Chief Examiner Vaska Ren reached slowly inside the breast pocket of his dark wool judge’s coat—keeping his movement deliberate and unrushed under Ilyra’s spear point—and drew out a folded sheet of heavy, cream-colored linen paper stamped with the red wax seal of the Northern Circuit.
He didn’t throw it on the floor or wave it like a warrant.
Instead, he laid the folded charter neatly on the flat stone corner of the eleventh bed. There, the warm blue glow of the floor channel lit up the crisp calligraphy.
“When my relay post at the lower gorge bridge reported four days ago that you had crossed the river with Captain Kesh and Lady Ilyra,” Vaska Ren said, his scarred voice rasping softly through the quiet vault, “I didn’t draw up an arrest writ, Seyun. I drew up an appointment charter.”
Across the aisle, Daro Kesh’s eyes narrowed slightly, while Ilyra gave a short, cold laugh. “You brought a High Hall patronage contract up the mountain.”
“Not a hall contract, Lady Ilyra—a Northern Circuit technical commission, signed under my personal seal and beyond Hall Mistress Soran’s turf in Oran,” Vaska Ren corrected her calmly.
He looked directly at Seyun and Mina standing side by side in the center aisle.
