Master Orlo Garrow smelled of curing salt water, unwashed wool, and rancid suet, a thick, greasy aroma that preceded him through the back kitchen door like an advancing fog bank. He was a broad, squat man with a neck like a bull and small, watery eyes set deep beneath heavy red brows. Under his arm he carried a battered zinc invoice folder, and in his left hand he gripped an iron-tipped walking cane.
“What’s the meaning of this foolishness on the porch top door beam, Rook?” Garrow bellowed, slamming his cane against the wet stonework flags. The iron tip struck with a sharp clatter that set the mugs rattling on the washstand. “Five silver coins? For thirty minutes of an apprentice’s time? I pay my slaughterhouse skinners two silver coins for an entire twelve-hour shift in the flensing pits! Who do you think you’re—the Chancellor of the Exchequer?”
Pella sat behind the deal board, Hal Rook’s brass measuring tongs laid flat before her. An open ledger was resting under her palms. Her apron was clean, her hair pulled back into a tight bun secured with a bone needle-point arrow. Beside her sat Eren Tal, sharpening an adze with an oiled whetstone, the rhythmic, scraping hiss of steel on stone continuing without the slightest interruption.
