Ch. 27: Procurement and Ch. 28 The Errand

Chapter 27: Procurement

On the morning after the wall inspection, Lia pronounced Marielle’s arm unchanged.

Marielle had begun to dislike that word. “It has not pulled again since yesterday.”

“I would prefer it had never started.” Lia examined the edges of the wound, then rested her fingers beside it. Pale light spread beneath her hand. “Both times yesterday, did it pull along the cut, or beneath it?”

“Beneath. Inward.”

“Toward your shoulder?”

“Not precisely. It felt deeper than the wound.”

“And changing position?”

“Made no difference. The first time I was sitting still.”

Lia nodded, though she did not look pleased. Her fingers moved a little farther down Marielle’s arm.

“Is that useful?” Marielle asked.

“Yes. It makes strain from movement less likely.”

“You already thought that was unlikely.”

“I still ask.”

Marielle watched the light fade. “What else have you ruled out?”

Lia drew her stool closer. “The poison caused the initial fever and tissue damage. I have found no continuing activity from it, including in the samples I sent for a second examination.”

“To whom?”

“A healer I worked with during the war. She treated more blade poisons than anyone should have had occasion to study.”

“And she agrees with you?”

“About the poison, yes. The wound should be recovering more quickly now that it is gone.”

Marielle looked down at the exposed cut. The edges remained stubbornly separated.

“A curse?”

“I tested for that. More than once, with different methods. Nothing responded.” Lia reached for her notes. “Your healing elsewhere is normal. The small abrasions you acquired in the workshop have closed at the rate I would expect.”

“They were very small.”

“They were useful comparisons. That was not permission to acquire more.”

Marielle decided against explaining the circumstances. Lia already knew enough about the workshop to object to it in detail.

“So the problem is confined to the wound.”

“Yes.”

“Something the dagger left behind.”

“That is what I suspect.”

Lia turned a page, then stopped without reading it. Marielle had seen her do that yesterday.

“You have a more specific suspicion,” she said.

“I do.” Lia set the notes aside. “Blood magic.”

Marielle’s eyes returned to her arm.

She knew the term. Usually it appeared in accounts of things people should not have done.

“You had not mentioned that possibility.”

“Until yesterday, I had a wound healing too slowly and no detectable spell to explain it. There were other causes to investigate before I frightened you with one I could not substantiate.”

“And now?”

“Now you have described multiple instances of something pulling at it while you were sitting still. I treated soldiers during the war who experienced pain without a fresh injury, or whose wounds reopened when no one had touched them. Some had blood bindings.”

Marielle considered that. “You think someone can affect it from elsewhere.”

“I think that is a possibility we need to investigate.”

“Can you find the binding?”

“Not yet.” Lia’s frustration was plain now. “Nothing answers when I examine it. If there is spellwork here, it may be dormant between those episodes.”

“So you need to examine it while it is pulling.”

“I would very much like the opportunity.”

The pointedness was deserved. Marielle disliked that.

“The first episode stopped almost immediately.”

“And you told no one until the second.”

“I intended to tell you.”

“I need observations while they are useful, Marielle. You would say the same to anyone taking measurements for you.”

Marielle could find no satisfactory objection to that.

“What are you testing?”

“I have kept material from the dressings, dated so I can compare how it behaves over time. I am examining the blood separately from the wound discharge, and testing both for responses to diagnostic magic. I have also written to a colleague who treated blood-work injuries during the war. She may recognize something I have missed.”

“Does she have a sample?”

“A portion. I kept the rest here.”

Marielle approved of that. “And if none of it responds?”

“We continue comparing it, and you report another pull immediately. Where you were, what you were doing, how long it lasted. Anything that felt different.”

“Even if it stops.”

“Especially if it stops before I reach you.”

Lia began replacing the dressing. Marielle held still while she secured it.

“Is continuing to work dangerous?”

“I have no evidence that seated work is making this worse. Lifting and reaching still strain tissue that has not healed, whatever is delaying it.” Lia settled the support beneath her arm. “Those restrictions remain. If the pulling returns, or you develop pain, bleeding, fever, or dizziness, you stop and send for me.”

Marielle looked at the neat edge of the bandage. She would have preferred a diagnosis. A set of tests and instructions was at least something she understood.

“I will tell Corren and Mael.”

“Thank you,” Lia said.

That afternoon, Marielle reviewed the materials list for the independent diagnostic arrays.

They needed five matched pieces of resonance glass.

The palace stores had sent six blue crystals, two clear ones, and something labeled resonance glass that had apparently once belonged to a decorative window.

She stared at it.

Serali leaned across the worktable. “That is not resonance glass.”

