The bloody thumbprint glistened under the grey late-morning light like a scab of dried cinnabar.
Debt-Bailiff Korr cleared his throat, rattling the stiff sheepskin contract in front of Sera’s face.
“Read the ink, girl,” Korr snarled, his scarred lips peeling back over yellow teeth. “Three thousand Low-Grade Spirit Stones of refined cinnabar ore, advanced to Captain Marcus Thorne for caravan provisions.”
He tapped a line of black figures scrawled in the margin.
“Six months of delinquent interest brings the total balance to exactly five thousand Low-Grade Spirit Stones,” Korr continued in a harsh bark. “Full payment due immediately upon demand. If unpaid, the debtor’s heir forfeits her freedom to the southern shafts and surrenders all ancestral martial arms, including the Thorne clan spear shaft.”
The bailiff flipped the heavy sheet, pointing his blackened thumb at the punitive clauses etched below.
“Clause four dictates ten years of hard labor in the deep sulfur pits for any relative attempting evasion,” Korr added with relish. “And clause seven forfeits the Thorne family’s twenty-percent ancestral prospecting share in the Sunken Cinnabar Mines directly to Blood-Captain Varga’s syndicate. Varga doesn’t overlook a single copper.”
The three mercenaries behind Korr grinned maliciously, adjusting the grips on their serrated blades.
