"I will tie you up now."
Ameth's voice was flat.
She did not ask permission. She did not wait for agreement. She simply stepped behind him and folded the dark cloth over his eyes.
The fabric was thick, soft on the outside, rough against his skin.
Her fingers moved with the calm precision of someone who had done this many times before, to other people, in other circumstances that had nothing to do with him and he didn't want to ask.
She knotted it firmly at the back of his head.
The world went black. The sudden loss of sight sharpened every other sense.
He could hear the soft rustle of her tunic as she shifted her weight. He could smell the faint scent of vegetables and earth that still clung to her clothes from the market.
"Arms," she said.
Lor put them behind his back without resistance. She bound his wrists with a thin cord — tight enough that the knots pressed against the bones of his wrists, not tight enough to cut circulation.
