The yard smelled of wet straw and horse before the bell, and the carts stood ready.
Calen walked the line of them in the grey light. He had slept two hours, and it showed in his hands.
Five carts. One kettle. One licence, with a seal on the second page.
Tools in the first cart, under sacking. Bedding in the second, dry and tied.
The Keep’s iron kettle in the third, because Dorran had asked for it twice and nobody had had the heart to refuse him. The fourth cart held the licence case, strapped to the bench, with Ysra’s pencil tucked through the cord.
Dace went down the line behind him, testing each brake with his boot and his weight. He grunted at the third cart and sent a boy running for a new pin.
He did not say anything about the kettle, and Dorran, still sitting on it, did not stop apologizing to it. “Sorry,” Dorran told the kettle, and when nobody answered him, he said it again, quietly.
Tobin stood at the tailboard of the fifth cart with his hands in his sleeves. He did not help with the loading. He watched it, and when a sack went onto the wrong side of the bed he said, “Left,” very quietly, and the carter moved it.
