The ash log hissed as the fire found the damp sap in its heart, casting flickering orange bands across Cael’s silver mail. The knight’s gaze remained on the hexagonal vial of green balm resting on the prep table, the glass throwing a pale, emerald crescent onto the scarred oak.
He did not put the medicine away. He looked at it as though it were a foreign object whose worth had suddenly been called into question by an illiterate peddler.
“I gave him the key pick,” Cael said quietly. His voice did not carry the ringing heraldic authority of the Three Bridges; it was dull, worn flat by the toll of seven unrecorded campaigns. “I took it from the armorer’s chest at the north gate before the watch was changed. I told him that if he brought me the three middle gatherings from your private ledger, the Provost would strike his father’s debt from the assize book. I promised him full immunity under royal seal.”
Jon did not move from the corner of the bread oven. His hands rested flat on the stone shelf, his knuckles pale in the firelight.
“Why the middle gatherings?” Jon asked.
“Because the middle gatherings cover the fifth and sixth years of your tenancy,” Cael answered, his fingers resting lightly on the cold oak table. “The years when the sluice works were rebuilt after the spring floods. The years when the Crown’s surveyors began to notice that the water tables beneath the Old Hill were behaving…
