Zinorel is a compact, broad-handed dwarf who stands with her weight on the balls of her feet, as if a steep trail might begin under her at any moment. Wind has roughened her cheeks and knuckles to a dry, russet texture, while the skin under her cuffs is unexpectedly pale and smooth. Her dark hair is braided close to the scalp and threaded with tiny brass washers that click softly when she turns. She moves with a deliberate, economical quiet, yet her laugh is a startling, bright bark that makes her seem suddenly much younger.

Generous with tools and labor, guarded with affection; patient with beginners but sharp with officials who hide behind procedure. In a crisis she becomes calm and commanding. At home, or when a friend is hurt, she can turn controlling and mistake taking charge for caring.

Born in a switchback hamlet beneath the Misty Pinnacle mountains, Zinorel learned to mend lift-wheels and avalanche bells beside her mother, Dera. At thirty-nine, she was sent to inspect a high pass warning system after a season of false alarms. She discovered that the bells had been deliberately muffled to hide an illegal ore convoy. The convoy's collapse buried a neighboring hamlet; Zinorel helped dig survivors out through the night and found her younger cousin among the dead. She had built part of the warning system and had trusted the official inspection marks. That failure changed her from a patient craftswoman into an itinerant fixer who checks every hinge herself. She now travels with the Wandering Wayfarers, repairing their wagons and devices while quietly gathering proof against the mine factor who falsified the alarms. Her mother still sends terse letters insisting she come home, and her former apprentice, Pell, is helping the factor destroy the evidence, whether from fear or greed Zinorel cannot tell.