The rain along the Lower Slipway fell in a cold, gray sheet that smelled of wet coal ash, rotting kelp, and the sour limestone sludge churning along the margins of the Gray Rush. Where the ancient ferry piers jutted into the current, the river didn’t flow with an even tide. It boiled against the granite cutwaters in rhythmic, muddy swells. That left pale collars of stone foam clinging to the iron mooring rings.
Pella Rook stood at the foot of the drowned timber ramp, the hem of her bottle-green apprentice wool tunic dark with rain. Her cowhide cart driver boots were planted wide on the slick cobbles. In her right hand she held Hal Rook’s eight-inch forged bronze key wrench, its three-flatted three-sided socket greased with fresh sheep fat to help the teeth bite through fourteen years of rusted river crust. Inside her heavy canvas apron, her fingers rested against her brass measuring tongs and the small iron stop bell.
Behind her, two town wardens in oilskin capes stood with their iron-shod staves grounded on the stones. That kept a dozen curious dock-hands and barge-men back at the top of the boat ramp stairs. Between the wardens stood Auditor Varo Nenn, his zinc map metal tube strapped tightly across his wool cloak, and Examiner Corvin Hest of the College of Summoners.
