polishing, getting ready for export

chapters/book1/ch12-final.md

@@ -128,7 +128,7 @@ He studied me for a moment. The scattered energy was gone, replaced by an assess
 
 "He anticipated *something.* Didn't know it would be this. Thought it might be professional — demotion, reassignment. Not…" He gestured vaguely at the air, encompassing the full horror with the inadequacy of hands.
 
-I let the silence hold. Devod wasn't the kind of man who needed prompting — he needed space, and the space would fill itself.
+I let the silence hold. Devod wasn't a man who needed prompting — he needed space, and the space would fill itself.
 
 "The vendors," he continued. "I saw some of it. My routes take me through the shipping warehouses — cargo deliveries, mostly, salvage goods, specialty materials for the trades. Ned and I crossed paths three, four times a week during the busy season. Coffee in the loading dock. He showed me a ledger page once — same company name, four different transactions, four different categories. 'Diversified interests,' the filing said. Ned said nobody diversifies into both canal-dredging equipment and decorative stonework unless they're diversifying into washing money."
 
@@ -146,11 +146,11 @@ Devod's expression changed. Not recognition of the plant — recognition of the
 
 That was the practical lead secured. Ghostveil moss, if it grew anywhere within range of Drenwick, would grow in exactly the conditions Devod was describing. I started building the expedition logistics in my head — team composition, supplies, timing — when Devod kept talking.
 
-"The harvesting, though — you said the preparation's delicate? You'd want someone who knows plants. Magical botany, not just field collection." He was tapping the edge of the carpentry bench with two fingers, already somewhere ahead of the conversation. "There's a woman who runs a bookshop in the arcane district. Deals in magical texts, theory, the kind of reference material most people don't know exists. My daughter, actually." A father's pride slipped through before he'd thought about it — a brightness in the voice, quickly steadied. "She'd know about plants like that. She's got the patience for the detail work. Precise. Methodical. If the preparation requires—"
+"The harvesting, though — you said the preparation's delicate? You'd want someone who knows plants. Magical botany, not just field collection." He was tapping the edge of the carpentry bench with two fingers, already somewhere ahead of the conversation. "There's a woman who runs a bookshop in the arcane district. Deals in magical texts, theory, reference material most people don't know exists. My daughter, actually." A father's pride slipped through before he'd thought about it — a brightness in the voice, quickly steadied. "She'd know about plants like that. She's got the patience for the detail work. Precise. Methodical. If the preparation requires—"
 
 He stopped.
 
-I hadn't moved. Hadn't changed my expression. I was too controlled for a visible tell, and I knew it, and that knowledge was exactly the problem — because Devod wasn't reading my reaction. He was reading the absence of one. A stranger hearing "my daughter runs a bookshop" asks a follow-up question. What's it called? Where in the arcane district? What's her name? I'd asked none of those things. I'd sat there with the particular quality of silence that only comes from already knowing the answer.
+I hadn't moved. Hadn't changed my expression. I was too controlled for a visible tell, and I knew it, and that knowledge was exactly the problem — because Devod wasn't reading my reaction. He was reading the absence of one. A stranger hearing "my daughter runs a bookshop" asks a follow-up question. What's it called? Where in the arcane district? What's her name? I'd asked none of those things. I'd sat there with the weighted silence that only comes from already knowing the answer.
 
 The scattered energy drained out of him like water through a cracked hull. The tapping stopped. His eyes — which had been bouncing between me, the window, the workbench, three half-formed thoughts at once — locked on and held.
 
@@ -160,11 +160,11 @@ Not a question. An observation from a man who might build nine things that fell
 
 "She manages Thresholds," I said. Neutral. Professional. "I work cases that sometimes require research in the kinds of texts she stocks."
 
-Devod studied me. The enthusiasm hadn't returned. What replaced it was something more careful — a father's assessment wearing a tinkerer's face. He was testing now, and the questions that followed weren't casual, even though they sounded like they should be.
+Devod measured me. The enthusiasm hadn't returned. What replaced it was something more careful — a father's assessment wearing a tinkerer's face. He was testing now, and the questions that followed weren't casual, even though they sounded like they should be.
 
 "The Pre-Compact theory section. She still stock that herself? Used to say the suppliers didn't understand the cataloguing system."
 
-I could have deflected. Given a customer's answer — vague, polite, the kind of response that acknowledges the question without really engaging with it. Instead I said, "She stocks everything herself. She's particular about placement. About quality. About who touches what."
+I could have deflected. Given a customer's answer — vague, polite, a response that acknowledges the question without really engaging with it. Instead I said, "She stocks everything herself. She's precise about placement. About quality. About who touches what."
 
 Too much detail. A customer says *yes* or *I think so*. I'd answered like someone who'd watched her do it. Devod's jaw tightened — not anger, recognition — and he pressed.
 
@@ -186,7 +186,7 @@ The scattered energy was entirely gone now. The man sitting on the carpentry ben
 
 "You should know something," Devod said. "About Mere's situation. About why she is the way she is — some of it, anyway. Her mother—" He stopped. Started again. "Charlette. Mere's mother. Charlette Fields."
 
-First time I'd heard the name. Filed.
+First time I'd heard the name. Noted.
 
 "Charlette owns Thresholds."
 
@@ -242,7 +242,7 @@ I stood. The expedition was forming in my head — three people minimum. Me for
 
 "I know."
 
-The walk home took twenty minutes. The noise ran the entire time, but it ran on two parallel tracks that refused to merge. One was the curse — three layers, two solutions, one gap. Layer 3's anchor drift remained unsolved, a visible flaw I could describe and diagram and do absolutely nothing with. The concept I needed — how to accelerate a gradual process that existed in the space between magical engineering and biological reality — wasn't in any framework I'd studied.
+The walk home took twenty minutes. The noise churned the entire time, but it churned on two parallel tracks that refused to merge. One was the curse — three layers, two solutions, one gap. Layer 3's anchor drift remained unsolved, a visible flaw I could describe and diagram and do absolutely nothing with. The concept I needed — how to accelerate a gradual process that existed in the space between magical engineering and biological reality — wasn't in any framework I'd studied.
 
 The other track was Mere. Charlette Fields. A deed that was a leash. Twelve years of escalating control dressed in reasonable language. A father who'd made the strategic choice and lived with the cost every day since. Wrapped presents on a shelf.