The broken wheel was holding up the road because the wagon’s owner had refused to cut it loose.
“There’s medicine in the back,” she told Tavin. “And flour under it. If I tip the cart, I lose both.”
Her name was Inna, and she drove the second wagon in the lower-town supply train. The first had reached the bend before a stonefall blocked the outer track. The third and fourth waited behind her, their animals standing with their noses near the ground. Inna’s left rear wheel had broken at the hub. The axle rested on a wedge of stone, and the wagon leaned toward the parapet.
Below the road, the lower channel carried water away from the town. It was still high from the blocked sluice, but no longer rising. A row of houses stood beyond it, their doors above the waterline by less than a handspan.
Tavin looked at the wheel. “Can we unload it without tipping?”
“Not if you take the flour out first. The medicine’s in a chest above it.”
“Then we take the chest.”
“The lid’s jammed against the wagon frame.”
