diff --git a/.github/copilot-instructions.md b/.github/copilot-instructions.md
index 6102680d..010dad10 100644
--- a/.github/copilot-instructions.md
+++ b/.github/copilot-instructions.md
@@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ The **canonical guide is [AGENTS.md](../AGENTS.md)** at the repo root - read it
 
 For code-style rules, see [`CODESTYLE.md`](../CODESTYLE.md) at the repo root - one guide with a General section plus a section per language the repo uses.
 
-Do not duplicate language-specific rules here. **Project-specific conventions and API/behavioral contracts also belong in [GOVERNANCE.md](../GOVERNANCE.md), not here** - this file is intentionally limited to the inline commit/PR-title summary, the guidance for reviewing carried fleet content, and the GitHub Copilot Review Runbook. Non-Copilot agents (Claude Code, Codex, Cursor, ...) are not directed to this file and don't read it by default, so any rule a reviewer must honor has to live in `AGENTS.md` to be provider-independent.
+Do not duplicate language-specific rules here. **Project-specific conventions and API/behavioral contracts also belong in [GOVERNANCE.md](../GOVERNANCE.md), not here** - this file is intentionally limited to the inline commit/PR-title summary, the guidance for reviewing carried fleet content, and the GitHub Copilot Review Runbook. Non-Copilot agents (Claude Code, Codex, Cursor, ...) are not directed to this file and don't read it by default, so any rule a reviewer must honor has to live in `GOVERNANCE.md`, routed to from `AGENTS.md`, to be provider-independent.
 
 ## Commit Messages and Pull Request Titles
 
diff --git a/GOVERNANCE.md b/GOVERNANCE.md
index 4c7562ce..8fffad9d 100644
--- a/GOVERNANCE.md
+++ b/GOVERNANCE.md
@@ -130,7 +130,7 @@ Clarify devcontainer setup steps in README
 
 ## Documentation Style Conventions
 
-- **Carried files carry no coordination references.** In the files the fleet carries - `AGENTS.md`, `CODESTYLE.md`, `WORKFLOW.md`, `.github/copilot-instructions.md`, the `repo-config/` and `spec/` files, the carried `AUDIT.md` - two things are banned. **Any reference to the template repo**, in prose or in a link: it is private, so a link 404s for a downstream repo's users, and the coordination flow is machinery a consumer of that repo should never have to see. Where a carried file must express a template-level behavior - "report a rule discrepancy upstream" - state the behavior rather than the destination. The maintainer supplies the destination out of band. And **a sibling fleet repo named as an illustrative example** ("repo X does it this way", "see repo Y's adoption"), which couples the repos and rots as they diverge. To point at a current good example, name it in the onboarding or conformance issue, never in a carried doc. **A contextually relevant link to a related project is not a coordination reference, and is expected.** Where another repo is part of this repo's subject matter - the image that consumes this config, the builder that generates this hardware, a library this depends on - link it normally. The test is whether the link serves a reader of *this* repo's content, not whether the target happens to be in the fleet. This rule governs carried template content. A repo's own `README.md` and topical docs are its own content, not carried verbatim, and it does not reach them. This pairs with the present-tense rule below: state the current shape, not a history of which repo it came from.
+- **Carried files carry no coordination references.** In the files the fleet carries - `AGENTS.md`, `GOVERNANCE.md`, `CODESTYLE.md`, `WORKFLOW.md`, `.github/copilot-instructions.md`, the `repo-config/` and `spec/` files, the carried `AUDIT.md` - two things are banned. **Any reference to the template repo**, in prose or in a link: it is private, so a link 404s for a downstream repo's users, and the coordination flow is machinery a consumer of that repo should never have to see. Where a carried file must express a template-level behavior - "report a rule discrepancy upstream" - state the behavior rather than the destination. The maintainer supplies the destination out of band. And **a sibling fleet repo named as an illustrative example** ("repo X does it this way", "see repo Y's adoption"), which couples the repos and rots as they diverge. To point at a current good example, name it in the onboarding or conformance issue, never in a carried doc. **A contextually relevant link to a related project is not a coordination reference, and is expected.** Where another repo is part of this repo's subject matter - the image that consumes this config, the builder that generates this hardware, a library this depends on - link it normally. The test is whether the link serves a reader of *this* repo's content, not whether the target happens to be in the fleet. This rule governs carried template content. A repo's own `README.md` and topical docs are its own content, not carried verbatim, and it does not reach them. This pairs with the present-tense rule below: state the current shape, not a history of which repo it came from.
 
 ### Markdown
 
diff --git a/scripts/test_prose_lint.py b/scripts/test_prose_lint.py
index da7161a1..bb66db02 100644
--- a/scripts/test_prose_lint.py
+++ b/scripts/test_prose_lint.py
@@ -174,6 +174,19 @@ def test_a_dot_prefixed_path_keeps_its_prefix(self) -> None:
         self.assertEqual('.editorconfig', prose_lint.rel(Path('.editorconfig')))
         self.assertEqual('GOVERNANCE.md', prose_lint.rel(Path('./GOVERNANCE.md')))
 
+    def test_a_subdirectory_root_yields_paths_that_exist(self) -> None:
+        """`git ls-files` prints paths relative to its `-C` directory, not the repo top level.
+
+        Review read it the other way round, which would make the join in tracked_paths produce
+        broken paths. It does not, and the invariant is pinned here because passing `--full-name`
+        would flip the behavior with nothing else to notice.
+        """
+        for root in (REPO / 'spec', REPO / 'scripts'):
+            with self.subTest(root=root.name):
+                found = prose_lint.discover([str(root)])
+                self.assertGreaterEqual(len(found), 5)
+                self.assertEqual([], [str(p) for p in found if not p.exists()])
+
     def test_a_binary_file_is_not_scanned(self) -> None:
         blob = self.tmp / 'payload.md'
         blob.write_bytes(DUP.encode() + b'\x00binary\n')