High above on the North Rim overhead frame, three hundred feet above the dark sump, the tone check pipe began to vibrate.
Ivara Quill stood with her single right hand clamped around the speaking funnel of the brass comms tube. Her ear was pressed to the cold metal. The tube was an old survey instrument, an inch and a half of drawn copper that ran down through the limestone air-flow shafts directly into the lower drainage vault. Through the hiss of the steam pumps and the roar of the water pipe hubs, a sharp, metal rhythm clinked through the metal: three rapid double-taps. It was followed by the muffled, clear shout of a courier’s voice.
Drop the gate.
“He’s in the doorstep,” Ivara said. Her voice dropped into the flat, razor-sharp rhythm of an engineer reading a critical pressure gauge. She didn’t look at Geth Marr. She kept her single hand locked on the speaking horn, verifying the deep ring. “The double has taken the bait. It’s planted squarely on the threshold.”
Geth Marr didn’t hesitate. The veteran quarry foreman stood before the heavy cast-iron housing of the Quarry Anchor cabinet, mounted against the sheer granite face of the rim. His leather apron was soaked with cold salt water, his gray hair plastered to his forehead by mist. In his massive, calloused right hand, he held the Quarry Delegate Authorization Seal. A six-inch metal tube of solid bronze cut with thirty-two linked teeth that represented the collective labor charter of…
