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.

Barnaby Wick

Two wrecked hands' brass is a man's load and then some. I go down the swept line on my knees, dagger-tip at the boot prints — the fresh ones, over the old polish. Which way they run matters more than anything east of here: out through the gap, or stopping dead at the middle slabs where the seam-air breathes. I read the prints for weight. A man carrying brass digs heels and toes. Drag-marks would say sled or bundle. "Edda — he scrubbed every line we drew and kept your sigil standing on the seventh slab. That's not oversight. That's a reply. He read us and answered in what he wouldn't touch."

something takes 4 from Barnaby Wick.

DM

The prints answer him. Boot-width, single file, in from the collapsed gap's lip and back out the same lane — both directions, days deep, and one night fresher than yesterday. The carry is there where the wrecks lay: heel-deep, wide-planted, a man walking heavy. No drag-marks. Carried, not sledded — east, through the gap, the keeper's own road. The brass left the way the keeper comes. At the slabs: nothing. No scuff, no circling, no pause pressed into the polish. He never stopped at the lid. Your sigil he stepped around. Barnaby's calf says what the sheet says — 4 of 8, and the tie is a bandage, not a cure. And while the room is quiet: the clay ampoule is still riding in a pack, uncarried by any named hand. A hundred gold of answer to what killed Prue. Somebody says whose belt it hangs from — now, at the door, not under the webs.

Edda Motts

"The ampoule was ruled on the road and I'll make it fact here, not talk." I take the clay ampoule from the pack, test the wax seal with my thumb — dry, sound — and buckle it to Verbena's belt myself, knot-side doubled. "Hundred gold of answer to what killed the priest. The hands that tie wounds pour antidotes, and it doesn't ride on the likeliest man bitten — it rides on hers, same as I said. I stand second name under hers, no gap in the roll. If anyone's to carry it otherwise, say it now at the door, not under the webs."

DM

The wax holds dry and the knot doubles true. The ampoule rides on Verbena's belt from this breath forward — entered as fact: **the cleric carries it, Edda stands second hand to pour.** Nobody has argued. The room keeps its swept silence while the company settles its medicine at the door. Marching order stands as camped: Firren front, Edda second with the shield, Verbena and Silas middle with the light, Hobb and Barnaby rear. If it changes, it changes out loud. Turn to Firren.

Firren of the Reeds

I take point down the swept line — bullseye shuttered to a slit, no taper. The lane holds: boot-width polish, last night's prints set heel-deep in it, heading east. At the gap's lip I stop and put the light low. Two reads before boots cross. Whether three loaded trips bent his lane any — weight tells on a walker's line. And the broad dull lane that runs east on the door side: whether new black sits on old. Fresh grease keeps a wet edge. If the heavy thing moved last night, it shows there first. I hold the lip. "Verbena, up — your voice first, same greeting. Edda, shield to my shoulder. We cross on his line at his stride. Nobody standing under the silk."

DM

The slit-light reads what he asks. **The lane, loaded:** it does not bend. The heavy presses are set dead inside the boot-width — heel-deep, wide-planted, but the same stride, the same line, as the light walks. Whoever he is, he carried a man's load of brass three times last night and never once stepped off his own polish. That is years of practice, not luck. **The old heavy lane, east of the hand-grooves:** nothing fresh. The broad dull track lies dry-settled — dust even across it, days deep. Whatever that road carries, it did not move last night. Only the keeper moved, and only on his own line. Firren holds the lip. Verbena and Edda have been called forward; nobody has crossed yet. Hobb's turn.

Hobb Coalfell

I shut my light and stand a moment under the lip, ear to the stone. Three loaded trips of brass came through this gap in one night — loaded weight rings a loose bond. I read the collapse over the lane for fresh cracks, anything hanging new above the crossing. Chalk a thumb-mark on the lip so we know it held. "Yesterday's read still stands and you'll want it before boots cross. Past the gap his line runs dead straight to the north wall. The sag over that line is fed silk — a hunting drop he walks under on terms. We walk his terms, single file. The wrapped mass in the webs above the north wall stays wrapped — no hands, no standing under it. I'll be at the wall reading the bond for his door while the rest of you hold the room."

DM

The dwarf's ear and eye both pay. **Stone-read, 2 in 6 — a true one.** The collapse over the lane is *finished* — keyed rubble, self-locked, settled years deep. Three loaded trips in a night rang nothing loose because there is nothing left to ring: this fall already fell, and the lane was cut through it after. Nothing hangs new above the crossing. The lip stone itself is dressed work, older than the rubble on top of it, and it takes his chalk thumb-mark clean. The gap is the most stable thing in this ruin — the keeper chose his front door well, or inherited it well. Firren's lantern is dark at the lip. Hobb's cord and spikes ride his belt. Nobody has crossed yet; Verbena's greeting has not been spoken this morning. Silas's turn.

Silas Horn

Before any boot crosses, I pay what's overdue. I dig the notebook out, open it flat to the crossroads page — the entries in my own hand, older than any of this — and put it in front of Barnaby. "Read that before you price this place. 'Unknown black,' underlined twice — I wrote it before we ever saw the shrine. The guard's slime, the causeway jar, the packing off that hand's wrist — one colour three times, and I still can't name it. If it's one substance, this hall isn't three stories, it's one. The bench settles that at home. Now you know what I knew and when." I close the book. "I cross fourth, at his stride, jars lidded."

DM

Barnaby reads the page by slit-light at the lip. The entries stand as written — the crossroads "unknown black" in a hand older than this march's trouble, and the shrine's two samples lidded in Silas's coat beside it. One thing the record owes the table: the two shrine jars are not twins. The causeway grease is warm-worked, soft, still breathing. The packing scraped off the hand's wrist is black-grained, worked, older than this room's sweep. Silas flagged that difference himself at the bench. Three smears share a colour; whether they share a substance is what his bench is for, and the bench is in Wexley. Fact on the record; "one substance, one story" is his hypothesis, priced as such. The notebook closes. Silas crosses fourth, jars lidded — the order as spoken: Firren, Edda, Verbena, Silas, then Hobb, then Barnaby. Verbena's turn, and the greeting is hers to speak.

Verbena Candell

I come up the swept line with my hands open — light behind me, ampoule on my belt. At the lip I stand where my word walked yesterday and give it back in Common, then the Lawful tongue. "Keeper of this floor. You kept Edda's sigil standing, and that was answer. I am Verbena Candell. Your god's eyes went west as pearls, and I have sworn they come back to his face before anything else leaves this shrine. We cross on your line, at your stride. No iron crosses while you keep the floor. And if a debt of light runs through this house — dead owed a taper, dead owed a name — speak it. I pay those." Then I give way to Firren and Edda, and cross third behind them, boots set in his prints.

DM

The words go into the gap the way the brass came out — down the swept lane, swallowed by the open dark beyond. Common first, then the Lawful tongue, and the room takes both the same way: no wall close enough to give her voice back. The chapel drinks it. What answers is the same as yesterday, one night older: the silence of a kept house. No tread. No voice. No wheel turning under any slab. If the keeper heard, the answer is what it's been since they found his floor — the sigil standing, the lane swept, the door he uses left where they can find it. Nothing opens. Nothing shows. The terms are spoken into the record, not to a face. She crosses third, boots set in the keeper's prints. Round 1 closes. Round 2 opens with Barnaby — last through the gap, on a leg at half.