“No.”

“It is pretty.”

“That is irrelevant.”

“I thought it might help.”

“It does not.”

Marielle put it beside the others and wrote a label.

NOT THIS.

Serali looked at the label and then at Marielle. “You could be more specific.”

“I was specific in the request.”

That had not helped either.

The blanks needed to come from the same firing batch, with comparable internal stress and as little previous magical exposure as possible.

Not merely the same color.

Not something a merchant assured her had come from the same workshop at some point during the last season.

The monitors needed to disagree with the wall for meaningful reasons.

They did not need to disagree with each other because one component had spent three years beside a weather charm.

Serali picked up a clear crystal. “What happens if they are not properly matched?”

“We spend days determining whether the wall is wrong, the monitor is wrong, or the glass is wrong.”

Serali put it down carefully. “I see.”

“Exactly.”

Marielle drew her list closer.

Five glass blanks. Ten unkeyed plates. Fine-drawn silver-copper wire. Binding resin. Fine-thread fasteners.

And chalk.

The chalk was unrelated to the monitors.

She needed more.

That was sufficient justification.

The door opened and Daravan entered. He looked at the table between them.

His attention stopped on the labeled pile. “What is that?”

“Not this.”

Serali covered her mouth.

Marielle indicated the label. “It is clearly identified.”

“I see.” He came farther into the room. “What do you need?”

Convenient.

Marielle handed him the list. “I am going into the lower artisan district tomorrow morning.”

He did not take it. “No.”

She waited.

Daravan remained still.

Marielle extended the page another inch. “This contains the suppliers.”

“Send someone.”

“I need to inspect the materials.”

“Someone else can purchase glass.”

“Someone else purchased that.”

She pointed to the window material.

Daravan looked at it. “That is not a compelling argument against everyone else in the palace. Send another engineer.”

Marielle considered whether he was offering a useful alternative or simply continuing to object.

Either seemed possible.

“The blanks must be matched. Two pieces can come from the same firing batch and still have different internal stress.”

“How do you check?”

“I tap them.”

“With what?”

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“My finger.”

Daravan looked at her.

“They sound different,” she explained.

Serali murmured, “Of course they do.”

“They do.”

“I believe you.”

Daravan finally took the list. “And the plates?”

“I need to check that they have not been pre-keyed.”

“The merchant cannot tell you?”

“The merchant can tell me anything.”

His mouth tightened.

That, apparently, he understood.

“The wire?”

“Fine enough not to distort the return.”

He read the rest.

Marielle waited.

“Three suppliers,” he said.

“Yes.”

“Any others?”

“If those do not have suitable stock.”

His eyes lifted. “That is not how we are arranging this.”

“I cannot purchase nonexistent materials.”

“Then you return, and we arrange another visit.”

“That is inefficient.”

“Yes.”

“You say that as though it is a virtue.”

“Occasionally.”

Serali stood.

Marielle looked at her.

“I will return this,” Serali said, picking up the decorative glass.

“To whom?”

“The person who sent it.”

“That may not be the person who selected it.”

“Then I shall begin an investigation.”

Daravan glanced at her.

Serali looked between them. “You appear to have enough investigators here.”

She left.

Marielle returned her attention to Daravan. “I was informing you so you could arrange the escort.”

“I understood.”

“Then why are you answering as though I asked permission?”

He set the list down. For a moment, he said nothing.

Then, “Four Lyehiran operatives remain unaccounted for. Someone watched the inspection party yesterday. Your arm is still not healing normally.”

Marielle’s irritation changed shape.

None of those statements was unreasonable. Still, none made the glass less necessary.

“Has the Watch identified the man?”

“No. Harrek is following the lead.”

“So you do not know he was watching me.”

“No.”

“He might have been watching Serali. Or the Headmaster.”

“He might.” Daravan did not sound reassured by the range of possibilities.

Marielle looked at her arm.

She knew why she had guards. The dagger, the unknown purpose of the injury, the four agents still somewhere in the city. She had accepted Corren and Mael accompanying her through corridors she had walked alone for years.

Before First Sun, she could decide she needed wire and go out to buy it. Sometimes an attendant came with her. Usually they waited in the carriage while she visited the shops.

Now she was arguing over whether she could leave at all. “You are not my keeper.”

Daravan’s expression changed. He lowered the list.

“No,” he said. “I am responsible for your security.”

“I understand that. But I cannot do my job if I cannot leave the palace. There will be materials I need to inspect myself, and work that cannot be brought here.”

He considered her for a moment. “I will protect you, then.”

Marielle did not immediately reply. Something pulled strangely beneath her ribs. Not her arm. An unrelated complication.

