Through the split flagstones of the witness ring, Noll Vey felt the dynastic ward awaken like a nest of disturbed adders.
The sensation came up through the granite footings and struck straight into his stone knees. It was an ancient, bitter resonance, cold as ditch-ice and sharp as an iron chisel driven into green timber. For two hundred years, the kings of the northern march had buried their exclusion edicts in the sub-vaults of Mere, anchoring their authority with the dead weight of royal prerogatives hammered into lead channels.
Up in the hall, the pressure on Tessa Dene’s palms was growing intolerable. Her knuckles were bloodless, her breath sawing through dry lips as she held the custodial token against the rail. Beside her, Lord Auditor Orin Vane sat rigid, his dark eyes fixed on the blue glow rising through the open floor grating.
“The ward will strip him to powder, Vey,” Vane remarked in his dry, measured cadence. “You are relying on a deserter whose bones are held together by an expired regimental muster. The royal-seat boundary does not negotiate with mutineers. It has executed every recorded outlaw since the first siege.”
“He is not asking to negotiate,” Noll said, stone dust trickling from the socket of his missing left arm. “He is walking across the cellar to settle a bill your office failed to audit.”
