Chapter 944 - 944: Cava Gives The Band One Address

Cava drove her capture hook through the recovery jaw before the seventh punch could pull any deeper into her shoulder.

The jaw closed on the hook. Metal teeth pressed against the old crown through her shirt, trapping cloth while the long scar dragged toward the black band around Ty's chain.

Her injured ankle struck Orra's hide each time Ruvan hauled the recall rope. Todd kept the foot wedged inside his elbow and used his last staff section to hold Jori's damaged leg above the stone.

Nessa still had the recovered field finger pressed against the second square punch.

Tovan's five breaths reached it again. The sixth pull returned empty.

"Close that punch until every body reaches a brace inside Rillhold."

Nessa lifted the finger. The breathing cup stopped knocking through the band.

The twelve punches stayed open.

Ruvan pulled the rope through the last fold of Orra's hide. Harven and three crossing workers caught the upper knots, laid Jori across a yellow carrying frame, and took his harness toward Clinic Five without changing his left leg's angle.

Meya walked beside the frame with one hand on Jori's hip buckle.

"Talli Ren receives his name, water injury, and every direction before anybody loosens the ankle wrap."

Jori caught her sleeve as the workers lifted him.

"Tell Talli the left knee belongs to the old stake until I prove otherwise."

"You will tell her yourself after you finish drinking without arguing."

The frame moved toward the clinic hall.

Ruvan assigned the rest of them around the crossing table by injury. Dema's three braces went to separate wall rings. Nessa's numb arm stayed across her chest. Jade stood behind Ty's skull with his chain laid through the red table groove. Todd and Cava shared a floor stake because his elbow still carried her ankle.

The freight landing guard received the gray wall ring and kept his red packing cord around one wrist. Ruvan left the man's pay card where Nessa's field finger had lifted it from the band.

"Lower current takes the west rooms first, so every new route closes before the second floor rolls."

The crossing workers tightened the six pale downstakes. Rillhold's black replacement stood inside the locked house below them, tied to the table by a line that pulled Ty's shadow toward the floor.

Cava felt that line inside all seven crown cuts.

Nessa placed the recovered finger beside the punch carrying Tovan's breath.

"The finger can tap one carrier line while your jaw gives the band a return address."

Todd shifted the staff across Cava's chest strap.

"How much of her shoulder does your useful version consume?"

"The band chooses that unless Cava fixes the jaw and cuts the address herself."

Cava checked the capture hook. Its blunt end remained through the jaw hinge. The sharpened inner curve could cut the packing fiber before the teeth reached skin.

She tapped the hook with each finger. Thumb, index, and middle answered. Her ring finger closed late. The smallest finger gave her no pressure at all.

The occupied clinic had fallen after Cava moved two sick children off a failed address. She had kept control through the first turn. Three quarry workers paid for everything the route did after that. Tovan's breath occupied one line, while eleven other punches waited to use whatever she opened.

Cava slid her wrist through a spare table strap.

"Strap this hand before the band takes it away from me."

Todd tightened the strap around her wrist and left the capture hook under her fingers.

She looked at the landing guard.

"One address reaches one breath line, and if another punch opens, Todd breaks the jaw while Ruvan pulls every wall ring before the band gets my shoulder."

His fingers tightened around the red cord.

"Keep the seventh account open until my shift card receives one live stamp."

"My shoulder stays mine while your card waits."

Ruvan turned the red table groove until Ty's whole chain rested against one downstake.

"Rillhold accepts one contact before lower current, with Cava controlling the final cut."

Jade put both hands around Ty's skull and the first chain link.

"Ty Hockenson, hold one down and leave every open punch outside your bones."

"One down remains, and the band keeps its teeth outside me."

Todd planted the end of his staff beneath the recovery jaw. Cava leaned her shoulder against it until the long crown cut lined up with the first of seven pulling positions.

The jaw bit through her shirt.

Pressure ran from the long scar into her collar and took the feeling from two fingers. She closed those fingers around the capture hook before they became useless.

"Nessa may tap the breath line while this hand still closes."

The recovered field finger pressed the second punch.

Five breaths crossed the table. The sixth failed.

Beyond the band, a cup rim struck bone twice. After turning the cup, Ty's left hand caught a chain; Kestra's buckles returned three knocks through the metal.

Nessa shifted the finger a fraction to keep the punch from widening.

"Three carrier buckles remain on Kestra's post, and Ty's left hand still holds the cup."

Jade kept her grip on the skull while Ty's green eye followed the taps.

"My hand can keep Tovan breathing, but the freight doors are turning around their post."

The third square punch opened against Cava's shoulder.

Nobody touched it.

Black heat pushed through Ty's jaw hinge. His chain stayed on one down while soul pressure pulled toward the third punch, stretching green fire between his ribs and lifting his pelvis against the red groove.

Jade tightened the red groove around every link.

"Ty Hockenson, name the pull without giving it a road."

"That weight followed my soul when a sealed crown wanted a living vessel."

The third punch drew one slow breath from beyond the table. The breath ended inside a sealed weight too heavy for the line to lift.

"It proves a sealed soul load, and it names nobody carrying it."

Cava forced the capture hook deeper through the jaw hinge. The numbness reached her wrist.

The landing guard's pay card slid toward the remaining punches.

Three wax loops peeled from its back. He lunged for them, but his gray wall ring stopped his chest at the table edge.

The first loop fitted around an empty punch and tightened to the width of a child's wrist. The second flattened into a chest strap measure. The third opened around the shape of a breathing cup.

No house address appeared on any of them.

The guard stopped pulling against his ring.

"Those places were sold as rooms for three dead workers' families."

Cava watched the smallest loop test the empty punch again.

"They measured the families before anyone promised them a room."

The guard looked at the nine unstamped shift boxes. Wax from the first box had begun running toward Cava's long scar.

"I gave the clerk their ages, sleeping needs, and work limits because the housing list promised each family a room near the freight floor."

"Then keep the card and make the clerk answer what those ages bought."

His thumb went beneath the softened wax. Pulling the card free would close the clean payroll return. Leaving it would let the three loops finish taking body measurements through Cava.

He tore the card away.

The wax broke across all nine boxes. Todd caught the three family loops on his staff before they entered the carrier punches.

Cava turned her capture hook.

The sharpened inner curve cut the packing fiber between her crown and the recovery jaw. The metal teeth stayed around her shirt. The address pull left her shoulder, taking the feeling in her smallest two fingers with it.

Together, Nessa removed the field finger from Tovan's punch while Jade rolled Ty's chain away from the third and Ruvan closed the table groove over the torn band.

The twelve punches shut from the outside inward.

At the eleventh, wood struck the underside of the table.

Todd dropped to one knee and caught a capsule staff section as the closing punch pushed it into Rillhold. The piece carried the groove left by the wooden Cross Link stair where he had abandoned it.

A cut red climbing line had been tied twice around the middle, with a brass strip marked by seven short cuts beneath the knot. Todd had left that strip for Nana before following Cava into Griswald's freight stair.

He turned the staff once, checking the cord rather than pulling it free.

"Nana found the piece I lost, which proves she moved and nothing more."