They lashed the Lurker to a sled because nothing with wheels would forgive them later. Corlan and two white-shirts had built the thing out of stall planks and iron straps in a hurry that didn't look like one. Rope webbed the beast, jaw wedged with a bar and a shovel. Ren set the ties and tapped each knot with his knuckle like that made the rope sing back to him.
"Jaw again," Ryo said. He didn't trust dead or pinned until he'd lied to it three times. Ren levered the bar and the Lurker hissed through its stuffed mouth like a man swearing around a gag. Good. Alive enough to prove a point. Not enough to make the point take a hand.
Harrod stood with his cloak back and his seal out, face flat. "My men go ahead," he said. "No whistles. No hooks unless I say. Merek—"
Merek smiled small with his wrists bound and said nothing because he liked his teeth. The cut at his hairline had gone purple under rain. The tin man Tomas rubbed his shoulder against the post like a dog trying a bad knot. Anna tightened it for him until he hissed.
Soren carried his countersign like a pole. He had not stopped for breath since the cistern. "We read at every bend," he said. "No one gets to say they didn't hear it."
"Read loud," Mara said, ledger under her arm, eyes raw. "My pen's tired."
The priest fell in behind the sled with his broom like a man escorting a coffin and daring anyone to call it pretty. Brann walked next to Merek because he liked that place without deciding why.
Ryo checked his bag. Book. Cloth. Jar. Tin. Whistles. Stock pin at his belt. He touched the bag's top. He didn't say anything to anyone about it. He never did.
They set hands to rope and wood and pushed. The sled moved like wet stone. Men grunted. Women with strong backs put their shoulders in without asking. The Lurker made a noise when it felt edges and tried to remember how to be king of a ditch. The boys at the tail rode it like a log and learned about balance.
"By Gareth's hand and mine," Soren said at the lane's mouth, voice sharp, "we escort evidence to the hall. Anyone who touches this sled without Warden's say sits and pays."
Escort line: raised. Mobile, anchored to herald. Duration: until presented or dismissed.
Ryo didn't straighten. He didn't like relying on words he couldn't put his hands on, but the road under his boots felt less like someone else's property for a breath.
They hit the bend where, earlier, men had been nailing "Assist Collectors" boards. Three were back at it, eyes down like they hoped to pass for weather. Two had cudgels. One had a red scrap pinned inside his cloak like a polite lie.
Harrod didn't play polite. "Off the road," he said, pointing at the ditch. "Put your boards in the mud. Touch a nail, I fine you here."
The cudgel men showed his men their palms and stepped aside because Harrod's voice had been meant for rooms where sticks meant a bad dinner later. The one with red kept his feet planted and squared his jaw.
Ryo saw the tell that mattered: his boot heels were clean. He hadn't lifted anything all morning. He posted orders and expected other people's backs to do the work. Ryo stepped up, took the board from his hand, snapped it across his thigh, and dropped the pieces in the ditch.
"You can fish that out if you want it back," Ryo said. The man swallowed and didn't.
They pushed. The sled slid. The weir's sound fell behind them and the road took its place. The chain marks from the black coats' yoke had left scratches on stone like bad writing. Ryo set his boot in one and made himself not look down at what didn't matter right now.
They passed the mill path. Men stood under the awning with flour on their faces like snow they hadn't earned. One raised a whistle half-concealed under his apron out of habit. Anna saw it and held up her fat pot and shook it. He put the whistle down like he was going to be sick.
"Read," Ryo said. Soren read. The words tasted cleaner than they had in the morning. People shut their mouths around whistles.
At the culvert, trouble waited like it had a slot on the day. The black coat with the chain pin and two men in grey stood over the arched mouth. A chain lay coil-dark on the road, tidy, as if someone had been about to lay it across and had been called away for tea. The chain pin raised his hand, smiling as if he'd liked the game so far and was ready for the next round.
