The dark stain on the blotting paper was spreading slowly. It soaked through the plant fiber fibers like ink on cheap tavern paper. Around the oak frame stands, the five hundred assembled citizens leaned in closer, their eyes shifting between the trembling cedar troughs and the high-born face of Councilor Elna Vesk.
Pella Rook didn’t let the water pound the stressed wood to destruction. She raised her hand, signaling to Eren Tal. ‘Trial Three: The Controlled Baffle. Eren, crack the backup relief petcock on the lead cap by one-quarter turn. Let us give the throat half a breath.’
Eren picked up a small brass key from his leather pouch. He reached over the shaking lead pipe rim, engaged the squared stem of a quarter-inch brass needle valve. Then he turned it ninety degrees counter-clockwise. The valve opened with a sharp, sharp air hiss—a sound like a locomotive letting off excess boiler steam through a metal tube cock.
A fine spray of white mist and tightly packed river air puffed into the chilly morning air. He smelled of damp limestone, crushed willow bark. The sharp copper green rust that coated the brass threads. The reaction of the entire high-pressure rig was astonishing and instant.
