Tessa asked me to stop hovering over the correction while the ink dried.
I stepped back.
"I'm admiring it."
"Admire it from there."
The final notice was much shorter than the original invitation. The exhibition assignment had been withdrawn. Neither participant owed a replacement bout, a pursuit challenge or a penalty for withholding consent under the unresolved conditions.
No rescheduled date sat beneath the decision. No private annex promised the sponsor something the public notice omitted. Veylan had checked the conditions before sending me to the records desk.
I had checked them again anyway.
The first reading had been for the obvious things. A date. A condition about recovery. Some polite sentence suggesting that refusing today meant agreeing tomorrow.
The second had been slower.
"You're reading the same side," Tessa said.
"There are only two."
"And you've already read both."