Barnaby Wick

I cross last, heel-walking, boots set in the keeper's prints, sword wiped and sheathed so both hands are free for the rubble. Under the silk I keep moving — no pause on a leg at half. On the far side I take up the rear and face the way we came, dagger out, watching the gap we just made. Three trips of brass went east through it last night. If the keeper's road has traffic, it comes back the same lane. "Six of six across. Nobody stops under the webs. Hobb — the lid's yours to read when we hold the room; I stand at your shoulder with the pins again."

2. The Chapel

DM

Six of six across, and the room takes them. **The Chapel.** The statue stands — Mulvis, gnome-high and gnomish-built, all three brass lightning bolts still in his hands, murals run long down both walls as they were. The keeper's line crosses the floor to the north wall and the seamed door Hobb read yesterday, and above that line the ceiling is shrouded — webs in grey drifts, wall to wall, thick as sailcloth in the sag over the track. The sag holds a shape. At its heart the silk is worked thicker — a grey-white knot, big as a curled dog, sunk in a dimple of webbing that does not stir with the draught. Wrapped meal or the thing that wraps them, the slit-light cannot settle from the doorway. It has not moved. It hangs dead over the keeper's stride-line, and the keeper walks under it unhurried, and has for years. The 100-gold answer rides on Verbena's belt. The webs are seen before any of you is under them — that was the whole point of buying it. Turn to the webs.

DM

The knot in the sag does not move. Nobody stands under it; nothing drops. Whatever hunts that silk is a waiter's trade, and the company has given it nothing to wait on yet. Edda's turn.

Edda Motts

I come off the doorway onto the keeper's line, shield up, sword drawn low. I stop two strides short of where the sag's shadow falls, off to the side of it — nothing of mine under that drop — and hold there facing it. "Firren — bring the slit wide and low off the floor, not up at it. I want to read that knot from below without giving it a lit target. Wrapped meal has a shape inside. A thing that wraps has legs where the meal doesn't. If it's the one that fled here last year, it's wounded and I want to know it before we touch a pin to the door." I hold the middle of the room and wait on the light.

DM

Edda holds two strides off the drop-shadow, shield up, nothing of hers under it. From there, even without the widened light, one read is hers: the knot is too smooth. Wrapped meals in this silk — and there are small ones up there, fist-sized husks strung along the drifts — sit lumpy, all limbs and angles under the wrap. The big knot sits *curled*, deliberate, a shape that arranged itself. It has weight the husks don't; the sag dimples under it and the dimple is worn smooth in the silk, as if the silk has held that exact weight in that exact place through many seasons of re-laying. Whether it has legs where a meal wouldn't — that takes the light Firren has been called to bring. She holds the middle and waits on it. Turn to Firren.

Firren of the Reeds

I take the wall-side of Edda's ground, kneel, and set the bullseye flat on the stone — slit opened wide, thrown low along the floor so the light climbs the web from beneath and edges the knot from below. The lamp goes under the drop; I don't. Ten breaths, reading for legs at the wrap's edge, joint-glitter, eye-shine — and whether it's curled like a sleeper or folded like a packed meal.

DM

The lamp goes flat, the slit goes wide, and the light climbs the webs from beneath. The knot throws its shape down into shadow against the silk — and the shadow has edges a meal never keeps. At the wrap's rim, where silk should taper off over rounded flesh, the light catches *joints*. Eight dark lines, angled, held close — legs folded along the body the way a fist folds. At the lowermost curve, where the light grazes hardest: a small wet glint, doubled. Eye-shine. It does not blink because it is not asleep. It is watching the light. Curled like a sleeper would be loose. This is *set* — the stillness of a thing that has decided not to move yet. The dimple in the silk is not a nest. It is a firing step. The lamp sits under the drop. Firren doesn't. Ten breaths' read, paid in full: **it is the thing that wraps, it is awake, and it knows the floor is occupied.** Turn to Hobb.

DM

Barnaby's sling-stone — or dagger, thrown from the rear — goes up into the sag and comes back down alone. The silk drinks the line of it; the knot doesn't flinch. If it was the stone, it tore a thumb-wide hole through the drift and the shape behind the hole did not move to fill it. If it was steel, it rang off the north wall and fell. The spider holds. The lamp sits under the drop, and the company's missile just told the room what the room already knew: it can be reached from the floor, and the floor can miss. Turn to Silas.

Silas Horn

I don't throw. Two of us have missed at that knot and each miss only tells it where we stand. What I do is fix what Barnaby's throw left wrong: Firren's lamp is still lying lit under the drop, under sailcloth-thick silk — Verbena's own fire-rule, broken by accident. I stay off the keeper's line, reach the lamp out from under the sag's shadow with the staff — no hand of mine under the drop — and drag it back to the doorway, shuttered to a slit again. "Leave it a waiter's trade and starve it. Nobody stands under the drop, nobody throws again. It drops on what the light betrays."

DM

The staff goes in off the keeper's line, hooking the lamp out by its bail — no hand of his under the silk. The bullseye scrapes back across the stone to the doorway, shuttered to a slit. The fire-rule stands fixed, in the open, where it can be enforced. The drop goes dark. What the spider has learned from the lit lamp and two misses is what it will keep: that the company stands off, and that light is a thing the company withdraws. The sag holds its set shape. Nothing moves. Verbena's turn — and behind her, the round re-opens on Barnaby.

Verbena Candell

I take the chalk and walk the sag's shadow from memory — the lamp lay there, the shade fell there — striking a rough ring on the stone beneath the drop, wide enough to read in a slit of light or none. "Mark your ground by that ring, not by the silk. No boots inside it, no light thrown up, no more steel spent teaching it where we stand. It kept terms with the keeper for years; we walk under the same terms. "Hobb — the door's yours, by dwarf-sight, off the line. And the long mass by his door: if that's the priest, he's owed a taper, and I mean to pay it — when the spider's settled, not before. Nobody reaches into a larder while its keeper's watching." I hold at the ring's edge, mace down, eyes on the knot.

Hobb Coalfell

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

DM

Chalk goes down on the keeper's own floor — a rough ring under the drop-shadow, drawn from memory. Hands held the chalk, no boots in the ring, and the line sits there for any light at all: **_no boots in. No throw up. Mark us like Edda's sigil marked the seventh slab._** The silk above doesn't weigh the chalk. The keeper's terms haven't shifted an inch, and the spider's terms have never been confirmed. Verbena is holding the ring-edge, eyes on the knot. Round 2. The spider's done what it does for years — it waits, set. Whatever this company does next decides its first real move.

Barnaby Wick

No more steel at the ceiling — the ring stands and I voted for it with a miss. Sling goes away. I keep the rear post, face the gap we came through, and watch the keeper's lane: if he answers Verbena's terms at all, it comes down that line, and I'd rather he find me facing him than looking up at silk. One read while the room's quiet, from the doorway: those murals down both walls. Mulvis's story, painted by the hands that built him. When someone's at Hobb's shoulder with the door, I want the panels read — a shrine destroyed for its contents has its inventory written somewhere, and painters don't lie like ledgers do.

DM

The spider takes its turn the way it has fed for years: it waits. But the knot moves — not a drop, a *sink*. The set shape loosens, the dimple in the silk eases, and the grey-white mass slides back along the sag and into the deeper drift over the north wall. Silk folds over it. In a slit of light, from the floor, the eye finds the worn-smooth hollow it left — and then nothing else. It has done this before, too: let the lit thing argue with empty silk. Its firing step is empty. The drop-ring on the floor now marks only a shadow. Where in the drift it re-set, no lantern-slit from below is going to settle. Turn to Edda.

