The key turned, and my right hand tightened before the door moved.
I made myself open it.
"Pain?" the healer asked.
"No. I was expecting it."
She wrote the answer beside the time. At least this visit would begin with an accurate record of my talent for making a problem worse before it existed.
The seal keeper pulled the metal door outward. Nihil lay inside its case, black and cracked, exactly where I had left it three weeks earlier. Nothing about the sword suggested it had spent the time missing me. My body had been less fortunate.
That morning's review had included an unpowered grip check, a short walk, and one measured circulation return. No inward wave had followed. The healer had permitted a brief external trace under supervision, with a lower limit than the one used in my ordinary lesson. She had not cleared a fight, an endurance test, or another private attempt in my room.
