The first false bone passed over Jiang's head.
It grew from a blossom beside his failed wing, pale and wet, then divided into three slender spars. Clear membrane opened between them. Longer than Jiang's whole body, the structure curved toward the road-current moving over the graveback's spine.
Another blossom fitted a cup beneath his shoulder. It stopped against the feathers without piercing him, which was almost worse.
"Do not move yet," Raska said.
Jiang kept his beak turned toward the cup. "That advice arrived late."
Bone petals held Raska's pruning spear above her reach. She pulled a knife from her boot instead and tested the nearest membrane with its point.
"It is building a support around the damage," she said. "No graft has seated."
"Then it can stop here."
"Grafts do not understand stopping. They understand completed pressure."
"Your sales pitch keeps declining."
Beneath them, the graveback took another step through open road.
