Tavin moves like a splash of water — quick, unpredictable, and always leaving a trace. He is small and wiry, shoulders narrow but coiled, with knuckles callused from climbing ropes and hauling crates. His clothes smell faintly of salt and boiled herbs. He wears a faded hand-me-down vest stitched with the sigil of the river ward (a hoop of braided reeds) over a shirt with one sleeve shortened and mended with mismatched buttons. One ear is pierced with a copper fishhook; a thin scar runs from his left eyebrow toward his temple, pale against sun-darkened skin. When he stands still he tends to look older than his years; when he runs he seems all boy again. The unexpected detail: tucked beneath his vest, wrapped in oilcloth, is a small carved wooden fox, polished by years of being fiddled with — an object he will defend like a talisman.