The dawn broke over the high crags of High-Arch with the cold, pale clarity of mountain water.
In the garret above the brass foundry, the animal fat candles had burned down to pools of grease. But the workbench was orderly. Every carbon register, approved voucher, and scrap of transfer paper had been returned to its lead-lined compartment in Tomas Reed’s satchel.
In the center of the table lay the finished document. Four folios of legal thick parchment, bound at the top margin with braided scarlet silk ribbon and sealed with red beeswax.
It was an Inquest Notice and Bill of Common Usufruct, drafted by Hester Quill under the procedural formulas of the High Court of Court trial.
Tomas stood beside the table in his gray wool tunic, his cowhide boots cleaned of valley mud and greased with neat’s-foot oil. His left wrist brace was buckled over clean linen wraps, cinched tight to stabilize the scarred tendon. Across his chest ran the straps of his porter’s harness, securing the seventy-pound ash-wood pack frame holding their records, instruments, and sworn exhibits.
Hester sanded the final signed name block, blew the grains away, and looked up.
“Under Section Fourteen of the Sovereign Usufruct Act,” Hester said, “service of an Inquest Notice upon a public officer may be carried out by personal delivery, by delivery to an authorized deputy, or, in the event of office refusal, by public affixation to the principal entrance of the town office in the presence of two sworn witnesses…
