Ehenu moves with the coiled assurance of someone used to wielding hammers as arguments. He is often streaked with soot in patterns that almost look deliberate: a crescent under one eye, a thin line down his left forearm. His skin has the warm, weathered tone of someone raised near sea salt and sun. He keeps a close-cropped beard black as a raven and hair bound at the nape with a strip of leather. His left hand bears a fine scar that runs from the base of the thumb to the first knuckle, puckered and pale. Unexpectedly, he always wears a faded, embroidered silk neckcloth of deep ochre, something more often seen on a scholar than a smith. When he walks he favors short, decisive steps; when he talks his fingers drum faint rhythms as if shaping invisible metal.