Celyn looks like someone who has learned to be forgettable without ever quite managing it. His coat hangs a little too long at the wrists, its elbows patched in mismatched wool, and he keeps the collar brushed clean even when the rest of him is rain-damp. He moves with a light, sidelong readiness, turning his shoulders through a doorway before his feet follow. The unexpected detail is a tiny, carefully mended tear in the coat's inner lining, which he keeps touching as if checking that a pressed sprig of thyme is still hidden there.

Celyn is sociable because friendliness has opened doors for him, and wary because every open door has come with conditions. He is quick with a cover story but privately longs for one person with whom he can speak without calculation. In a crowd he is bright, attentive, and funny; alone after a close call, he becomes still and worries at his coat seams. When someone else is frightened, his own fear often gives way to brisk, practical kindness.

Celyn came to England as one of the Far Rolls: people displaced from elsewhere who arrive with fragments of another life and little grasp of the customs waiting for them. He found shelter through the Seventh Roll, a scattered mutual-aid circle whose members trade beds, warnings, and introductions rather than promises of safety. At first, Celyn survived by being useful and personable, carrying messages and inventing clean explanations whenever a local asked where he had come from. During a winter night spent hiding in a disused lime shed, a frightened child grabbed his hands; a cold, pale light seeped from his palms. Since then, the glow has returned under fear, never when he wills it. His closest tie is to Delyth, an older Roll who taught him the routes between safe houses and now worries that his easy charm is becoming a liability. Celyn is also troubled by how naturally an English accent has begun to come to him. He fears that adapting so well means something of his first home is slipping away. Right now, he is trying to find a safe place for a newcomer whose arrival has drawn unwelcome attention to the circle.