Tovin has a weather-browned face, a narrow chin, and a wary, almost birdlike way of turning his head before the rest of his body follows. His coat hangs a little too long at the wrists, patched in tidy squares of mismatched cloth; one cuff is repeatedly darned in bright yellow thread, the kind used for mending sailcloth. He moves with a peddler's careful economy, setting each foot as if testing a bridge plank. In a room, his gaze goes first to the exits, then to people's hands, and only afterward to their faces. He leaves the impression of someone who has learned to keep walking even when frightened.

Tovin is observant and practical, but he dislikes being treated as a source of clues rather than a person. He can be brisk and skeptical while bargaining, then surprisingly tender with animals and children. When calm, he uses dry humor to test whether people are safe; when frightened, he clings to exact details and becomes stubborn about anything he did not personally see.

Tovin was raised on the cart road between the market towns of Brack and Kest, helping his mother sell needles, salt, and cheap tin charms from a handcart. Years of bargaining taught him to remember faces and small details, while years of sleeping beside roads taught him not to trust a quiet stretch of night. His mother, Drea, died during a winter fever when Tovin was twenty; he still carries her little wooden bird whistle, though he cannot make it sound properly. Three years ago, Tovin was caught in a sudden rockslide on the Gannet track. He spent a night pinned beneath his overturned cart, listening to his mule struggle in the dark. By dawn he had freed himself, but the experience changed his habits: he checks every route for a second way out and refuses to travel beneath steep slopes after rain. His mule, Brindle, is now his closest companion. Shortly before dusk, Tovin passed through Passby Grove and heard a human voice chanting from among the trees. He saw a hooded figure standing near a split, pale stone, one hand raised and the other gripping a narrow object that flashed once in the fading light. The chant had a repeated, clipped rhythm, like someone reciting instructions rather than praying. Tovin hurried on and heard the breach begin behind him. He is shaken, angry at himself for not warning anyone, and troubled by the possibility that the intruder recognized him.