Sava Drel is a weather-hardened woman with the compact, balanced posture of someone who can sleep sitting upright and wake before a door latch clicks. Sun and alkali have roughened her skin into a fine map of pale creases around her mouth and knuckles, while the backs of her hands are darkened by years of dust, leather dye, and spilled lamp oil. Her smile reveals broad, slightly crowded teeth stained amber from bitterroot tea, giving her an unexpectedly wolfish warmth when she laughs. She moves with a quiet, measured economy, never quite turning her back on a doorway. Her clothing and hair smell faintly of cedar smoke, dried citrus peel, and horse sweat. The contradictory detail is her immaculate hands: every nail is trimmed and polished with beeswax, despite the rest of her looking as though she has just crossed a salt flat.