The emergency relay bell in the Candlewake office began to strike at six in the evening: three short rings, a pause, then three long, frantic pulls that set the brass clapper vibrating against the housing until Mara caught the rim with her palm.
Noah appeared in the doorway of the office within seconds, holding an unlit lantern, his coat pulled over his sleep-rumpled flannel shirt. “Is it the pump?”
“Civic,” Mara said, already reading the tape as it clattered from the brass telegraph receiver. The paper ribbon was punched with the short, irregular dashes of the town shelter’s hand key: BOILER MANIFOLD RUPTURE. BASEMENT STEAM FLOOD. CORRIDOR GROUND BROKEN. EXTENSION LOST.
Tessa came down the stairs two at a time, carrying her canvas tool satchel in one hand and her heavy wool mackinaw in the other. She did not ask questions; she leaned over Mara’s shoulder, her grease-darkened thumb pinning the ribbon against the wood.
“The manifold blew,” Tessa said, her face tightening. “The town hall boiler is an old low-pressure Kewanee. If the manifold went, the steam pipe sheared off the ground rods for the east annex.”
“The rooms?” Mara asked.
“The sleeping rooms have their own door frames,” Tessa said, pulling her coat on. “The room wards will hold as long as the doors stay latched. But the covered corridor we built last week—the temporary warded extension that connects the dormitories to the vehicle dock—depended on the auxiliary copper loop off the heating trench. If that line melted…
