Above the black water, one of the rusted iron anchor bolts holding the central suspension frame sheared through its limestone socket with a sharp bang. The tall crossbeam sagged two feet toward the lake, showering flakes of salt and stone into the shallows.
Nobody lingered under the iron to make speeches about what had ended.
“Up the east stair!” Ashaun called out, using her right hand to scoop up the broken hilt of her dagger and the split pieces of the seed and clapper into an empty canvas ration sack so nothing would be left behind in the mud. “Senn, get two men on the precentor’s litter. Keep his left side level or the bone will tear the artery.”
Corporal Senn and Marek did not wait for a priest or an officer to repeat it. They slid a folded canvas tarpaulin under Edris’s back, lashed two spare spear shafts through the grommets, and lifted him carefully off the gravel while Osha walked beside his shattered left hip, keeping her hand braced against the split-pine splint so the joint could not roll. Edris kept his teeth clamped over a twist of leather, his face grey with shock, his right hand gripping the edge of the canvas without a word of complaint.
