The room held its new shape.
Vane turned.
The man stood two steps behind where Vane had been standing — close enough that he should have felt him arrive, far enough that he hadn't. Tall. Lean in the way of someone reduced by years in hard ground to only what was necessary, the way a blade was reduced. Dark clothes with nothing announcing itself. His hair was dark going slowly grey and his face—
Vane stopped looking at his face.
He looked at the hands. Then at how he stood — weight over the left foot, right slightly back, the spine carrying itself the way Vane's spine carried itself when it was reading a room before deciding to read it. As he watched, Varian shifted his weight slightly from the left foot to the right.
Vane became aware that he had done the same thing a moment before.
He ran the Usurper.
[Name: Varian]
[Rank: 9 (Transcendent)]
[Authority: The Unwritten (SSS)]
[Danger: Error]
The scan returned wrong.
