imp

DM

First light finds the camp on the rise — stone at their backs, the fire a ring of cold coals, the marsh flat and pewter-colored below. The night gave them nothing worse than dew. Barnaby's calf has stiffened under Verbena's tie; it carries him, and it lets him know about it on the downslope. The walk back is short and dry-footed on yesterday's bootprints. No grease trails move in the ditches this morning. No croak answers the boots. The marsh is as quiet as it has ever let them see it. The great door stands as they left it — gates smashed, hall collapsed, the narrow path swept boot-wide through the rubble. But the room has been kept again, overnight, while they slept a bend away. The wrecked hands are gone. Both of them — every plate, every cable, every finger Barnaby pried out of his cuff and dropped on the swept line. The brass is picked clean out of the rubble. Hobb's chalk tracings, Silas's knock-marks, the crossed cables Edda drew: scrubbed, all of it, the floor wiped back to grey stone. Except one mark. The company sigil on the seventh slab is untouched — crisp, deliberate, left exactly as Edda chalked it. As if it had been read, and answered by being allowed to stay. Nobody has stepped past the gates. Nothing in the room moves.

something takes 4 from Barnaby Wick.

DM

The book says two hands guard this rubble. The floor says otherwise — the wrecks are gone, brass picked to the knuckle, every chalk line scrubbed but one. The hands' turns pass. There is nothing in this room to swing at. Barnaby's calf carries yesterday's door-wound — first aid tied it, nothing healed it. He walks at 4 of 8 and knows it. And before anyone steps off the swept line: the clay ampoule is still riding in nobody's named pocket. Neutralize poison, wax-sealed, bought with Prue's money. Whose coat does it ride in? Say it now, in the light, while it's still a choice.

DM

Hand 2's seat passes the same as its twin's — the wreck it rode in on was carried off in the night with everything else. Nothing under the rubble stirs. The room holds its swept quiet.

Barnaby Wick

"Ampoule rides in Silas's coat," Barnaby says. "His own reasoning, and I'll stand behind it: he walks in the back and keeps his hands when the rest of us are busy. A dying man has to reach him — so the company keeps him alive on purpose. Entered in the record, witnessed." Then he takes his weight off the bad leg, crouches at the gap's lip, and reads the floor past the edge of the swept line — the keeper's care ends here, it always ends at the lip. Three loaded trips out with the brass. Nobody carries clean for three trips. He wants what the boot-width polish was NOT protecting: what slid off a loaded apron, and what was put down flat on purpose.

DM

Entered: the ampoule rides in Silas's coat, witnessed. Barnaby reads the lip a long moment. The keeper's care does end here — that's real. But so does the luck of it. Three loaded trips and the apron spilled nothing. No dropped plate, no shaved screw, no dragged gouge where a heavy sack swung low. The man carried clean all three times. That's not luck; that's a professional's back and a lifetime of the work. What the polish was NOT protecting: nothing slid off, but something WAS put down flat. Just past the lip, off the swept line by a hand's width, a pale rectangle in the dust — the clean shadow of something flat and straight-edged that lay there a while and was lifted. The size of a slate, or a ledger. The keeper set his book down here. Rested it, and picked it up again.

Edda Motts

"Ampoule to Silas — witnessed, second name under Barnaby's, no gap in the roll," Edda says. "A dying man reaching a coat is the whole argument, and I'll stand behind it in the light." Then the pale rectangle. She looks at it a long moment without touching. "He sets the book down flat when his hands are full and picks it up again. So the tally travels with him — out here, past the seam, on his back. And my sigil he read and left standing." She straightens. "Answer him the same. Nobody chalks over the rectangle and nobody touches the seventh slab. He honors marks. Today we're the proof he's right to."

DM

Second name under Barnaby's, witnessed: the ampoule rides in Silas's coat. No gap in the roll. Edda's rule stands as the company's line — nobody chalks over the rectangle, nobody touches the seventh slab. Said in the light, in the open, where anything listening through the fall could hear it. Whether the keeper honors marks or merely counts them, the room gives no answer. The swept line runs to the gap's lip and out again, boot-width, days deep and one night fresh. The sigil stays crisp on the seventh slab. The rectangle keeps its clean shadow. Whatever book lay there is somewhere in the shrine now — or on the keeper's back, walking.

Prue Candell

"Third name under Edda's — witnessed," Prue says. "My money bought the ampoule, Silas's coat carries it, and I'll note in my book that a dying man reaching a coat is faster than a dying man reaching a purse. That's the whole trade." She looks at Barnaby's stiff calf and says the rest plainly. "No cure in my head this morning — Light again, same habit, and I'll not dress it up. So Barnaby walks at half and I can't fix that today. Edda leads through the gap. Barnaby, you take the middle and keep your hands in your coat till something earns them."

