Jon Hale took the gray earthenware bowl into both hands, pressing his thumbs firmly against the rounded rim. The vessel was surprisingly heavy, cold with four quarts of wellwater and dense with river silt and three chunks of scrap lead resting at the bottom.
The air in the northeast bedchamber had grown thick with the scents of crushed rowan, burned tallow, and the sharp, alkaline tang of vinegar.
Sir Cael Ardent sat propped against the wooden headboard, his bare chest glistening under the candlelight. His teeth were bared, his eyes fixed upon the small wooden table where Sister Oda had laid out her instruments: the polished caribou-bone stylus, a pair of long-nosed silver shears used for trimming monastery wicks, and a square of thick oilcloth.
“This is the First Petition,” Lady Signe Lorr announced from the foot of the bed, her judicial register open across her knees, her quill dipped in fresh black ink. “Conducted under Assize Charter 412, Paragraph Six: ‘Forensic Isolation of Unstable Regalia.’ Let the record reflect that the officer consents to provisional impoundment.”
“I consent,” Cael rasped, his voice scraping against his dry throat like gravel. “Do it before the morning bell.”
Sister Oda stepped to the right side of the bed. Her dark woolen habit was pinned back, her sleeves rolled tightly above her elbows, exposing corded forearms stained yellow from years of brewing celandine and marsh-mallow.
