Tongen didn't move immediately.
He looked at Jelo for a long moment—not studying him the way he did before a training session, not measuring him the way he did when he was deciding how hard to push. This was different. Quieter. The kind of looking that wasn't about assessment at all. The kind that sat with something before deciding what to do with it.
Then he walked to the far edge of the training ground where a low stone bench ran along the wall, worn smooth from years of use, the surface darkened in the middle where people had sat the most. He settled down in the center of it—not at the end, not tucked into a corner. The middle. Deliberately leaving room on both sides.
"Sit down," he said again. "All of you."
