Aldous Blackwood's fingers went on tapping the desk, and Alistair counted them, since there was nothing else in the room worth counting.
The document lay between them, turned to face him, the ink still fresh enough to smell.
Three choices had been put on that desk an hour ago, and not one of them had been offered kindly.
'Sign, and he owns every part of me. Refuse, and this room ends tonight. Stay uncertain, and he keeps me on a string until it stops amusing him.'
Alistair thought of Due in the Oasis, standing in a settlement he had emptied by his own order, keeping his voice level in front of Sera and Tavin while nothing underneath that voice was level at all, waiting on a single word from a man three countries away.
And Elara, working her way through old salons and older letters, unmaking Crane's arithmetic without ever raising her voice.
