Lady Signe Lorr opened her black pigskin register to the freshly sanded pages she had written after returning from the West Quay granary at eight o’clock, and laid beside the book the small, brass-wired glass assay-phial containing two ounces of Lot 884-Vanguard siege powder.
“When you rode out of the capital twelve days ago, Sir Cael,” Lady Signe said, her voice carrying the dry, unhurried authority of the High Assize bench in full session, “the Lord High Chancellor attached me to your vanguard under a Special Writ of Observation. Until eight o’clock this morning, I confess I believed my commission was a routine fiscal audit of border forage accounts and municipal fortification subsidies.”
Cael looked at the fifty-eight-year-old magistrate across the map board, his grey eyes narrowing above his gold gorget. “My commission from the War Ministry grants me supreme tactical command over all municipal structures and civilian movements within a five-league radius of the Harth anchor, my lady. Not even an Assize Justice may countermand a battlefield deployment while the enemy host is within sight of the walls.”
“Your commission grants you tactical command within the bounds of Statute Seven of the Imperial Assize, Sir Cael,” Signe corrected him smoothly, laying her forefinger on the red-underlined page of her docket. “Have you read Statute Seven recently, or did the Chancellery preceptors prune the statutory law of the realm out of your collar along with the names of the parish tradesmen?”
