The hearth hall was quiet in the way a timber gallery went quiet just before a cave-in, when the props had begun to take the mountain’s weight and every man held his breath to hear which upright would splinter first.
The heavy river slate lay flat between two trenchers on the center oak table. Red light from the banked fire caught the white chalk lines, turning the cuts the color of dried cinnabar. Around the table, nobody reached out to touch the stone.
Noll brought his voice up through the stone chimney breast, letting it settle into the room with the dry clarity of an old village clerk reading an inventory of estate debts. He did not use stage cadence.
“The debt slot is ten,” Noll said, vibration vibrating gently along the tabletop so that Cale’s pewter ink-stand gave a faint rattle. “It is the last major slot in the Bastion framework. If we open it, we cannot close it with a handful of copper coins or an apology to the Survey House.”
Prit had climbed onto the wood-chest near the bread oven. The goblin sat with skinny shins pulled against his chest, fingers wrapped around a piece of dull grey audit chalk taken from his boot heel.
