"Same thing here, mostly."
They left the shelter together after that, because none of them was willing to let Leon walk straight from one interested set of eyes to another without support. Trade and information in Carrion Market might move fast, but the lower tiers still gave enough cover to shadow one another if they kept the routes staggered and the timing clean.
Hest's stall sat on the inner middle spine exactly where Pell had said it would, wedged between a rope mender and a table selling sharpened bone pins and fish oil. The stall itself was narrow and orderly, with a low counter, three hanging shelves, and a lamp hooded so well that the light stayed tight on the goods and left the trader's own face partly in shadow.
Hest was narrow too, with a smooth voice, trimmed beard, and sleeve seams reinforced with gray thread that would have looked like practicality if Pell had not pointed out the one line of silver hidden in the left cuff. He looked up when Leon approached, and his eyes moved to the provisional tag first.
Then to Leon's face.
Then to the wrapped token in his hand.
Very small reaction.
Enough.
Leon set the token on the counter without sliding it across.
"This took the wrong route."
Hest looked at the wrapping, not touching it.
"So I see."
His tone was calm, but the fingers of his right hand pressed once against the wood before relaxing. Not fear. Annoyance, maybe. Or the knowledge that the wrong witness had arrived.
Leon said, "Was it lost?"
"No."
"Delayed?"
Hest met his eyes. "That depends on whether you believe in intention."
That was a terrible answer.
Which meant it was probably useful.
Leon glanced once to the side.
The rope mender next stall over was pretending not to care. The woman at the fish oil table had gone very still while arranging pins that no longer needed arranging. Information spaces always made audiences. The mistake was forgetting they had bought seats.
Hest noticed Leon noticing them.
Good.
Leon said, "I was told to look at it, not settle it."
"Then look."
He left the token where it was, untouched.
Interesting.
A guilty person who wanted the object hidden would have reached for it too quickly, or distanced from it too obviously. Hest did neither. Which suggested the object itself was not the point.
Leon asked, "Who was waiting?"
Hest's expression stayed composed. "Not your concern."
"Then whose concern is the delay?"
"Who sent you?"
That was the first direct attempt to reverse the line of questioning.
Leon almost admired the speed.
He said, "Someone who already knew the token reached you and wanted to know whether the delay mattered."
Hest's mouth shifted by half a degree.
Not surprise. Recalculation.
There it was.
The trader did not fear being discovered. He feared being understood correctly.
Leon leaned one forearm on the counter and lowered his voice enough that Hest had to lean in slightly to catch it.
"The object wasn't lost," he said. "And you didn't intercept it for personal gain. If you had, it wouldn't still be here in original wrapping and within arm's reach. You let it sit because whoever was waiting on the other end matters more when they have to wonder why."
The fish oil seller stopped moving entirely.
Hest said nothing.
Leon went on in the same quiet tone.
"So the token is leverage, but not for you. Which means you're part of someone else's pressure, or you're proving that you can create that pressure without being told. Either way, the delay is the message."
Hest's eyes changed.
Only slightly.
The calm did not go away. It hardened into something more exact.
"You're new," he said.
"Yes."
"And still alive."
"So far."
Hest looked down at the token then, finally touched it with two fingers, and slid it back toward Leon.
"The mistake," he said, "was not that it reached me. The mistake was who noticed."
Leon picked up the token.
That was enough.
Not the whole answer, but enough to report.
He turned to go.
Hest said, "If Sel sent you, tell her the delay was deliberate and the recipient learned patience more quickly than expected."
Leon looked back once. "That sounds rehearsed."
"It is."
"Then someone expected this conversation."
"Yes."
Leon left the stall with the token in his coat and the answer sitting badly in his mind.
Mara joined him two turns down the spine. Pell appeared from somewhere he absolutely should not have fit into. Toma, wisely, had stayed below.
"Well?" Pell asked.
Leon walked another few steps before answering.
"The token wasn't the problem," he said. "The waiting was."
Mara looked at him. "So Sel knew already."
"Yes."
"Then why send you?"
Leon looked back once over the middle spine where Hest had already resumed his work as if nothing had happened.
"Because the point wasn't the token," he said. "It was whether I understood what kind of debt a delayed answer creates."
That night, when the token went back up to the third rib landing by runner because Sel had no interest in making repetition convenient, the reply came down just before sleep would have been possible.
A single line on a narrow strip of cloth.
Correct answer. Wrong assumption. Come again.
Leon read it twice.
Then folded it once and sat very still in the dark.
Because he had passed.
And somehow, that felt worse.