The new guide shoe arrived on a hand sled from Harrow Yard.
Six local workers brought it through Bracken Weir’s upper street, stopping twice on the steep turn and setting the load on its physical blocks while they changed grips. The foundry lay a dozen kilometers away. Its work turn, cooling time and finishing cuts had occupied the weeks since Maret ordered Neri’s corrected section. The freight from Riven Gate supplied useful stock and tools, but this particular piece had been made by people close enough to argue over its actual face.
Rin met it at the gate yard.
He checked the maker’s mark, the section number and the bearing surface before signing the receiving turn. Neri stood beside him with her copy open. The completed footing had stayed sound through its reduced service watch. Today the moving leaf could receive the part it had been waiting for.
Iven brought tea to the work edge and remained outside the lifting line.
He liked seeing a repair arrive at its last ordinary step.
Maret isolated the work channel. The other local supply remained on its protected route. Rin’s crew supported the gate leaf through the existing hoist, checked the catches and removed the worn shoe. Its contact face came out shiny on one side and battered on the other, a small object that had spent months trying to make the wrong support geometry bear a changing load.
