The brass opening gong had not yet finished its first deep shaking across the central terrace when Seyun’s voice cut cleanly across the courtyard.
“Clerks of the town grain board, village healers, and charter witnesses of the winter market!” Seyun called out from the raised stone apron beside the podium. He held his stamped wooden visitor tally in his left hand. Meanwhile, Mina stood at his side with her engraved Oran guild apprentice plate held clearly in view.
Fifty heads turned at once toward the platform. In the front row stood the two black-hatted country tax clerks from Oran and the white-bearded village bonesetter from the lower timber locks who had spoken up at the outer gate the day before. Along the side galleries stood twenty outer-court base students who had watched Seyun sweep these exact flat stone slabs for eleven winters.
Senior Elder Tor Ves strode out of the weights pavilion half a breath behind him, his oiled beard bristling as he signaled two inner-court wardens to step toward the platform stairs. Seyun spoke the exact lawful formula before a warden’s boot could touch the first riser.
“Under Article Four of Ash Reed Sect’s Founding Winter Grant,” Seyun declared, reciting the words he had copied in his fourth year and checked by animal fat light in the visitor shed an hour ago, “when the ordinary third-terrace harvest is claimed by tribute, supply order, or shortage, any unchartered guest buyer presenting a checked cold and exact need and a licensed…
