The great dark wood-paneled boardroom on the fourth floor of the former Smelters’ Cartel headquarters had been transformed. The scent of expensive imported cigars and fine French brandy was gone, replaced by the clean, sharp smell of fresh whitewash, turpentine, and damp pine shavings.
The twenty-foot dark wood table had been pushed to the wall, replaced by rows of simple pine benches brought up from the canal boatyards. Sitting upon those benches were eighty elected delegates from the six blast furnaces, the rolling mills, and the mold-galleries. Men whose faces were etched with the permanent scars of molten metal, wearing clean work smocks and heavy boots.
At the front of the hall stood Tomas Reed, Hester Quill, and Renn Tal. Beside them sat Branden Keel, his sightless face raised toward the open windows where the cool, clean river air swept into the room.
Hester Quill unrolled a huge sheet of royal parchment, its top margin lit up in gold leaf with the arms of the sovereign court and the three hammers of the newly established Foundry Mutual.
“Delegates of the Basin,” Hester spoke, her voice carrying through the quiet hall. “By decree of the High Sovereign Bond Trial, the corporate charter of the Smelters’ Cartel has been permanently cancelled. In its place, the court has chartered the Independent Foundry Mutual of Bellwether. This hall, the rolling mills, the six blast furnaces. The twelve thousand four hundred crowns of endowed trust funds are now the unending property of the men who…