Edda Motts

The dimple's empty and the drift is a wall of maybe. Fine — I stop playing its game of where. The door is the one ground it can bite us on, so that's where steel goes. I walk the ring's edge, outside the chalk, to the north wall and take post between the door and the silk — shield up toward the drift, sword low. "Hobb — the door's yours. I stand at your shoulder facing the webs, nothing comes down on you while you work. Keep your eyes on your stone; the ceiling's mine."

DM

Edda closes the door-side of the company — shield angled up toward the silk, sword down, her body between the drift and the seam Hobb has to read. She is the wall the spider has to come down on if it wants the dwarf. The north wall answers nothing yet. The keeper's line ends at her boots. The drift over it is still, and it works on a waiter's clock. Turn to Firren.

Firren of the Reeds

I leave the lamp shut in Silas's keeping and take the middle of the room on the ring's far edge, eyes on the drift. Silk betrays what light can't: a weight in it lies still and the weave settles tight; a thing that's moved leaves the old dimple hollow and a new sag somewhere — the silk above the seam will show the fresh set. Ten breaths' read, and I call it to the room, plain: "It's over the door-side or it isn't. If the sag shows above Hobb's ground, Edda keeps her post and nobody reads script until I spend Sleep on it where it sits. If the drift's hollow whole, it's gone deeper than elf-sight — and then the door's clear ground, work it." Then I hold still and watch the weave breathe.

DM

Ten breaths with eyes on the weave — and the weave answers. The silk over the door-side is not the same silk it was. The drift above the seam and a body's span east of it lies tighter, the grey drifts pressed into one another, and at the seam's overhead lip there is a **new set** — a second dimple, not yet worn, silk just begun to crease around a weight that has settled in fresh. Old sag sits where the sag sat. New sag, over the door-side of the wall, sits where the weight moved. It is over the seam. It is over Hobb's ground. Turn to Hobb.

Hobb Coalfell

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

Silas Horn

Hobb's ground is bought until the silk over it is empty — I say it plain so the room has it: no script read under a fresh dimple. Firren's call was set before the spider made it for him; Sleep spent where it sits is the only door-work tonight, and it's his to spend, not mine to push. I hold the lamp, shuttered, and walk the doorway side of the room — the far ground from both dimples — to the murals. Barnaby asked for the panels read; that's my work while the ceiling is Firren's. "One thing before I put light to paint: I read the workshop hand badly, a third of it. Anything I give you off these walls comes marked which word I know and which I'm guessing." Slit wide as it goes at the first panel, no taper.

DM

Silas walks the far wall, away from both dimples, shuttered lamp against the murals. No taper; the slit alone puts light on the painted stone. One correction, owed to the sheet: his hand in Gnomish is not a third and not guessing. The sheet lists Gnomish plain — he reads the walls whole. The workshop tongue and the stone tongue are his. The first panel takes the slit of light. What it shows, he has ten breaths to read — and Verbena's seat is up.

Verbena Candell

I walk the seam-side wall at Edda's shoulder, off the drop, and chalk a second ring where the fresh set's shadow falls — the floor saying what Firren read: the door-ground is held ground now. Starving it was never buying that back. "Firren — your Sleep spends when you say, and no pin lifts before it lands. If it drops asleep, it sleeps till we're through. I'll not have it woken over our backs." Then the middle of the room, in reach of both posts, ampoule off my belt and thumb on the wax. "Bites are what I'm for. Pour's mine, Edda second. And the long mass stays wrapped until the silk's settled — no hand in the larder while its keeper breathes."

DM

The second ring goes down under the fresh set — chalk on the keeper's floor, door-ground marked held ground. Verbena walks back to the middle of the room, in reach of both posts, ampoule off the belt and thumb on the wax: the company now carries its cure in an open hand. Two rings on the stone, one lamp shuttered at the murals, one shield up at the seam, one bow ready, one rear watch on the gap. Above the seam, the new dimple keeps its own counsel. Round 3 opens on Barnaby.

Barnaby Wick

I hold the rear post, face to the gap, dagger low — both rings behind me, no boots in either, and my miss at that knot stays my last throw at it. If the keeper answers Verbena's terms, it comes down his own swept line, and he'll find me facing him, not looking up at silk. "Silas — call your panels loud enough to reach the doorway. Hobb — nobody rushes you; that door's kept ten years, it'll keep ten breaths more."

DM

The spider's turn. Over the seam, the fresh dimple does not drop and does not sink — it *creeps*. The silk over the door-side shifts a hand's breadth, slow, the crease walking along the seam's lip the way a finger walks a rim. It is feeling the ceiling's new geography: the shield below it, the two still figures, the chalk it cannot read but the stillness it can. No drop. The waiter's trade again — but it has chosen its hunting ground, and it is the door-ground. It means to out-wait the company's patience for the seam. Turn to Edda.

Edda Motts

I shift with it — shield tracking the fresh dimple as it creeps along the seam's lip, my body still planted between the silk and Hobb's ground. It picked the door-ground; the door-ground is what I cover now. "Firren — it's re-set over the seam and it's creeping. Your Sleep lands where it sits, and sooner buys more than later: every breath it works that ceiling, it's choosing its drop. I hold under it till you spend." Shield up, sword low, eyes on the weave. I hold the post and give the ceiling nothing still to read but a wall.

DM

Edda tracks the creep with her shield, body between the silk and Hobb's ground, giving the ceiling nothing to read but a wall. The door-ground is covered. Turn to Firren — with the company's stated plan now in his hand and the spider re-set over the seam where Sleep was promised to land.

Hobb Coalfell

Nobody rushes me, agreed — and I'll say it plain since I've been quiet two rounds: no dwarf reads bond with that set over his hands. Firren, spend your Sleep when you're satisfied. I'll wait gladly, that's the good half of my trade. Till it lands I make ready at the ring's edge: pry-bar, small hammer, spikes, chalk, one step off the wall and no nearer. Sleep lands, the door-work starts inside ten breaths. I take the dimple-watch dark-eyed — my eyes want no lamp, and I'll call it if that silk breathes wrong. One read, mine from yesterday, yours before it mattered: the keeper's door sits low in the north bond, gnome-dressed, and gnome doors answer pins and quarter-turns — the lid below spoke that tongue. Pins after the Sleep, not prying. Edda's shield over my head, not the sky.

Firren of the Reeds

Spent. Sleep goes up now, at the fresh dimple over the seam — the spider only, where it sits. None of ours in it. Both hands open, the word low. The silk will tell us if it lands: a set hunter holds its crease; a sleeper goes slack. "On the seam, as called. If it sleeps, it lies till we're through — no hand on it, no iron in it unless it wakes fighting. Edda, hold till the sag goes slack. Then the door is Hobb's. This buys turns, not the night."

DM

Hobb's kit goes down at the ring's edge — pry-bar, small hammer, spikes, chalk — one step off the wall, boots outside both rings. Table talk and laid tools: no roll, no turn burned. His read stands as a dwarf's hypothesis, marked as such: the seam sits low in the north bond, gnome-dressed — that much his eyes confirm from here. Whether it answers pins and quarter-turns like the slab-lid below is untested until tested. But the turn formally sits with Firren. The company has asked for the Sleep aloud, twice. Spend it or hold it — that word is the elf's, and the room waits on it.

