Driver Jori arrived from the south depot just after midday. He still wore his delivery harness, and a red mark showed where its strap had rubbed his neck. He carried a folded receipt in both hands as though it might tear if he gripped it too tightly.
Mara met him at the grain depot with Wei and Yan. Two guards stood by the gate. One, a local hire, recognized Jori and stepped forward. The other wore a Registry clerk’s gray sash.
“We need to speak inside,” Mara said.
The local guard hesitated before unbarring the door. “The depot’s under order.”
“Whose order?”
He looked toward the clerk.
Jori laid the receipt on the table. It showed that his grain wagon had been taken two days before the siege. Beneath the quantity was a stamped transfer order with Prefect Soren’s seal. Wei compared the mark with the one copied from the pavilion packet.
“It matches,” he said. “The time is different from the city ledger.”
