Eren Tal didn’t shout. In ten years of framing heavy oak wagons, shoeing heavy cart horses, and driving iron felloe bands onto seasoned elm hubs, he had never found that shouting made a loose wood slot fit any tighter. When an iron tire cracked on the anvil, a wheelwright didn’t scream at the forge. He picked up the tongs, dropped the spoiled metal into the cool tank. Then he figured out which apprentice had skimped on the charcoal.
He stood over Pella Rook, his thick carpenter’s hands resting flat on the edges of the deal board, leaning his weight forward until the pine boards groaned against the laundry tubs. His breath smelled of boiled tea and chicory, hot and dry in the cold back kitchen air.
“My grandfather built the coal carts for the High Terrace mines,” Eren said, his voice level, steady, and shaking with an icy, contained rage that cut through the wet stonework room like an adze blade. “He taught me the trade when I was eight years old. The first rule he beat into my hide with a three-foot rule was this. If a spoke has an ash beetle hole through the heartwood, you throw the spoke in the firebox. You don’t fill the hole with beeswax, rub charcoal dust over the wood, and tell the carter it’s prime seasoned timber because the carter is in a hurry to haul wheat to the mills.”
