Len took the brass lubrication key from Rassa Vale’s crooked fingers. The metal was cold despite the heat of the kiln, its edges worn down to silky smoothness by seven years of being turned over in an old man’s pocket. It had substantial heft. Nearly eight ounces of solid brass, cut with five square-shouldered wards that were designed to bypass the clockwork interlocks on the governor’s high-pressure oil reservoirs.
Without this key, the bronze arbor would seize in its babbitt bearings within ninety seconds of the valve opening, welding the shaft to the housing and ending the release before the first sky layer could discharge.
Len turned the key over in the lantern light, examining the care of the brass-work. It was stamped with the checker’s mark of the old Provincial Foundry, an institution that had vanished twelve years ago under the first decrees of Chancellor Morn. He tested the wards with his thumb. Each notch was cut to three decimal points of an inch, designed to depress a spring-loaded bronze plunger deep inside the oil pool that fed high-pressure sheep fat directly to the arbor sleeve.
He opened his leather tool roll, slipping the heavy brass key into an empty stitched pocket beside his hardened steel sounding tips and his wrench wrenches. He rolled the canvas tight, knotting the rawhide thongs with a quick, practiced twist of his right fingers.