DM

Third name under Edda's — witnessed. Three names on the ampoule now: Barnaby's, Edda's, Prue's. The roll has no gap. Prue's confession stands plain: Light again, not Cure, and Barnaby pays for the habit in his calf. She prices it herself before anyone else has to. The order she's drawing — Edda through the gap first, Barnaby middle with his hands in his coat — is a marching order, not a vote. It wants the other two names before the first boot crosses the lip. The gap waits. The seam beyond it is dry, slopes down, and holds the rectangle's clean shadow just past the edge of the keeper's care. Whatever the chapel is keeping this morning, the company is about to find out single file.

Silas Horn

This seat gave up after 3 attempts and yields the turn.

DM

Silas's seat yields — logged as a passed turn, not a stolen one. He adds no name to the marching order and makes no move toward the gap. Detect Magic stays in his head, unspent. The ampoule rides in his coat whether or not he said so himself; three witnesses carry that now. Round 1 closes with three names on the order and one silence. The inert seats pass again. The floor is Barnaby's.

Barnaby Wick

"Prue's order carries my name under hers," Barnaby says. "Edda through the gap, me in the middle, hands in my coat till something earns them. Silas's silence doesn't hold the line — he rides third-from-last with the ampoule whether he said so or not, and I'll answer for that at the roll if he wants it answered." He takes his place on the swept line behind Edda, off the bad leg's lead, and keeps his eyes on the lip's edges while the company forms — not the dark past it, but the near side: the rectangle's shadow, the fresh sweep, whether anything crosses the keeper's boot-width line before the first boot of ours does.

DM

Round 2, and the turn is Barnaby's — but no word has come from his seat. I hold it here. The open business, for the table's eye: Prue's marching order stands named by one voice. Edda through the gap first, Barnaby middle hands-in-coat, nobody past the lip till it's carried. Three names on the ampoule, zero names seconding the order. Silas passed clean. The gap is dry, downsloping, and keeps the rectangle's clean shadow just past where the keeper stops sweeping. The blackened archway runs 120' north with soot and webbed prints both ways. The slab lid still opens only from below. Barnaby's seat, when it speaks, sets the pace. Nothing moves until a player does.

Edda Motts

"The order carries my name too — I'm the point of it," Edda says. "Through the gap first, shield forward, and the rectangle stays under its dust. Prue behind me, Barnaby middle, Silas and the ampoule last. Roll's full, no gaps." She steps off the swept line and through the gap onto the downslope, shield up, sword out, boots on the keeper's boot-width line and nowhere else. She reads what the slope gives her at a walk — soot, webbed prints both ways, where the fresh sweep ends and the old dark begins — and calls it back in a low voice for the ones behind.

DM

Second name under Prue's — the order carries two voices now. Barnaby takes his place on the swept line behind Edda, off the bad leg's lead, and puts his eyes where a thief's eyes belong: the near side, not the dark past it. He watches the lip's edges while the company forms — the rectangle's clean shadow, the fresh sweep, the keeper's boot-width line. His ear goes to it too, a practiced listen. He hears what the room gives a careful man: nothing. No crossing of the line, no scuff, no tick of settling brass, no breath that isn't theirs. The keeper swept in and out and the room has kept his silence since. The rectangle keeps its shadow. The line holds. The order wants Edda's boot next — the first one past the lip.

Prue Candell

Prue follows Edda through the gap, second in the file, mace in hand, boots on the keeper's boot-width line and nowhere else. Her post is the seam between the file and whatever's behind it, so she walks it facing half backward — one eye on the slope ahead, one on the lip and the rectangle's clean shadow behind. A priest's habit, the same as the rear-guard post she keeps choosing. "Two voices carried it, mine makes three," she says low. "And Silas rides last whether his seat was awake to say so or not — the ampoule goes where the coat goes."

DM

Edda's read at a walk, paid plain: the soot starts a body's length past the lip, and the prints in it are webbed — a wide splayed tread, both directions, coming and going. The fresh sweep ends at the lip exactly; past it the dark is old. She calls it back low: "Soot. Webbed prints, both ways. The sweep stops here — this is the occupied door." The seam is dry, shoulder-high, sloping down, open to a broken vault far above. Prue walks it half-backward, keeping the rear. The party crosses — Edda, Prue, Barnaby middle, Silas last with the ampoule in his coat. The table moves.

2. The Chapel

Barnaby Wick

"Webbing — the vault. Look up before anyone steps under it." Barnaby stops the file with a flat hand and points: sailcloth-thick mass, spanning the broken vault overhead, old and grey and heavy enough to hold whatever fed in this room. "This shrine already collects travelers. Something spun that doesn't spin for nothing." He stays on the keeper's boot-width line, weight off the bad leg, hands still in his coat per the order. "Prue — a taper up on your Light, before we're under it, not after. I'd rather meet what's up there at the vault's edge than let it choose its own moment over our heads."

DM

The chapel. The statue stands, all three brass lightning bolts in its hands, the murals as they were. And the ceiling — the webs shroud it, thick grey rigging overhead, exactly as the company was warned. Prue died on this floor to what hides in webs like these. Look up before you're under them: the webs are SEEN, in the light, before any boot is beneath. Something is up there. The ampoule is in Silas's coat, and the man who carries it walks last. The order for this room is rolled fresh. Barnaby's seat is first. Nobody acts before a player does.