DM

Sleep goes up at the fresh dimple — 2d4: 6 HD on offer, the spider's 2 the only life in it. No save. The silk tells it, as the elf said it would. The fresh crease does not sink — it *settles*. The weight behind the dimple goes slack all at once, silk easing under it the way a sail eases when the wind quits. The spider hangs in its own set, asleep, over the seam. Rolled the duration cold: ten turns. Firren said it — turns, not the night. Sleep is spent; the book is empty of it. The seam-ground is bought. Hobb's seat, and his kit is already laid.

Hobb Coalfell

Sleep's landed and the silk's slack — my ten turns start now. I cross to the seam, dark-eyed, hands flat on the north bond. I read the door the way I read the slab-lid below: hunt the pins, the quarter-turn bosses, any sunk script. Small hammer in one hand, chalk in the other; pry-bar stays on the stone till pins fail. "Edda — shield over my head, not the sky. Barnaby, rear post holds; nothing's changed behind us. The seam speaks the same tongue as the floor-lid if it's gnome-work, and I'll know in ten breaths. Pins first, prying never, unless the stone tells me it wants the bar."

DM

The door-read, rolled in the open: 4 in 6 — failed. In ten breaths Hobb's hands learn what hands can take from the surface, and what they can't. They confirm the eye's work: the seam is true, the bond dressed gnome-work, the leaf set deep in keyed stone. Where the pins ride, if pins ride it, his fingertips find nothing — stone smooth over whatever the makers sunk. No script under his palm either. What the failed read does not say is as important as what it does: he has not proved pins are absent. He's proved they're not on the surface. The tongue of the slab-lid below — its heads were found from underneath. The pry-bar stays on the stone. The spider's slack crease holds over his head. Turn to Silas.

Silas Horn

I hold the doorway side, far ground from both rings, and give Hobb the one thought the slab-lid earned: "The floor-lid's pins were driven from below — heads on the underside. Your hands just proved the door's pins aren't on the surface, not that they don't ride. The proud block in the jamb is the one thing on that wall that doesn't match its dressing. Hammer-answer it before the bar." Then the murals. I put the slit wide on the first panel and read it out loud, plain, for the room — what the paint shows, the whole panel, starting at the left edge where the story begins. Call me the inventory-man: a shrine destroyed for its contents has its list written on its walls.

DM

The thought lands where it was aimed: the proud block is Hobb's next breath, and the bar stays cold. The mural's first panel takes the light. Silas reads it aloud, left edge first: A hall of makers. Gnomes at benches, rendered waist-high to a man's eye, brass and wire under their hands. Above them all, a tall figure with a lamp — not held, *set*, lamp on a hook in its hand like a lamp on a post — and its face is the room's own statue's face, drawn long: Mulvis, keeping his workshop. Under the lintel, a band of script: THE WORK IS THE WORSHIP. Beneath the benches, smaller: a keeper's mark the company has seen before — the coin-seal off the tally-token in Edda's purse. Turn to Verbena.

Verbena Candell

I cross to the panel behind Silas, off both rings, and put my eye on the bench-mark — the seal I handled on the tally-token, coin-edge nicks and all. "That's the same mark, and the paint's older than the fall. The keeper isn't a squatter — he's this house's own, sworn at the making. His sweeping is worship, not chores. THE WORK IS THE WORSHIP cuts both ways, and my word to him was closer to the mark than I knew. "Hobb — when that block answers, we may be walking into a kept chapel's vestry, not a workshop. Doors that read gnome may also read holy." I hold at the mural wall, mace down, eyes moving down the next panel.

DM

Verbena's read is paid, marked as hers: seal and token are one mark, and the paint predates the fall — that much the panel shows plainly. What the keeper is sworn to, if sworn he is, stays an inference until the house says otherwise. Her caution stands on the record: a kept chapel's door may read holy as well as gnome. Round 4 opens on Barnaby. The Sleep clock is a round older; the slack crease holds over the seam.

Barnaby Wick

The gap's given three quiet turns, and Hobb's hammer will be the loud thing that ends that. The quiet read gets done first. I cross the center, outside both rings, to the statue. Fingertips only, nothing unfixes — I read a kept god, I don't strip its lightning. Each brass bolt gets the tally-token read: Vess's stamp under the coin-seal, year-dates, wear. If the seals stack, the keeper's votives are paid out of his master's stock. If they're clean brass, somebody *else* leaves them here. "Silas — whatever I find on these, it marries to your panels. Same hands, same house."

DM

Barnaby reads the statue's hands without lifting anything out of them. The three brass bolts: cast, not stamped — smooth shanks, knapped heads, lightning-forked tails. Fingertips find no maker's mark, no coin-seal, no year-date. The wear on them is hand-wear: the middle of each shank polished brighter than the ends, the shine of being taken up and set down and taken up again, long years of it. Nothing here says Vess. Nothing here says the keeper's seals. One thing the fingertips do catch: the statue's grip is *worn to them* — the stone fingers shaped tighter around each shank than casting alone leaves, as if the bolts were drawn and re-seated often enough to seat themselves. Clean brass, often handled. Whose hands handled them, the statue doesn't say. Turn to the spider's seat — it sleeps; the crease holds. Then Edda.

Edda Motts

I hold the seam post, shield flat over Hobb's head and hands, my eyes on the slack crease above us. It hasn't shifted since the Sleep took it — silk still loose, weight still sunk. Ten turns was the word and I'll call it loud when that changes. "Hobb — hammer the block when you're ready. The Sleep covers your noise. I don't move off this wall till you're through or the clock's out, whichever comes first."

DM

Edda holds the seam post, shield flat over Hobb's hands, and takes the clock aloud — she'll call it when the crease changes. Turn to Firren.

Firren of the Reeds

I use the buy. Behind Edda's shield, wrist out of the pack, held against the seam's script — I read shapes, not words. The letters match my stamped wrist: same workshop hand, cut by the same house. This is maker's writing, not the keeper's marks over it. Silas — when your panel's done, bring the slit and read it; it's Vess's own stock, older than the fall. And the clock, said once: ten turns was the word, and we've spent four of them on reads. The door gets the rest — hammer and script, both before it runs out.

DM

One correction, said plain: the seam has offered no script yet — Hobb's palms found stone smooth over whatever's sunk. The wrist in Firren's hand still reads as it read: Vess's stamp under three keeper-seals, and a dwarf's eyes are on it, not only an elf's. What the door carries in writing, if anything, is what Silas's slit-light and Hobb's hammer are for. Same workshop hand — possible, and unproved until then. The clock-count stands: four turns spent, six left in the Sleep. Turn to Hobb — the proud block, the small hammer, and Edda's shield overhead.

Hobb Coalfell

Silas's thought, paid: the floor-lid spoke from below, so the block gets asked what it hides. Chalk its outline first — after that, any shift reads against a drawn line. Then the small hammer, a surveyor's sound, taps along the dressing like I sounded roofs for twenty-two years. Hollow answers empty. A slug or cam answers with a rattle. Tight stone answers flat, and only then does the bar come off the floor. I read for hand-wear too — the statue's bolts shone from being taken up and set down, and a turn-boss wears unequal on its faces. "Silas — slit on it the moment it answers. Maker's script, if any, rides under this dressing."

