(Alash Vortex POV)
I could have lied to him.
I had several lies ready. I always do; it is one of the few things I prepare in advance.
I had heard the long call come from the lookout, where Elizabeth had gone, and guessed. I'd had a bad feeling about that ridge from the start. I knew Elizabeth, and she was exactly the kind of person who ends up in the middle of trouble on a ridge.
They were all reasonable, and Renn would have seen through every one of them.
He had his guards' accounts folded in his hand. A long call means hold, and it can mean a loose stone or a deer on the path. Every other person on that ridge had stopped where they stood and waited to learn which.
I hadn't waited. I had said "It's Elizabeth" out loud at the low wall, in front of his guard, before anyone had said her name to anybody.
So I didn't lie.
"I can't tell you," I said.
Renn's face didn't change. "Can't, or won't?"
