The midnight bell of the mountain clock had long since run down, but in the vaulted limestone silence of Needlehouse, the passage of the hours was measured by the sinking animal fat in the horn lantern.
A cold draft whistled through the high air-flow chimney pipes. It smelled of subalpine frost and distant snowfields. On the dark larch drafting table, Kezra and Fellis worked side by side in rhythmic, disciplined exact timing. The euphoria of finding the Survey Corps archive had settled into the quiet, exacting labor of working mapmakers who knew that dawn would bring a descent into the dark roots of the Spine.
“Take the heel-wax, Fellis,” Kezra said, her voice low. “Light strokes only. We don’t want to drag the rag fiber across the enamel grooves.”
Fellis held the cake of black cobbler’s heel-wax in his uninjured right hand, warming it slightly against the lantern chimney until the surface softened to the consistency of firm animal fat. Beside him, with his left forearm strapped securely inside its rigid willow-and-leather splint, he held the edge of a fresh, heavy rag-paper sheet firmly against the engraved bronze master plate of Stonewake Bench.
Working with careful patience, Kezra rubbed the softened wax across the paper. Under the steady friction of her gloved thumb, the fine raised ridges of the brass emerged in rich, charcoal-black relief: the three rising level terraces, the upright riser notches, the outside corner datum ticks, and the deep foundation drainage channels.
