The lower survey room had one table, four chairs, and a furnace that made the ink dry before the clerk had finished writing.
Sera moved the sample case to the farthest corner. Elian set his notebook on the table and placed a copy beside it. Brin brought the basket, though he had been told twice that he did not need to attend. He wanted to hear the cup described accurately.
Dain stood near the door with Jora. Two guards waited in the corridor. A physician from the survey office examined Sera’s sample packets and agreed that they should remain sealed until a laboratory had suitable storage. He signed a note to that effect, which Sera read before allowing him to leave.
The clerk began listing the mosaic fragments. Elian named each one by its number and position on the drawing. The clerk repeated the number. Brin checked the matching packet. It was slow work, but it gave each object a place in a record that could be compared later.
“Fragment seven,” Elian said. “Blue and white, from the lower border.”
“Blue and white,” the clerk repeated.
“Three blue, one white,” Brin corrected.
The clerk looked at him. “Is that necessary?”
“Yes.”
Dain said, “Write it.”
The clerk wrote it.
Iven stood by the window with Neri. Outside, the survey office overlooked a narrow service span connecting two buildings. The span was enclosed by a railing on one side and a high wall on the other. A set of anchor rings ran along the wall at regular intervals, intended for maintenance lines. Beyond the span was a stair descending to the public walkway.
Neri followed his gaze. “You’re measuring the exits.”
“I’m looking at a bridge.”
“You’re measuring the exits from the bridge.”
“There’s only one easy one.”
“Two if you count the window.”
“That’s not easy.”
“Depends who installed it.”
He smiled, but he did not stop looking. Dain had placed a guard at the far end of the span. Another stood below the stair. They were visible without appearing to block the public route. It was a sensible arrangement for escorting valuable material and an uncomfortable one for anyone who might disagree with the escort.
While the clerk worked, the physician returned to collect a thermometer he had left beside Sera’s case. Sera stopped him before he could leave again.
“Did you examine the fluid?” she asked.
“I looked at the sealed packets. That isn’t an examination.”
“Would you be willing to do one?”
“If I’m assigned the work.”
“And if you find something the office doesn’t expect?”
He placed the thermometer carefully in its case. “I record what I find.”
“Do you keep a copy?”
“The laboratory keeps the record.”
Sera waited. He glanced at Dain, who was speaking to the clerk.
“I can request a duplicate,” the physician said. “Whether it leaves the laboratory is another matter.”
“Request one,” Sera said. “And write down the condition of each seal before anyone opens it.”
He gave her a look that suggested he did not enjoy being instructed in his own work. Then he took out a pencil and added the request to his notes.
After he left, Neri said, “You didn’t tell him what you think the fluid is.”
“I don’t know what it is.”
“You have a guess.”
“Yes. I don’t want him looking for my guess instead of what is there.”
Iven watched the physician cross the span. He walked close to the wall, passing each anchor ring without touching it. At the far end the guard let him through. The ordinary ease of his departure made the guarded span look harmless. Iven wished he could be certain it would stay that way.
The clerk reached the cup. Brin described the blue bird, the crack, and the wire around the handle. The clerk wrote everything except the bird’s crooked beak.
“It’s crooked,” Brin said.
“I can see that.”
“Someone might not, if they only have the receipt.”
Dain moved closer and examined the cup. “Write the beak.”
The clerk did. Brin looked pleased. Iven wondered whether the commander understood that the correction made the receipt harder to substitute later. If he did, he had allowed it anyway.
Elian signed the inventory and kept a copy. Sera signed a separate note about the samples. Dain placed the fragments and cup in a padded case, then gave it to one of the guards.
“That goes to the physician’s cool room,” Sera said.
“It will.”
“May I accompany it?”
“No.”
“Why?”
“Because the order assigns custody to the survey office.”
“I’m asking to see where you put it, not to take it away.”
Dain looked at the physician’s note. “Jora, accompany the case and verify the room.”
Sera considered this, then nodded. Jora took the case from the guard. The guard opened the corridor door for her, and they left together.
The clerk gathered his papers. Elian kept his original notebook on the table.
“The order includes the notes,” Dain said.
“It says original notes. This notebook also contains work unrelated to the room.”
“Then remove those pages.”
“They’re bound.”
“Bring it to the office, and a clerk can copy the unrelated entries for you.”
Elian’s hand closed over the cover. “No.”
The word was quiet. It changed the room more than a shout would have.
Dain did not move. “Explain.”
“The notebook includes names and addresses from my survey of Rung Ward. Some of those homes are missing from the official map. I won’t surrender the list to an office that has not explained why it removed them.”
“Those are separate questions.”
“They are in the same book.”
“You could have brought the pages you were ordered to surrender.”
“I could have torn out my notes. I chose not to.”
Iven looked at the notebook. The missing homes mattered. He had walked those lanes; he knew what a map could make invisible. He also knew that Elian had once trusted the maps enough not to check every line. The surveyor’s refusal was not a complete answer to that history, but it was a choice made in the room, with Dain watching.
Dain held out his hand. “Give me the book.”
Elian did not.
Neri stepped between them. “We can copy the relevant pages here.”
