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Keth brought the reader close to Kesta’s wrist without touching her. Symbols rolled across the display.

“The proximity signal is silent,” he said. “The crystal remains active.”

Dreven’s jaw tightened. “Active how?”

“That is the problem.”

Kesta studied the exposed strip. “Memory glass can store information without transmitting continuously. It may be collecting data until it reaches a compatible relay.”

Tavi leaned over the table. “Or waiting for a wake signal.”

Kesta looked at him. His usual amusement had vanished.

“What kind of wake signal?”

“Impossible to know without reading the hidden layer.”

“Can you?”

“Not with this.” He lifted the handheld unit. “I can tell you the crystal has power. I cannot tell you what it wants.”

Dreven’s tail moved slowly behind him. “Then remove it.”

Kesta glanced at him.

He met her gaze without hesitation. “The tracker is attached to your body. If you want it gone, it goes.”

That simple answer loosened something inside her.

She looked back at Sera. “Can you remove the crystal without taking off the entire band?”

“Probably.”

“Probably?”

Sera gave her a dry look. “Would you prefer certainty from someone who has never seen one before?”

“No.”

“Then probably.”

Kesta nodded. “Do it.”

The removal took nearly twenty minutes. Sera worked the black filament free a fraction at a time while Kesta kept her wrist motionless beneath the lamp. The crystal extended farther around the band than any of them expected, woven beneath the metal in a narrow spiral. By the time the last section came loose, Tavi had stopped joking entirely. Sera lowered the crystal into a glass dish. The copper symbols around Kesta’s wrist flickered. Dreven’s attention snapped to them.

Kesta felt no pain, only a brief warmth before the markings stabilized again. Keth checked the reader.

“The public protection mark remains.”

“And the locator?” Kesta asked.

“Silent.”

Dreven exhaled. The relief showed just enough for her to see it.

Sera inspected the small cut where the casing had opened. “The band stays physically intact until we know whether removing the entire housing would break the public protection record. I will not trade one unknown problem for another.”

Kesta considered arguing. Then she looked at the black crystal lying in the dish.