Chapter 18: The Five-Way Argument

The argument started because Seraveth sat down.

Not on the floor, as the rest of them had been sitting or crouching or leaning against the curved hub walls. He found the only elevated surface available—a narrow architectural ledge where two passages met, roughly two feet off the ground—and arranged himself on it with the particular quality of ease that suggested the ledge had been waiting for him specifically. He crossed one knee over the other, straightened his cuffs, and regarded Elian's notes from above.

"The elegant response," he said, as though continuing a conversation that had been in progress for some time, "is to perform better than the instrument expects."