“The order calls for originals.”
“The other pages aren’t part of the order.”
“I can’t determine that without seeing them.”
“Then have a clerk watch Elian remove the relevant pages,” Iven said.
Elian looked at him sharply. Iven raised a hand. “I know they’re bound. We can cut the stitching and keep the pages intact.”
Sera opened her case and took out a thin blade. Dain’s guards shifted in the corridor. She held the blade flat on her palm, well away from Elian.
“It’s a tool,” she said.
Dain glanced at it, then at Elian. “Will you surrender the relevant pages?”
Elian looked down at the notebook. “If I can make a copy first.”
“You have a copy.”
“I have a copy of the room sketch. Not the measurements I made afterward.”
The clerk looked toward the furnace. “I can copy them.”
“No,” Elian said. “I will.”
Dain considered the room, the people in it, and the time it would take. “One hour.”
Elian sat. The clerk sat opposite him. Sera kept the blade on the table. Brin moved his chair beside the window and watched the span, where Jora had disappeared with the case.
Neri whispered to Iven, “This is going better than I expected.”
“That’s a dangerous sentence.”
“I know. I wanted to see your face.”
He would have answered, but a guard entered and spoke to Dain in a low voice. The commander listened, then turned to Elian.
“The secretary has amended the order. The notebook is to be taken intact.”
Elian’s pencil stopped. “On what grounds?”
“The survey office requires the full context of your work.”
“The context includes private addresses.”
“I’m aware.”
“Who requested the amendment?”
“The secretary.”
“Did my father?”
“I don’t know.”
Iven believed that Dain did not know, or at least that he would not claim knowledge he lacked. It did not help Elian.
Dain held out his hand again. “The book.”
Elian closed it. “I won’t give it to you.”
The guard at the corridor moved nearer. Neri shifted her stance, placing herself beside the table. Sera put the thin blade back into its case. Brin stood by the window, looking from one adult to another.
Dain saw all of it. “No one needs to be hurt.”
“Then let him finish copying,” Iven said.
“The order has changed.”
“That’s convenient.”
“For whom?”
“For whoever wants the addresses.”
Dain’s eyes narrowed slightly. “Do you know that’s what they want?”
“No. Do you?”
“No.”
“Then we have the same problem.”
“We have different responsibilities.”
Dain stepped toward the table. Iven moved with him, not blocking the path directly but close enough that the commander would have to acknowledge him. Dain stopped.
“You’re not an officer of this office,” he said.
“No.”
“Move aside.”
“No.”
Neri’s hand touched Iven’s sleeve. Not a plea to stop; a warning that she was there and he should know where. He glanced toward her, then toward Elian. The surveyor had slid the notebook under his coat. Brin had opened the window a handspan, enough to let cooler air into the overheated room.
Dain looked at the window. “Close that.”
Brin hesitated. Iven saw the guard at the far end of the span turn toward the building. There was nowhere to go by the ordinary route without passing him.
Sera said, “Commander, if you seize the notebook by force, the people whose addresses it contains will learn that the office has it. They may conclude you intend to use it against them.”
“I don’t intend to use it against them.”
“Can you promise the office won’t?”
“No.”
The answer settled in the room. Dain did not soften it.
Elian stood. “I’ll bring the relevant pages myself after I’ve copied them.”
“You’ll bring the book.”
“I won’t.”
The guard beside Dain reached for Elian. Neri caught the guard’s wrist before his hand closed on the coat. She did not strike. She simply held him away long enough for Elian to step back.
Dain’s graft tightened beneath his sleeve. Iven saw the movement and set the plate pattern without projecting it.
“Don’t,” Dain said.
“Then don’t take him,” Iven replied.
The commander did not attack. He stepped aside and opened the door himself. “You’re free to leave the room. The notebook is not.”
Elian moved toward the window instead. Brin pushed it farther open. Cool air came in from the span, carrying the smell of rain and hot metal.
Neri looked at Iven. “The railing will hold one person at a time.”
“Is that your professional opinion?”
“It’s the one you’re getting.”
Elian climbed through. He landed on the span and turned toward the stair. The guard at the far end lifted a hand, telling him to stop.
Dain came through the door onto the span from the other side. He had taken the corridor while Elian used the window. The guard at the stair moved forward, and suddenly Elian stood between them.
Iven climbed out after him. Neri followed to the window but stayed on the sill, keeping the way open for Sera and Brin. The span was wide enough for two people to pass carefully, not wide enough for a crowd to fight without someone going over the rail.
Dain looked at the notebook beneath Elian’s coat. “Last chance.”
Elian held his ground. “I made copies of the room. You have them.”
“The order says the original.”
“The order is wrong.”
Dain’s gaze moved to the anchor rings along the wall, then to Iven’s feet. Iven recognized the assessment too late to know whether he had been invited into it.
Below, a cart rolled along the public walkway. Its driver called up for someone to close the window; papers were drifting out and landing in the street.
Brin leaned out. “They’re blank.”
“Then they’re valuable,” the driver called back. “I haven’t had a blank bill all month.”
No one laughed. Dain advanced one step.