The vaulted stone cellar beneath the northern gatehouse of Oakhaven smelled of burning apple-wood, wet frieze wool, sheep fat, and the sharp, acidic tang of drying dark oak-ink.
Outside, the freezing mountain gale rattled the heavy iron grilles of the casements. But within the cellar, the thick limestone walls kept the mountain storm at bay. Two heavy iron draft-lamps hung from the center vaulting. It cast pools of warm yellow light across the deal worktable where Hester Quill had established the provisional registry of the Office of Unfinished Claims.
In the center of the table, resting upon a clean sheet of white rag blotter, lay the three twelve-inch splitting wedges pulled out from Pier Six. He was flanked by the copper-faced striking hammer and the four-inch cold chisels taken from Orson Vance’s canvas tool-bag.
Tomas Reed sat on a low oak bench by the hearth, using a dry woolen rag to wipe river grit from his boots. His left forearm, stripped of its calfskin brace for the first time in eighteen hours, was red and swollen where the damp leather had chafed against the puckered muscle-sheath scar. The dull, grinding ache in his radius was a persistent reminder of his permanent thirty-five percent grip deficit. But he worked with steady, practiced patience, massaging the stiffened muscles with sweet oil of almond before wrapping the arm in clean linen and rebuckling the three brass straps of his brace. A cart driver didn’t complain about an aching wrist. He kept his gear…
