The open road rose along a gentle gravel incline between low stone walls covered in hoarfrost. Three hundred yards beyond the boundary chain, set beneath a stand of ancient, wind-bent northern pines, stood the official border station of the Fifth Northern District.
It was a broad, single-story building of whitewashed spruce logs and dressed granite, its steep roof shingled in split cedar that smelled of woodsmoke and winter resin. From the broad stone chimney, a plume of gray smoke rose straight toward the star-filled sky. Yellow light streamed through eight large multipaned glass windows. It was clear, flawless sight glass, fully free of the greenish bubbles and sulfur film that coated every pane in Rookvale.
Tavi pushed open the heavy iron-strapped oak door, Martha and the two children following close behind him. The blast of indoor warmth hit them like a physical embrace, thick with the comforting smells of seasoned birch-logs, hot animal fat, beeswax, and roasted mutton.
On the wall above the oak counter hung the district control valve. A amazing four-foot swinging weight clock wrapped in polished dark wood, its brass swinging weight swinging with a long, unrushed, three-foot stroke that filled the room with a deep, peaceful tick... Tock... Tick... Tock. It was a sound stripped of clockwork panic. It measured out the lawful hours of a world that didn’t fear the night.
