Veylan hit me with a rolled cloth. I had been watching his other hand.
The cloth struck the front of my coat with a soft slap. I looked down at it, then at the little practice fitting he held beside his hip.
Its light remained off.
"Again," he said.
"There wasn't a release."
"There was a hand moving toward your chest."
He stepped back onto the starting mark. I returned to mine with the uncomfortable feeling that several weeks of learning had prepared me to lose to laundry. The check before practice had been uneventful. Closed skin, less ordinary pain, the same damaged return I had described yesterday. Seraphina had recorded the improvement without widening what the record meant.
Kara had adjusted the glove around the thinner cloth. The opening no longer shifted when I turned the wrist. It had taken her less time than I had spent worrying about another charge. Neither improvement made Veylan's moving hand disappear.
