Amara Hillyard had not taken off her coat. She sat straight-backed at Elias’s right, tall enough in the chair to make everyone else seem to slope around her. Her plate was untouched. “Flowers would imply the evening has another subject,” she said.

Elias pulled out his chair but did not sit. “Then at least we’re saving time.”

The dryness in his voice scraped the room. It was not the tone he had planned. He had planned calm. He had planned to let the food soften the room, let old history warm before he asked for anything. But the room had arrived armored. He could see it in the careful distance between Jonas’s courtesy and his eyes, in the way Amara had chosen the chair with a full view of the lab door, in the legal man’s sealed face.

He sat at last. Cutlery touched porcelain in short, polite starts. Nobody took more than a trial bite.

Liora cleared her throat. “I should say, Elias, it’s kind of you to host. Given the… attention around your work, I wasn’t sure you’d want a room full of witnesses.”

Jonas lowered his eyes to his plate. There it was. Not even three minutes.

Elias carved a piece of roast he did not want. “I invited people who can tell the difference between a witness and a mind.”

Dev set down his fork. “That difference tends to matter less once a board report reaches a regulator.”

Amara finally picked up her glass, though she did not drink. “Especially when a technician dies during an unsanctioned calibration.”