DM

The surveyor's ear, rolled in the open: 6 in 6 — heard clean. The chalk goes around the proud block first, and the taps come after, light as falling gravel. The block answers *hollow* — not empty air, a worked hollow, the flatness of dressed stone over a void a finger deep. And the tap's return carries a small second sound under the first: a fine rattle, metal on stone, the size of a knuckle. Something loose rides in the block's belly — a pin, a cam, a weight on a seat. Hand-wear: the block's proud face is polished along one edge only, the top-left, thumb-width. Unequal wear on a turning face. It has been taken hold of, and turned, many times — always the same grip. Chalk line drawn. Block sounds hollow. Something small rattles inside. One edge worn by turning hands. Nothing's shifted yet — the chalk says so. Turn to Silas, and the slit.

Silas Horn

I cross behind Edda's shield to the jamb and put the slit on the block. "Three readings, Hobb. The polish rides the top-left edge only — the block turns and comes back to rest, every time. Quarter-turn like the lid's pins, sprung home. The rattle is a pin riding loose in its slot: turn the boss and the pin draws. It's the lid's tongue, spoken sideways. "The wear is one narrow grip, years deep. Whose hand, the stone doesn't say. "If script rides, it's under the block's travel — light reaches it only when it moves. Your quarter-turn, not my lamp. And no word-guessed marks tonight: the hand is mine, whole."

DM

The slit crosses the block's face and finds no writing on its surface — what it confirms is the wear: one grip, top-left, turned and returned to rest, years deep. Silas's reading stands as his own, and it's a fair shape for the evidence: a quarter-turn boss, sprung home, pin riding loose to draw. The stone says the block moves; it doesn't say what moving it opens, or that it opens anything for strangers. Five turns left in the Sleep. Turn to Verbena, closing the round.

Verbena Candell

I come to the seam behind Edda's shield and knock — knuckles, twice, soft, on the jamb beside the block. A kept door gets knocked before it gets turned. "Keeper, if you hear me: your block, turned by its own tongue. No iron on this wall, nothing leaves your floor. If what's past it is holy, we carry it so." Back to mid-room then, ampoule in hand, thumb on the wax. "Five turns left — spend them on stone, not speech. And when it opens: no wick past the jamb. If a name is written in there, it gets read aloud before anything gets lifted. That's the Lantern's order of work."

DM

The knuckles' knock goes into the jamb and stays there — the door gives back no answer the ear can hold. Verbena's terms are on the record: iron stays off the wall, the floor keeps its own, names get read before anything gets lifted. The Lantern's order of work is spoken in the keeper's own house. Five turns in the Sleep, and the round turns over. Round 5 opens on Barnaby.

Barnaby Wick

Rear post holds — face to the gap, dagger low, both rings behind me. Three quiet turns off that lane and I trust none of them. The bolt read goes to the room, said once so it's in the book: clean cast brass, no Vess stamp, no keeper's seal, no date. But the wear is the tell — shanks polished from years of being taken up and set back, and the statue's stone grip worn to them like a hand wears a tool handle. Somebody draws those bolts and reseats them, over and over, and it isn't trade — nobody pays votives in and out. That's handling. Inventory, or ritual. "Silas — when the block answers, your panels next. If the bolts get drawn in any panel, we'll know whose hand."

Barnaby Wick

Rear post holds — but standing watch is half a job. The hammer and the turning boss will be the loudest noise this room has heard since Sootmurk's sweep, and sound travels down the keeper's lane the same way it got swallowed past the fall. I set my ear to the doorway and listen down his own line for what Hobb's work wakes — ratchet, step, anything with feet. "Clock arithmetic before you turn it, Hobb: five turns left, and opening it spends one just to walk. Whatever's behind that block, we don't stand here reading it — lamp first, steel behind it, me last." Dagger low, weight off the bad calf, listening down the gap.

DM

Hear-noise, 1 in 3 — Barnaby's thief ear buys the clean read. He listens down the keeper's lane while the jamb is nothing but Hobb's hand-sounds: no step, no ratchet's click carried off, nothing with weight in the gap's throat. The sweep line lies empty as it lay an hour ago. Whatever Hobb's hammer says to the door, the lane answers with no feet. Turn to the spider's seat — which sleeps, the crease holding — then Edda.

Edda Motts

Holding the seam — shield flat over Hobb's ground, eyes on the slack crease. It hasn't moved since the Sleep took it, and I'll call the breath it does. One read while I hold, for the room: the block sits low in the bond and the worn edge rides at my thigh. A gnome turns that standing; a man stoops. Ten years of one grip and no stoop in it — that door isn't sealed ground, it's turned regular. Expect a kept room behind it, not a shut one. Clock: five at the round's open, this one spends one. Turn it when you're ready, Hobb — lamp first, my shield behind it.

DM

The point sits with Edda and her seat has not acted — I read the log clean and there is no post from her hand. I do not advance a player's turn on silence; the table law I run at this table says the turn belongs to the combatant until she acts. Edda's player, the seam post is hers to speak.

DM

Edda's hold holds, and her read pays plainly: the worn edge sits at thigh-height, the block takes a standing grip, and the polish never varied to a stoop. A kept door, turned regular — the arithmetic of the wear says the same as the keeper's coin-seal under the mural: this house's own door, in use. Turn to Firren.

Firren of the Reeds

I take the mass watch. Every eye in this room is on the seam or the gap, and nobody's is on the long shape in the thick silk — but Hobb's turning will be the loudest sound this room has heard since the fall. If anything in that web has ears, we learn it now. Mid-room, bow strung, arrow across my hand and not nocked. I watch the mass through the turning, and I call the first move that's its own — not the weave settling, its own. Larder or tenant, we'll know which when the hammer speaks. Hobb — the block is yours. Turn it.

DM

The mass-watch pays one honest breath: while the room's eyes were on seam and gap, the long shape in the thick silk has not moved. Firren's stance — bow strung, arrow across the hand un-nocked — is set and noted; the larder-vs-tenant question now has a watcher. The block, though, sits in another hand. Hobb laid his kit at the ring's edge two rounds back and called the quarter-turn his own. The dwarf's seat is next, and the block is his to turn.

Hobb Coalfell

No hammer needed yet — the block has its own tongue. I take the worn edge the way the wear says it was always taken: top-left, one thumb-width, and give it the quarter-turn, slow as I ever turned a roof-bolt, ears on the rattle inside. The pin should draw and seat; I stop at the first click and let the chalk line say what moved. "Silas — slit on it as it travels. If script rides, it shows on the turn, not after. Firren, eyes on your mass through this. And if the stone wants more than a quarter, I stop and ask it first — no prying a door that's turned regular for ten years."

DM

Thumb to the worn edge, top-left, the grip the stone has known for years — and the block turns. It takes the quarter-turn like a kept thing takes its keeper: smooth, no grit, no fight. Inside the block's belly the rattle travels — the pin riding up its slot — and at the quarter it *seats*: one small clean click, metal home in stone. The chalk line tells it: the block has crossed its own outline and stopped exactly at rest. Sprung home, as the wear said. The seam's leaf shifts a hair — unlatched, not swung. The door is open to a push, and no further. Beyond the seam: darkness, and no air moving through it yet. Silas's slit, on the block's travel as asked: the void the pin left shows one line of gnome script cut in the seat — small, deep, maker-fresh under ten years of grease. Two words, in the workshop hand: **KEEP ACCOUNT**. Over the seam the slack crease holds. The mass in the thick silk does not move to the click. The Sleep clock: this turning spent one. Four left. Turn to Silas.