“I mean, I will send protection with you.” Daravan looked back at the suppliers.

“Corren and Mael already accompany me,” she said. “We can arrange the route.”

“And two additional guards.”

Marielle stared. “Four?”

“The palace has controlled entrances. The city does not.”

That was a reasonable distinction. It did not make four guards fit into a glassmaker’s shop.

“The shops have narrow aisles. Crates. Worktables. Four guards following me through them will obstruct movement and make me conspicuous.”

“I am trying to prevent anyone reaching you.”

“Then put the additional people where they can see something. Corren and Mael with me. Others watching the approaches instead of occupying the same aisle.”

Daravan studied her, then drew the list closer. “Two with you. I will ask Harrek for two observers.”

“In plain clothes.”

“Yes.”

“At a distance.”

“Where they can maintain sight.”

“That is a better design.”

“I am delighted you approve.”

“You sound otherwise.”

“I frequently do.”

Marielle looked at the list again. Four people, but not four people surrounding her. The difference mattered.

“You stay with Corren and Mael,” Daravan said.

“Yes.”

“One inside the shop with you. One covering the entrance where the interior is too narrow for both.”

“Reasonable.”

“No leaving through another door without them.”

“I did not propose that.”

“No improvised suppliers.”

“If the glassmaker has moved—”

“You return.”

“That creates an entirely unnecessary journey.”

“It creates a journey we can secure.”

Marielle considered arguing but he had already considered her argument.

Annoying.

“Fine.”

“Departure?”

“Eight bells.”

“Expected return?”

“Before midday.”

“Check-in?”

“Where?”

“I will agree the point with Harrek. On the route.”

“Who are the observers?” she asked.

“Harrek will assign them.”

“Will I know?”

“Your escorts will know how to contact them. You do not need to look for them.”

“I would not.”

Daravan looked at her.

Marielle considered. “I might.”

He wrote beside the supplier names. Times. Route. Escort. Check-in.

Marielle watched the additions. “I need the materials quickly.”

“I know.”

“We have confirmed two compromised reporting points. We do not yet know how many others there are.”

“I know.”

“Until we can compare their behavior independently—”

“I know, Lady Marielle.”

She stopped.

Of course he knew.

He had crouched beside the altered bridges.

Had listened while Halal explained the reference lattice, watched the wall return values it had no right to find reassuring.

Daravan was not disputing the need, he was trying to make the work happen without losing the people doing it.

An irritating objective, but not an unreasonable one.

Marielle held out her hand.

He looked at it.

“The list.”

He gave it back.

She read his additions. “I am not taking a carriage between all three shops. The middle distance is shorter on foot.”

“To the district and back.”

“Good.”

She put the list beside the unfinished monitor housing.

Daravan remained at the table.

Marielle looked up. “Was there something else?”

“Lia’s restrictions.”

“I remember.”

He glanced toward the housing.

It sat slightly beyond comfortable reach.

Before Marielle could move it, he drew it closer to her right hand.

“There,” he said.

She looked at the housing, then at him.

He had done that yesterday too. It was helpful, though unnecessary to his immediate work.

“Thank you.”

Daravan nodded.

At the door, he stopped. “The Watch arrangement is not confirmed yet.”

“I understood.”

“I will tell you when Harrek has assigned it.”

“I am not leaving until tomorrow.”

“I know.”

He went.

Marielle picked up her pencil.

Four field monitors, one control. Corren and Mael, two observers, if Harrek agreed.

Several systems improved by arranging their parts properly.

She could work with that.

Daravan was halfway to his office when he recalled his exact wording.

I will protect you, then.

He could have said he would arrange an escort. That had been the subject under discussion.

Instead, he had made a declaration in an engineering room while holding a list that included binding resin and chalk. He hoped it had sounded more ordinary to Marielle than it did in recollection.

Her accusation had troubled him more.

You are not my keeper.

He had begun the conversation with an order when she had come to him to arrange something necessary. She had already accepted restrictions on her work, her movements, even which hand she could use to open a case. He should have allowed for that before adding more.

At his desk, he set his copy of the supplier list beside the duty roster.

He knew this habit. During the war, after men under his command were wounded, he had reviewed routes and positions long after the immediate reports were finished. Occasionally he found something useful. Often he found a decision he would have made again with the information he had possessed at the time.

He still reviewed them.

Marielle had been hurt at First Sun. She was a councilor under his protection, a colleague he liked and respected. Now the wound would not heal properly. That was sufficient reason for him to be concerned.

It did not make every precaution he proposed a good one.

The arrangement would cover the approaches without filling the shops with guards. Harrek would choose officers who knew how to do that work.

