Shortly before midnight, the mountain wind quieted to a low draft whispering through the outer dark rock wall of the abandoned seal court. In the sheltered western nook, Seyun folded the coarse canvas cloth carefully around Master Uren’s returned stone tablet, tied the hemp binding cord with a square knot. Then he slid the bundle beneath the head of his torn sleeping mat beside his Account Book.
Footsteps crunched lightly on the gravel path from the lower hospice. Sixteen-year-old Halin and the veteran caravan defender Pera stepped through the side back gate carrying a steaming copper kettle of boiled willow-bark tea and a roll of clean linen bandages for Steward Osen Tal, who was quartered in the corner bay recovering from the deep flank wound he had taken shielding Mina in the northern chamber.
While Halin knelt by Osen’s pallet to check the dressing and offer the bitter tea, Pera walked over to the nook fire where Seyun was unlacing his boots. Her left foot stepped evenly across the cold flat stone slabs in her thick wool socks. It for months had turned ice-cold whenever an imposed rhythm approached.
Having heard from Mina at the hospice that Nara Soth had returned the original Balance tablet intact at dusk, Pera asked softly whether the rumor among the sentries was true. That Nara had reached a higher turn of Crown on the shale bank today. That Seyun intended to close their third rival mark at sunrise rather than wait six days for…