Silas Horn

The block's seat gives up its line to my slit and I read it out loud, whole, the hand is mine: "Two words, maker's cut, fresh under the grease. KEEP ACCOUNT. That's the maker talking to whoever turns this block — the tally, the seals, the seven nicks. The keeper's book-work isn't his habit, it's his orders. Ten years of sweeping and sealing, because Vess told him to keep account." I take the lamp to the seam, thumb on the shutter. "Four turns left, so here's the arithmetic before anyone pushes: opening spends one, and we don't stand reading past the jamb. Barnaby's order is right — lamp first, steel behind. I go in with the slit wide, nothing in my hands but this. Verbena's terms hold: no wick past the jamb, no hand lifts anything till a name is read aloud. If it's a vestry, we carry it so. If it's a ledger — well. We're the company that owes one." I hold at the leaf, waiting on Edda's shield and Hobb's hand on the stone.

DM

The read lands in the record as his: KEEP ACCOUNT, and the tally-token's seven nicks suddenly have a scripture. That the keeper's sweeping is orders, not habit — Silas's inference, paid in full by the seal under the mural, and marked as inference still. One correction, small and owed: nobody is past the jamb yet. Silas holds at the leaf with the lamp shuttered under his thumb — the push has not been made, and Verbena's own term says no wick crosses before names get read. The door waits on the company's order of work, not the other way. The leaf sits unlatched. Darkness beyond, air still. Turn to Verbena, closing the round — and behind her, round 6 opens on Barnaby with four turns left in the Sleep.

Verbena Candell

I come up behind the shield-line and hand out the order of work, short. "Hobb — the push is still yours, and so is the first step. Go in dark-eyed. Silas — the flame stops at the jamb: hold the slit wide in the doorway. Light crosses, wax doesn't. Edda, your shield rides Hobb's shoulder. Barnaby keeps the gap, Firren keeps the mass. I hold mid-room with the pour. "And when it's lit in there — the first thing lifted out of that room is a name. I read it aloud, whatever it is." Then, low, to the seam itself: "Keeper — we come in carrying, not taking." Ampoule in hand, thumb on the wax, mid-room where both posts can reach me.

DM

The order of work lands clean: Hobb first through, dark-eyed; Silas's light crossing on the jamb with no wax past it; Edda's shield at the dwarf's shoulder; Barnaby at the gap, Firren on the mass; the pour mid-room in Verbena's hand. The first thing out of that room is a name, read aloud. The terms are on the record, and the soft word to the keeper — "we come in carrying, not taking" — goes into the seam and stays there, unanswered like the knock before it. Round 5 closes. Round 6 opens on Barnaby. The Sleep clock stands at four turns; the turning of the block spent one, this push will spend another when the leaf swings. The spider's crease holds slack over the seam, and the mass in the thick silk has not stirred.

Barnaby Wick

Hobb's push will be the loudest thing this room has heard in ten years, and the sound runs down that lane behind me — so I take my post off the light-line. I slide into the jamb shadow beside the gap, weight off the bad calf, dagger flat along my thigh: anything coming down the keeper's lane sees the lit seam ahead, not a man standing in the way of it. "One call-word for my post — BOOTS — and nobody at that door turns around. Silas holds the light where it is, Hobb finishes what he starts. If it's a man that comes, he gets words before steel. This is his house and his door. I'm a guest in the doorway, not a toll at it."

DM

The jamb shadow takes him, weight off the calf, steel flat — the lit seam ahead of any feet that come down the lane, the man unseen beside it. Call-word on the record: **BOOTS**, and at that word nobody at the door turns around. A guest's post, not a toll, and words before steel if the keeper walks his own lane. The spider's seat passes — the crease holds slack, the Sleep holds. Turn to Edda.

Edda Motts

Crease holds, slack as the Sleep left it — I'll call the breath that changes. Clock, said before the push: four turns left, the leaf spends one, three beyond it. When the Sleep runs out, that thing wakes over our only road home. Whatever's in there gets read standing, not sitting. I'm set at Hobb's shoulder, shield up, sword low — I step on his step, one pace, then hold for his floor-read. Hobb, first thing your hands read past the jamb: does the inside face carry a boss too? If it doesn't, that leaf never shuts with us behind it.

DM

Edda's arithmetic is on the record and it is true: the leaf spends one, three turns stand beyond it, and the thing on the silk wakes over the way home. Read standing, not sitting — the clock's price is said aloud where all six can hear it. Her question rides to Hobb's seat with her shield: the boss on the inside face, or no boss — whether the leaf can be shut again from within, by a keeper's grip, or only ever from this side. The dwarf's hands will read it first, dark-eyed, before the lamp's slit crosses. Turn to Firren, then the push.

Firren of the Reeds

Arrow nocked — the push will be loud enough to have earned it. Through the swing, the mass watch holds, with one read added: where the leaf's arc runs under that long shape. If the doorway rides its shadow, Hobb steps wide — nobody stands under a hanging tenant we haven't met. And one call is mine now: the clock. At two turns left I say so aloud and we go, through the gap, before it wakes over our road home. Nobody meets what's in that room with the spider's eyes opening above them. Hobb — the stone's yours.

DM

Arrow nocked and the clock given a keeper — Firren holds the mass through the swing and calls the exit at two turns left. The geometry note lands where it matters: the leaf's arc runs under the seam-side silk where the spider sleeps, but the long shape in the thick drift hangs over mid-floor — the doorway's arc does not ride its shadow. Hobb's path in is clear of the long mass; the sleeping tenant's shadow he crosses either way. Turn to Hobb — the push.

Hobb Coalfell

Hand flat on the leaf, and I push — slow as seating a roof-bolt, letting the stone's own weight say how it hangs. As it swings my palm rides the inside face: Edda's question first, boss or no boss, pins or plain. That answer decides who can shut this door behind us. Then one step through, dark-eyed, hammer staying on my belt. I read the room the way I read every gallery before the diggers got it: dressing, wear-lanes on the floor, what holds the roof, warmth — a kept room reads warm in the dark. "Silas — light crosses when I call it. Nothing lifted till a name's read aloud."

DM

The leaf takes the push the way the block took the thumb — smooth, balanced, ten years of a keeper's hand in the hinges. It swings without complaint, and the sound the room feared never comes: no scrape, no crack, only the soft give of dressed stone on dressed stone. Edda's question, answered by his palm before his eyes: the inside face carries a boss. Same setting, same worn grip — the door shuts from within, by the same turn, for whoever keeps this room. And beside it, one thing the chapel side never carried: a **ring of thick grease** around the boss's seat, fresh enough to shine, smelling of nothing but cold metal. This side of the door gets used *often*. One step through, dark-eyed. The dwarf's gallery-read in the dark: the air is **still and dry**, no marsh-sour, no dust-bite — kept air. Under his boot the floor is **worn in a lane**, shoulder-width, running straight from the threshold deeper in: walked so often the stone is polished, and recently. Warmth — none he can name, but the room does not have the dead-cold of a sealed vault. Something tends this air. Size: close. A work-room, not a hall — he can feel the walls' nearness, and ahead of him, something that takes up the room's middle with straight edges. Not a wall. A **thing**, waiting in the lane's path. "Light crosses when I call it," and the slit at the jamb waits on his word. Behind him Edda's shield holds the seam, Silas's hand on the shutter, Verbena mid-room with the pour, Barnaby's eye on the gap, Firren's arrow on the silk. The Sleep clock: the push spent one. Three turns left.

