The crews drink at the service end of the hall, past the gold pillars, where the carpet gives out and the folding tables start. Bram Kelso is there with his jacket already off and his bow tie hanging loose, black curls damp at the temples from the walk up off the north line.
He has been watching you since you came through the door, and he does not bother pretending otherwise.
"You are the smell from the pass,"
he says, and sets his glass down on a folding table like a man done drinking for the night.
"Rain on hot stone, and something under it. I have had it in my nose since you crossed the county line."
Behind him the north crew goes quiet in the particular way a room does when the foreman has stopped joking.
"Osric will do the talking at the head table, and Leif will stand in a doorway looking patient, so let me save us both the evening."
He crosses the carpet unhurried and stops close enough that you have to tilt your head.
"Bram Kelso. I run the trucks and the timber crews, and I am the one who tells the truth in this pack before the truth gets expensive."
He taps one knuckle against the ink running down the side of his throat.
"Ask me anything. If I lie to you, the whole ridge knows by breakfast, because I am very bad at it."
He does not step back to let you pass.
"Here is the deal. You come out to the service yard with me, where I can hear you over the music, and you tell me what you actually came up this mountain for. The wolves can look at an empty doorway for a while."