Two weeks after the fall of the Great Palisade, the southern raised stone road was transformed into a bustling, sunlit artery of peaceful commerce. Where sixty feet of sharpened timber spikes and iron ratchet turnstiles had once blocked the King’s Highway, there was now only an open, crushed-gravel roadway sixty feet wide, bordered by clean drainage ditches and newly planted willow slips.
Laden farm wains rolled freely from the Sump toward the northern markets, their iron tires crunching over the roadbed without stopping. Wagon drivers waved their hats as they passed the roadside knoll where Chief Healer Alia Sen’s newly restored granite tomb stood surrounded by blooming white marsh-roses.
Tomas Reed stood at the crest of the raised stone road, his ash-wood pack frame squared against his shoulder blades. His oilskin wading coat was freshly oiled. His iron-gall ledger was safely strapped beneath the waterproof flap. His left wrist brace was cinched tight with its three-inch iron buckle. The scarred tendon throbbed with the morning chill, a permanent physical reminder of the cost of carrying unclosed duties. But his grip on his six-foot walking staff was steady as an oak post.
Beside him stood Nessa Vale, checking the brass fine-scale of her sound transit. Sile Rook, his thirty-year-old tall oak body-shield slung across his back, freshly repainted with the balanced scales of the Last Claim. Hester Quill stood closing her field desk, her registers tied with green ribbons.
