Ysra had sent Hoff’s copy request back before the bread came out. It came with a slip of paper folded under it, and the slip said only Keeping the list. Later. Calen carried the request to the gate post and laid it there, folded in four, with the seal turned down. Hoff picked it up, looked at the fold, and put it inside his coat without a word.
“Did the seal match?” Hoff asked.
“Ask Ysra.”
“I am asking you.”
“And I am telling you to ask her,” said Calen. “She has it in a folder. She will tell you when she is certain.”
Hoff’s jaw moved. He did not argue. He had known Ysra for as long as Calen had, and he had seen her sit through a whole Trial without blinking.
The second rider from Vanmoor came up the road before noon. He was on a grey horse with mud to its knees, and he carried a flat sheet in a leather case. He gave it to the gate boy, who gave it to Hoff, who gave it to Calen without reading it, which Calen noticed and did not comment on.
The sheet was stiff and new. It had a sand-coloured border and a seal in green wax, and the hand was small and upright, a clerk’s hand, not a commander’s.
