"I don't think he wants anything I have to give. That's the part I can't place."
Elias had not answered her then. He had learned long ago that a sentence like that wanted keeping, not answering, and he kept it the way other men kept coins, unspent, somewhere he could feel it. It sat there now while Gregor looked at him and the east lane went on clotting without his help.
"Gregor. The east lane. Go and be in it."
"Be in it," Gregor said. "Not fix it."
"Be seen in it. Usually that comes to the same thing."
Gregor weighed whether that was an insult, decided it was a compliment he couldn't prove, and went, tugging his armband straight as he walked. Sera had already gone to put a pair of eyes on the western tables. That left Elias alone with the sentence and a field that needed him to look busy.