Daravan began the request, including the agreed route and check-in. He left space for the observers’ names, then reached for the palace duty roster.

Chapter 28: The Errand

Myrae smelled different before the market fully woke.

By midday, the district would be noise and color: spice smoke, dye vats, hot metal, damp stone, perfume, leather, frying oil, and people yelling over one another with the confidence of experts and liars.

At eight bells, it was quieter.

Stalls half-open. Awnings being raised. Shopfronts sweeping out yesterday’s dust. Bakers setting out trays. Smiths already awake because apparently fire had no respect for humane hours.

Marielle loved it.

Not the jostling. Not the way every fifth person tried to sell her decorative hinges as though appearance could compensate for weak pins.

She loved the materials.

Wood sorted by age and grain. Brass rods bundled by thickness. Clay wrapped in damp cloth. Resin jars kept in shaded racks.

Every district had a language, and Myrae spoke in texture, weight, heat tolerance, and the sound a thing made when tapped with a knuckle.

Corren surveyed it with the expression of a man who considered every awning a possible ambush and every baker a suspect.

Mael watched the approaching carts.

Neither appeared moved by the materials.

Daravan had met them before departure.

Of course.

Harrek had assigned the two observers. Corren had received the contact arrangements and repeated them back without making Marielle privy to anything useful.

Daravan had reminded her of Lia’s restrictions.

She had reminded him that both her memory and her right arm remained functional.

He had handed her into the carriage anyway.

Now Corren stopped beside the glassmaker’s door and looked through the front window.

Mael checked the street behind them.

Marielle waited.

She had agreed to the precautions.

Waiting was apparently one of them.

Corren nodded, and they entered.

The first piece of resonance glass was wrong. Marielle knew before she touched it.

The merchant did not.

“This is from the same firing,” he said.

“No.”

He blinked.

Mael stood a little behind her right shoulder. Corren remained at the open doorway, watching the street and the reflected shop interior.

The glassmaker held out another blank.

Marielle tapped it with one fingernail.

Then the first.

Different.

Not dramatically.

Enough.

“This one cooled faster.”

The merchant looked at the glass and then back at her.

“You can hear that?”

“Yes.”

He looked toward Mael.

Mael gave him nothing.

Marielle approved.

“I need five sufficiently alike to compare once they are keyed independently,” she said.

“I understand.”

“You understand the sentence. These do not meet it.”

The glassmaker’s expression became strained. “I have another crate.”

“Good.”

He went into the storeroom.

Marielle studied the rejected blanks.

Mael looked toward her left sleeve.

“I am not going to collapse,” she told him.

“My lady?”

“You keep looking at my arm.”

“I was checking—”

“Whether the wound hurts?”

Mael hesitated.

Then nodded. “Yes.”

“Very bad lying. You should work on that before Daravan sees.”

Corren spoke from the doorway. “Captain already knows.”

Marielle set down the glass. “Captain Daravan knows many things. It is part of his curse.”

Mael’s mouth twitched. “He instructed us to watch for pain, dizziness, unusual behavior, or attempts to evade escort.”

“Did he?”

“In general terms.”

“What qualifies as unusual behavior?”

“For you, Lady Marielle,” Corren said, “we were told to apply generous interpretation.”

Marielle smiled despite herself. That was almost funny.

Also offensive. And observant.

The glassmaker returned before she decided which mattered most.

He set a shallow crate on the counter.

Six clear blanks. Same dimensions. No obvious prior keying.

Marielle forgot Daravan.

She tapped the first.

Second.

Third.

Paused at the fourth.

Mael watched her hand.

Corren watched a man stopping outside the window.

Marielle tapped the fourth again, then the fifth and sixth.

“These.”

The merchant exhaled.

“The sixth?”

“Wrong.”

“It came from the same firing.”

“Yes.”

His expression suggested this had become a personal attack.

Marielle considered explaining uneven cooling at the kiln’s edge and decided against it.

Progress.

While the merchant wrapped the selected pieces, Mael asked, “Why does the difference matter?”

“The monitors need to disagree with the wall for useful reasons. If their materials differ, they may disagree with one another.”

He nodded.

A useful question.

The merchant offered to include the rejected blank at a reduced price.

“No,” Marielle said.

“A spare.”

“A spare problem.”

He stopped offering.

Corren took the wrapped case.

“I can carry it,” she said.

“I know.”

“I know how to carry glass.”

“I know.”

“Then why—”

“Captain’s orders.”

Marielle looked at Mael.

He opened the door.

An efficient conspiracy.

Outside, a man examined a tray of buckles across the street.

A woman stood beside the opposite stall, apparently considering ribbon.

