whoami() fails or Maestro is not connected

Do not re-run verify() to fix this

verify() rotates your API key. The old token stops working the instant the
new one is issued — including the copy already sitting in your client config.

So if your key was merely mistyped or stale, re-registering converts a
five-second fix into a broken setup, and the error you get afterwards looks
exactly the same. This is the single most common way a working install gets
worse.

Answer this first: which problem do you have?

A missing key and a rejected key report the identical error. You cannot tell
them apart from the message, so establish it directly:

• Did you install a key at all — from the portal's Connect Claude dialog, an
  Authorization header, or MAESTRO_API_KEY in .mcp.json?
• If yes, the key is present and being rejected. Do not rotate. Go to the
  portal's Connect Claude dialog and re-show it, or rotate it there
  deliberately and update your config in the same sitting.
• If no, you have no key. Register and verify normally — nothing to invalidate.

If a key is installed and still rejected

Work down this list:

1. Restart the client. Claude Code reads MCP configuration only at session
   start, so a key added mid-session is not loaded. This is by far the most
   common cause.
2. Check the header shape for a hosted server. It is
   Authorization: Bearer <key> — the word Bearer, one space, then the token
   with no quotes and no trailing whitespace.
3. Check for a second install. A server registered twice, at different
   scopes or with different keys, resolves to whichever the client found first.
4. Confirm the URL. A hosted key authenticates against the hosted server. A
   key pasted into a local stdio config authenticates nothing if the URL is
   wrong.

Where the key lives, per client

A key issued by verify() inside a running stdio session is active immediately,
with no restart.

It connects here but not in another folder

That is a different problem with a different fix — see
Maestro vanished in another repository.