The audio briefing with Harrowby was logged and co-signed. Then, the twenty-one percent reserve loss inflicted by Master Sorell’s draining clamp forced an immediate, practical choice inside Sister Merrow’s washroom. On the second column of the cedar Triage Board hung four paid commercial commissions scheduled for tomorrow’s midday window. Including a three-silver coin boiler-header check for Master Bren’s animal fat works, a two-silver coin salt water-vat balance for Mistress Ketter, and two one-silver coin chimney pipe surveys for upper Weaver Lane.
All four merchants had already deposited their silver coins into the workshop’s locked deposit box earlier in the week on the expectation that Ada Morland or Imran Bell would step through the arch for ten minutes to sign off on their repairs.
“If we open the full physical threshold tomorrow at noon even for fifteen minutes to earn those seven silver coins,” Pella said, tapping her chalk math on the slate beside Foreman Eren Tal, “the startup surge will drop our charge bank matrix from one hundred and thirty units to one hundred and twelve. And if the highland storm hits forty-eight hours early—as Korr Var’s mountain rain gauges are beginning to suggest—Imran or Jo’s ninety-minute overtime window would cut out twelve minutes before the third gate is clear.”
