The Great Hall of the Diverter Pavilion had not seen an honest gathering of working people since the foundation stones were laid eighty years before.
The vaulted ceiling of black timber rafters echoed with the low, steady murmur of three hundred commoners who filled the oak benches from wall to wall. Blacksmiths with singed eyebrows sat beside river lightermen with salt-cracked palms. Granite quarrymen from West-Reach rested their elbows beside wagon drivers from Oakhaven. At the center of the hall, resting on heavy timber frame stands, sat the eight recovered chests of gold crowns. Their iron lids thrown was wide open to the gray daylight.
Tomas Reed stood at the high office desk, wearing his gray woolen cart driver’s coat. His leather dispatch pouch lay open before him, flanked by the master foundation scroll of the Grand Continental Diverter and the ancient iron seal-matrix of King Alden.
Beside him sat Hester Reed, her ink-stone freshly ground with clear river water, her goose quill poised over three broad leaves of royal uterine thick parchment.
Tomas lifted the heavy iron seal-matrix in his scarred right hand.
He closed his eyes for a single heartbeat. He felt the deep, ancient hum of the Last Claim resonating through the cold iron. The long, forty-five-year record of deferred upkeep, falsified logs, and stolen wages came together upon the paper before him with total legal clarity.
