeps the wrist steady when the floor shifts."
The room felt smaller.
Roald's voice came quieter. "How would you know that?"
The man didn't answer immediately.
Instead he glanced toward the window.
"Does the river still bend twice before it widens?" he asked.
Roald's heart thudded.
"Yes."
Silence.
The man's jaw tightened almost imperceptibly.
"They never fixed the west dock," he murmured, more to himself than to Roald. "It always tilted after the thaw."
Roald's breath caught.
That dock had tilted.
Every spring.
His father used to curse it.
"How do you know that?" Roald asked.
This time the question wasn't curious.
It was sharp.
The man met his eyes.
And for the first time, something unguarded flickered there.
"I shouldn't," he said.
It was almost a confession.
Roald leaned forward slightly. "You were there."
A long pause.
The man did not nod.
But he did not deny it.
"I passed through," he said.
Roald knew that wasn't true.
Passed-through men did not know how children held spoons.
Passed-through men did not remember docks tilting.
Passed-through men did not look at the river through a window that was not there.
"You didn't pass through," Roald said quietly.
The man's fingers tightened around his cup.
"Eat while it's warm," he said.
It was not an answer.
And that, more than anything, confirmed it.
The man reached for his cup again.
Roald watched him this time — the way he held it, steady but not rigid. His hands were scarred in thin pale lines, the kind brambles left. One knuckle sat slightly crooked, healed poorly years ago. His cloak smelled faintly of sap beneath the smoke of the inn.
"You said rivers and marshland," Roald said carefully. "That isn't passing through."
The man gave a small huff of air. Not quite a laugh.
"No."
Silence lingered between them.
Then, as if the thought had simply surfaced —
"Lomor still climbs higher than he should?"
Roald's breath caught.
"You know my brother."
The man's eyes did not leave the table.
"He never liked staying where he was told."
Roald stared at him.
"How do you know that?"
A faint crease formed between the man's brows, as though he were deciding how much of the truth to allow.
"I showed him how to read ground sign," he said. "Broken twigs. Pressed moss. The way bark peels differently when a stag passes too close."
Roald felt something tighten in his chest.
"You taught him tracking?"
"For a time."
Lomor had claimed he learned on his own. That he simply watched the woods long enough and they spoke back.
Roald studied the man more closely now.
"You're the reason he can vanish in plain sight."
A corner of the man's mouth lifted.
"He was good at it before me."
"But you helped."
"Yes."
The answer was simple. No pride in it. No claim.
Roald hesitated.
"Why did you leave?"
The question felt larger than the others.
The man went still.
Around them, the inn continued its steady murmur — spoons against bowls, low laughter, boots against wood. But at their table, something thinned.
"I thought I wanted something cleaner," the man said at last.
"Cleaner?"
"Straight lines. Measured streets. Places where things are built according to plan."
Roald frowned. "Honeyburrow has plans."
The man shook his head faintly.
"It grows. It bends. It shifts. Nothing stays where it was meant to. A fence leans and no one fixes it because it has learned the shape of the wind. A path widens because enough feet have decided it should." His gaze drifted somewhere past Roald. "It is… organic."
The word sounded almost foreign in his mouth.
"And you didn't like that?"
"I thought I didn't."
Roald watched him carefully. "And now?"
The man did not answer.
Instead, his eyes settled fully on Roald.
Something in them had changed.
Not warmer.
Sharper.
The ease that had rested between them thinned like mist burned away.
Roald felt it before he understood it — the subtle tightening in the air, as if a door somewhere had quietly shut.
"The competition," the man said at last.
Roald blinked. "What about it?"
"It begins in ten days."
"Yes."
The man's gaze sharpened slightly.
"Are you going to enter?"
The question caught Roald off guard.
"I —" He hesitated. "Sir Wilkinson thinks I should."
"But you?" the man asked.
Roald swallowed. "I don't know yet."
A pause.
Long enough that Roald became aware of his own breathing again.
"And afterward," the man continued, "there will be a dinner."
Roald's stomach fluttered. "Yes…"
Another pause.
This one heavier.
"Do not eat anything he serves you."
The words landed softly.
But they did not feel soft.
Roald blinked. "What?"
The man held his gaze.
"The dinner after the competition," he said, each word measured. "Do not eat anything."
Roald's mind scrambled for meaning. "Why? Who —"
The man stood.
The chair legs scraped once against the floor.
For a moment he remained there, looking down at the boy. The seriousness in his face did not leave — but it softened at the edges.
Almost regretful.
Almost protective.
Then, unexpectedly, he smiled.
Not broadly.
Just enough to crease the scar along his nose.
And without another word, he turned and walked toward the door.
The inn swallowed him as easily as it had before.
Roald sat very still.
The pottage in his bowl had gone cold.
And for the first time since arriving in Dillaclor, he wished Honeyburrow still leaned crookedly toward the river.