Marielle looked at the man.

Then the woman.

Then the lane behind them.

“Stop looking for them, my lady,” Mael said.

She turned. “I am looking at merchandise.”

“You have looked at that same tray three times.”

“The buckles are badly made.”

Corren glanced at the tray. “They are.”

Mael looked between them. “That does not mean she is not looking for the observers.”

Marielle frowned. “You are becoming difficult.”

She directed her attention toward the next supplier.

For approximately twelve paces.

Then looked at a man carrying an empty basket.

Mael cleared his throat.

“I have stopped,” she said.

“Yes, my lady.”

She suspected that was not agreement.

The wardwright’s supplier had nine plates.

Marielle needed ten.

This was the first problem.

Three had been lightly keyed. Two carried old residue. One had a crack hidden beneath the edge binding.

That left three.

“Actually,” she told the shopkeeper, “you have three.”

The woman stared.

Mael examined the rear door.

Corren shifted at the entrance to keep the street in view.

Marielle turned the cracked plate toward the light. “There.”

The shopkeeper looked and her objection became quieter. She went to her back room for more stock.

By the time they finished, Marielle had six usable plates and a written undertaking that the remaining four would come from an unopened shipment.

The delivery would go to the palace, which prevented another journey. Daravan would approve.

She found herself pleased by that and immediately attributed it to efficiency.

They made the check-in at the agreed Watch post.

Corren spoke briefly to the officer while Mael stayed with her.

Marielle bought chalk from the tray beside the post.

Not another shop or a detour.

She considered the distinction defensible.

Corren looked at the packets when he returned.

“On the list,” she said.

“I remember.”

The third supplier stood behind the dyers’ court.

They passed a fittings display on the way. A small spring had excellent tension and no apparent purpose deserving it.

Marielle paused.

Mael paused with her.

She looked at him.

Then at the spring.

Then resumed walking.

She could admire something without buying it.

Occasionally.

“This is going well,” she said.

Corren looked at the roofline.

Mael checked a turning cart.

Neither answered.

“That was an opening for conversation.”

“Yes, my lady,” Corren said.

“You are both terrible company.”

“Yes, my lady,” they said together.

That was worse.

Blue-stained water ran in channels beside the curb. Old pigment tinted the walls of the lane.

The sign above the third shop had been repainted recently.

Aurrel’s Resins and Binding Compounds.

Neat gold letters. No unnecessary flowers.

Promising.

Corren stopped outside. Mael went to the entrance, looked through, and spoke briefly to the woman behind the counter.

Marielle waited again.

Then Corren nodded.

Mistress Aurrel was silver-haired, with rings on several fingers and the expression of someone who had been born unimpressed and refined the skill.

Marielle had always appreciated that about her.

“Lady Marielle,” Aurrel said. “You are early.”

“Captain Daravan has opinions about market density.”

“Does he buy resin?”

“No.”

“Then his opinions have limited jurisdiction.”

“Excellent. I agree.”

Corren took his place at the entrance.

Mael checked the rear of the shop.

“The door?” he asked Aurrel.

“Bolted. Window looks onto the service lane.”

He inspected both, then returned close enough to see Marielle and the back window.

She set the plate samples on the counter.

“I need clean binding resin. Heat-stable. No ash-lime. No river grit. No old stock warmed to improve the pour.”

Aurrel raised her brows. “Someone has wronged you.”

“Repeatedly.”

“Terrible.”

Aurrel turned toward the shaded shelves. “I have two batches worth your time. And the tension pins you requested.”

Marielle took out her notebook.

Corren put the glass case where passing elbows would not strike it. Mael remained beside the rear aisle.

Aurrel uncorked the first jar.

Marielle leaned closer. “Too cloudy.”

“It clears when warmed,” Aurrel said.

“That does not remove what made it cloudy.”

“You have not tested it.”

“I would prefer not to begin with something that needs an excuse.”

Aurrel studied her, then recorked the jar and brought another from the shelf.

“I do not sell inferior stock.”

“Then you will be pleased when I establish that.”

Corren made a small sound at the doorway.

Aurrel set the second jar down. “The shipment you rejected last winter came through a wholesaler.”

“I know.”

“I did not blend it.”

“I am giving you the opportunity to feel superior.”

“I appreciate that.”

Marielle checked the seal, then the batch mark.

Same stock in the larger jars behind it.

Enough for all five housings.

The morning’s purchases had begun to become an apparatus in her mind. Clear blanks. Matched plates. Wire carrying a return that belonged to the instrument, not the wall.

They would still need to test it.

But she could build it now.

She drew the second jar closer with her right hand.

This was why she had come herself.