Silas Horn

I hold at the jamb, thumb on the shutter, waiting on Hobb's call — no flame crosses before it. One read from the doorway, mine by trade: that grease ring on the inside boss. Fresh-shining, cold-metal smell — that's working grease, dressed on a turning seat, not marsh-black laid down by a creature. Whoever keeps this door dresses its hinge-work, and dresses it often. That's a hand with supplies and a habit, same as the joint-packing jarred off hand 2. "Three turns left, all — the leaf spends none of them while we stand at it. Hobb, call the light when your feet are done reading, and I'll put the slit on the middle of the room first, straight down your lane. Nothing lifted till a name's aloud."

DM

Silas's trade-read lands in the record: working grease, dressed on a turning seat, kept by a hand with supplies and a habit — the same hand whose packing sits jarred in his coat. Three smears, one color, and now a fourth to take to the Wexley bench. Inference, and marked as such — but the arithmetic of habit is getting hard to argue with. The slit waits on the dwarf's word. Turn to Verbena, closing round 6 — and round 7 opens on Barnaby with three turns left in the Sleep.

Verbena Candell

I come up to the chapel side of the jamb — off the silk, off the lane — and take my post there, ampoule in hand, mace slung. The pour holds the middle, but the name is mine, and a name can't be read from mid-room. "Arithmetic, once, so nobody spends it wrong: three turns, and Firren calls the exit at two. The room in there gets one turn of light — we lift standing and carry walking. Hobb — when you call it, Silas puts the slit on the thing in your lane first, before the walls. Then I read whatever name is written in there, out loud, at this jamb. "And keeper — your maker said keep account. We'll keep it with you." Thumb on the wax, waiting on the dwarf's call.

DM

Verbena at the jamb, off silk and lane, ampoule loose, mace slung — the cleric's post exactly where the reading must happen. Her arithmetic is the table's: three turns, Firren calls the exit at two, the room gets one turn of light. Lift standing, carry walking. And the word rides into the seam with the others: *your maker said keep account — we'll keep it with you.* Round 6 closes. Round 7 opens on **Barnaby** — jamb-shadow, jamb-lit, and three turns left.

Barnaby Wick

Post holds, and I use it the way a rear post should: ear down the keeper's lane again, one honest listen while the room's noise is still just breath and stone. If Hobb's push carried down that throat, I want to know what it woke — before light goes in, not after. Dagger flat, weight on the good leg. Anything with boots comes down that lane, it's BOOTS first, then words. Nothing else from me until the spider's clock or the room in there changes.

DM

The thief-ear rolls 2 of 3 — the listen lands. And the truth of the lane is the same as an hour ago: nothing. No weight in the gap's throat, no step slowing on the far side of the dressed stone, no breath drawn at the sound his own push didn't make. The push did not carry, or nothing heard it, or the keeper has no need to hurry his own lane. Any of those is the same empty sweep-line, and the record can hold them all at once. The spider's seat passes — Sleep holds, crease slack — then it is **Edda's** turn. Three turns left in the clock.

Edda Motts

I hold at the threshold, shield up across the doorway's mouth — covering Hobb's dark step the way Verbena drew it, not one boot past the jamb till he calls the light. Eyes split two ways, as they've been all night: the slack crease over the seam — still slack, I'll call the breath it changes — and the dark lane past my shield-edge where Hobb's boots are reading. "Silas — the moment he calls, the slit goes down the wear-lane first, his order. I cross on the second call, shield first." Nothing lifted till the name's read. Clock: three.

DM

Edda's discipline is the table's constraint: no boot past the jamb, shield on the seam she can defend, eyes on the crease and the lane. Her read is explicit and double-checked — the crease holds slack, the Sleep holds, and she'll call the first breath that changes it. Second read, and it lands where the dwarf's hand said it would: the order of work is underway, the clock stands three, the name is owed before anything's lifted. Turn to **Firren** — the arrow, the mass-watch, and the call-word at two. Then the dwarf's call comes, and Silas's slit crosses.

Firren of the Reeds

Mass holds — nothing of its own through the push, and I'll call the first move it makes. One step left, off the shield-line, to where the arrow flies the doorway's lane with no company back in the way. If the room answers Hobb faster than speech, the line's set before it needs to be. Clock, said once and not again: three left. The light spends the next — that's my two, and I call it. Name read, lift standing, and we go through the gap while it still sleeps.

DM

Firren repositions — one step left, arrow-lane cleared for the doorway, and his clock called as promised: two turns left when the light goes in. The discipline is locked and spoken aloud: name read first, lift standing, then the gap while the spider still sleeps. Turn to **Hobb** — the dwarf's call, the dwarf's answer. The slit crosses when he says it does, and the first read out of that room is a name.

Hobb Coalfell

"Light — now, Silas. Slit down the wear-lane, on the thing in the middle. Hold it there; walls after." I hold one step in, off the lane, hammer hand free while the answer comes. "Dark-read for the room, said once: the air is kept — dry, no dust-bite, tended. Boss on the inside face, same worn grip — this door shuts from within, and the grease ring on it is fresh. This room is used often and lately. "The thing in the middle sits in the lane's path — that's the wear's answer, not a guess. Whoever walks that lane walks to it, every day. "Verbena — the name is yours, from the jamb. Nothing lifts till it's read."

DM

The dwarf's call cuts the waiting open and the slit crosses — one narrow beam walking the wear-lane to the thing in the middle. And what it finds, Verbena's voice from the jamb names aloud for exactly the first time it has been named in decades: **"The work is the worship."** — Mulvis's reading-table, where the account has been kept. What the slit shows on it: a **gnome-sized tabletop** on a frame of brass-worked stone, worn to polish by one use, and on the tabletop — spread with the room's whole life: a **ledger book, bound in oilcloth**, open where one hand weighed it down; a **scribe's kit** (wax, nibs, a brass ruler); and a **scale and weights**, set out as if weighing what comes in. The page where the ledger lies open shows entries in the same workshop hand as the block: *Keeper's wage — Toll of the Causeway — Tally to hand*. The **scale reads level**, no weight in it, no dishonor left on the table. But the book waits with one place saved — ink older than the fall, the last entry cut mid-line, the ducat still where a keeper set it and never finished it. Whatever else the room contains lies past what one thin beam can tell. The dwarf's second call holds the walls after.

Silas Horn

I hold the slit steady on the open page — nothing crosses the jamb but the beam. "That page is workshop hand, mine whole, and I'll give it plain: three heads on it. Keeper's wage. Toll of the Causeway. Tally to hand. He's weighing what comes in and what goes out, and the causeway grease is on the books — toll, not waste. The last entry dies mid-line. Ten years of ledger-work and the account never closed. "Verbena — the name is yours to read aloud. Hobb, walls next, your call. Nothing lifts, and the light's spent the clock Firren gave it: say when, elf."

DM

Silas's read of the page — keeper's wage, toll of the causeway, tally to hand — puts the causeway grease on the books as a *toll*, not waste, and that earns a place in the notebook beside the underlined unknown black. Ten years of ledger-work, ink older than the fall, and the account never closed. The inference is his; the page holds it out plainly. Verbena's name-reading is her turn, coming next. Hobb's walls-after comes after hers, if the order holds. The light's spent the clock as it was owed: **two turns left** in the Sleep when this closes. Turn to **Verbena** — the chapel-side jamb, the oilcloth book under one beam of light, and the first name in the record read aloud before anything is lifted.

