The governor’s staff had put the market on a board before the broken street had cooled.
A map showed the warning location, the eventual breach, and the routes cleared before the ordinary alarm. Three circles and a handful of times made the rescue look cleaner than Eli remembered it. There was no mark for the woman who had fallen against a cart, none for the storeroom drawer, none for the moment when the crowd had nearly run because a hunter mistook urgency for confirmation.
The times were real.
That kept him from dismissing the board as propaganda. A person could arrange true things to make a difficult decision look finished without inventing a single number.
He waited outside the meeting room while Sera asked the clerk which parts of the warning agreement were available for public inspection. Through the half-open door he could hear an official reading Rook’s offer. Shared access to the emergency quest network. Priority coordination across district boundaries. Supply planning through central command. Recognition of that command while the crisis continued.
The governor had opposed emergency expansion before the market. Now his signature rested on the table beside a pen.
“Is the crisis defined?” someone inside asked.