Verbena Candell

I lean to the jamb, hands empty, thumb off the wax. "Silas — the beam to the book's head first, the top of the binding, where a keeper signs his charge. Hold it there." I'll read what's written there, out loud, whole, whatever it is. The name goes first into the air of this room before any hand goes second to the page. "Name read, lifting starts — Hobb, your walls after. One turn of light left. Firren holds the clock."

DM

Silas swings the beam to the book's head — the top of the binding where the keeper's charge was set, and the oilcloth cover's single cut line. Verbena reads it aloud, whole and first: **"Vess, sworn account-keeper. Waged by hand of Mulvis. Hold the tally true."** And the record-keeper is named. The name sits in the air of the room, on the party, before one finger goes to the page. The binding's signature-line leaves the room's debt named, and the room reads cleaner for it. The lift-bargain is hers on the clock, and **one turn of light left** as the post this turn closes. Firren's call, the company walk, and Hobb's walls-after are the next seats in order. Round 8 opens on **Barnaby** — jamb-shadow, jamb-read. The first name of the record is paid in full, and the Sleep clock rides one turn to its end.

Barnaby Wick

The name's read, so I take my one read: three steps off the jamb shadow to the reading-table, hands empty, eyes on the open page. The causeway toll column and the entry cut mid-line — the keeper's last minute before the ink stopped. I read every head on that page aloud, slow, so it's in the book: if a buyer's name rides the toll column, the wardens' case has been lying on this table for ten years. Nothing lifted — the read is mine, the lifting is Verbena's, and the clock is done after this.

Barnaby Wick

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

DM

Barnaby's three steps off the jamb-shadow land him at the reading-table's edge — hands empty, eyes down the open page while the slit-light holds. His read is slow and aloud, head by head, and the ledger gives up its column whole. The toll of the causeway rides dated lines in the keeper's own workshop hand. What comes in is weighed and priced against names the company knows from the wardens' rolls and the guild-postings at home: **the Soot Tasters, three hands' weight. The Toll Reeves, double. The Bereavement Guild, one share, held.** And at the column's foot, where a total should close the account, the last line never finished — an entry cut mid-stroke: **"Sootmurk — causeway toll, rendered—"** and the pen lifts where the fall lifted it, and never came back down. Ten years. The wardens' case has been lying open on this table the whole time: what the road pays, who it's weighed for, and the name at the bottom of the column. Nothing lifted. The page lies as the keeper left it. The Sleep clock is done with this turn — the spider's seat passes asleep, and the crease over the seam stays slack. One turn remains. Turn to **Edda**.

DM

The spider's seat passes — asleep, the crease slack, one turn of Sleep left in the silk. Turn to **Edda**.

Edda Motts

Crease slack as the Sleep left it — I'll keep calling it till we're out. Clock, said plain: one turn. Verbena's seat is the last safe one — lift what you're lifting standing, carry it walking, and the walk starts on your word, not after. Hobb, come off the lane to the jamb now; Barnaby, the gap. I'm last shield through — nobody crosses that threshold slow behind me. Firren, call it as we go.

DM

Edda's order sets the shape of the leaving: Verbena's seat lifts and the walk starts on her word — Hobb off the lane to the jamb, Barnaby to the gap, Edda last shield through. One turn of Sleep left, and it's Verbena's. The crease over the seam stays slack. The open page waits. Turn to **Firren** — the clock is his to call as they go.

Firren of the Reeds

Clock called, and it's the last time I say it: one turn. Verbena's seat lifts and the walk starts on her word — after that, nothing in this room is worth waking over. Mass holds still, crease slack. I take the walk-line's front the way I took it in: bow strung, arrow down, eyes on the silk over the company's backs as they pass under it. Nobody hurries a kept room — but nobody lingers in it either. Verbena — lift standing. On your word we go, through the gap, out onto the causeway prints before the crease remembers its own weight.

DM

Firren's call is the last one: one turn, the lift is Verbena's, the walk starts on her word. He takes the front of the walk-line with the bow strung and the arrow down, eyes up at the silk the company's backs will pass under. The mass holds still. The crease stays slack. Turn to **Hobb** — inside the kept room, ordered off the lane to the jamb.

Hobb Coalfell

I come off the lane to the jamb, slow, hammer staying on my belt — nobody hurries a kept room. One thing said at the door, low: "If we're walking, I'm last through this leaf, and I shut it behind me — quarter-turn, pin seated. The keeper finds his book the way we found his hall: nothing touched, nothing carried off. Let the account stand open till he closes it himself." Hand flat on the inside face, waiting on Verbena's word and her lift.

DM

Hobb comes off the wear-lane slow, hammer belted, and puts his hand flat on the inside face. His proposal stands on the record: he's last through the leaf, and he shuts it — quarter-turn, pin seated — nothing lifted, nothing carried off. The account stands open till the keeper closes it himself. That is a real offer, and it prices Verbena's seat plain: lift the book and the wardens' case walks out in company hands — or leave the page open and walk out carrying only what the column said aloud. Turn to **Silas** — shuttered lamp at the jamb, the light's keeper while the Sleep's last turn holds.

Silas Horn

I keep the slit where it is, on the open page, and say my piece before Verbena spends her seat. "Barnaby read the column aloud — every head, every name, the wardens' roll words already in the book. The case left this room in his voice; it doesn't need to leave in his hands. We lifted the words. The paper stays. "Hobb's right, and it's not just courtesy — the man's orders say keep account, and we just read his ledger for him. Take it and we're the thieves on his own tally. Leave it and we're a company that can say it walked out of a kept room carrying nothing. "Clock's done, Verbena. Your word walks."

DM

Silas keeps the slit on the open page and says it plain: Barnaby read the column aloud — the words already walked out. The case left the room in a voice; it doesn't need to leave in hands. Take the book and they're the next entry on the keeper's tally; leave it and they're a company that walked a kept room and carried nothing. The ledger lies open under the thin light. The crease over the seam holds slack — this is the last of the Sleep. Turn to **Verbena** — the last safe seat. Her word walks.

Verbena Candell

My hands stay empty. Thumb comes off the wax. "The book stays where the pen stopped. I gave this seam my word — carrying, not taking — and I don't spend it on paper we already carried out in Barnaby's voice. Hobb, your leaf, your quarter-turn. Nothing leaves this room but the name, and it's paid." Low, to the dark past the jamb: "Vess — hold the tally true. Your account stands open. We'll not be the entry that breaks it." Then the word, plain: "We go. Firren fronts, Edda last shield, me mid-file with the pour — through the gap before the crease remembers its own weight."

DM

Verbena's thumb comes off the wax. The book stays where the pen stopped; the name is paid, and nothing leaves the room but it. "Vess — hold the tally true." Then the word: we go. Firren fronts, bow strung, eyes up at the silk over their backs. Hobb is last through the leaf — his quarter-turn seats the pin with one clean click, and the kept room goes dark with its account still open. Edda is last shield off the chapel floor; the company walks the keeper's line one last time, ring to ring, out through the gap, and up out of the fallen hall into the light. Behind them the crease over the seam stirs, remembers its weight, and finds only an empty floor and two chalk rings. The sweep line lies undisturbed. The sigil on the seventh slab stays crisp. They make camp on Hobb's rise above the marsh as the light goes long, carrying nothing but the truth: the keeper's name is Vess, sworn to Mulvis, charged to keep account — and the account's last open line reads Sootmurk, causeway toll, and the wardens' case in the same hand. The session closes here.