"By the Chainmaster's writ," he called, "you will surrender contracted property to a licensed handler." He jerked his chin at Harrod, polite. "Bailiff, you can sign for it if you like."
"No," Harrod said, bored with himself. "Move. You're welcome to walk with us if you need exercise."
The chain pin nodded like he respected a lie even when he didn't. He snapped his fingers without looking down. A boy half Ryo's height, mud up to his knees, slid out from under the culvert arch with a whistle in his mouth. He didn't blow it. He put it between his teeth and looked at the chain man, waiting.
Brann said, "Don't," as if to the boy and the world.
Ryo saw nails. Not scattered. Stitched into a little mat just under the sled's path where the chain lay. Two dots on the mat's corner. The nails were set backward—points up through a thin cloth. If the sled went over, it would grab and jar. The Lurker would hate that and try to move. Then somebody would call fetch so the beast moved toward the chain like it knew where to put its neck.
"Toller," Ryo said, not lifting his voice. "Rug."
Toller skated sideways, saw the mat just by how the chain man kept his eyes not looking at it, and slid his rope under the cloth edge. He yanked. Nails came up in a wet, ugly clatter. The boy under the culvert flinched like his own teeth had been pulled.
The chain man's smile didn't change. He waved up his other hand. Two more black coats stepped out from the brush with a pole between them. A loop hung off the end—a yoke like the last one but wider, iron faced, with teeth inside the loop to bite rope or flesh when it closed. They tilted it so the loop could drop over the rope that held the Lurker's head. They started forward.
Ryo grabbed the broken board from the ditch where he'd stomped the "Assist" sign. He held it flat like a shield, stepped into the pole's path, and slid the board inside the yoke just before it would have closed on rope. Teeth bit wood and stuck. The men heaved. The board took the energy instead of the rope. It cracked, then held on two stubborn slats. Ryo shoved the yoke sideways and put the loaded loop under the sled frame. He looked at the chain man and smiled without humor.
"You attached?" Ryo asked.
The chain man's eyes cut to the yoke and then back. "We are," he said.
"Good," Ryo said, and kicked the yoke further under the sled so the loop hung up on the cross-brace. "Corlan, move." Corlan grunted and put the sled weight on the yoke. The teeth bit their own iron and sang. The two black coats tried to pull. They couldn't. The sled owned their tool. The chain man's smile dropped a tooth.
Harrod didn't bother to hide his grin. "Keep up," he told the chain men. "We're late for a table."
The chain man considered starting something stupid. He didn't. He gestured to his two with the yoke. "Leave it," he said, and motioned the culvert boy back with a flick of two fingers. The boy went into the dark like water takes a leaf.
They pushed again. The rope hummed. The Lurker made a low sound. Ryo put his hand on the sled frame near the head tie and breathed with the rope until the hum slid back to held.
Merek leaned toward Ryo as he walked with Brann. He kept his voice soft, private, the tone of a man enjoying himself in a crowd. "Chain won't fight you here," he said. "He's counting who will cheer. He'll count them twice in the hall and lock them into a story with a seal and a laugher's pen. Bring your frog. He'll cut it into parts and name each part his."
"I'll feed him rope before I feed him meat," Ryo said.
Merek's smile sharpened. "He'll feed you paper," he said. "Let's see which of us shits better afterward."
"Quiet," Brann said without looking at either of them. He didn't like the way Merek's voice moved in air.
They crested the low rise where the road bent toward Millroads. The hall's roofline showed like a statement some man had made a generation ago and had people recite since—stone square, banners wet. Riders in black with chain pins sat fifty paces out from the gate. The gate itself had a chain draped across, heavy links as big as a man's palm, each link marked with a knotted stamp. A man stood under the chain in a coat Ryo hated on sight—cut rich, gray pin at the throat, neat beard. Olsin, Ryo assumed. Steward. A second red cloak at his shoulder held a paper case like it had weight.
"Stop," Harrod said before anyone else could. He didn't shout. He wanted to measure his breath. He stepped up until salt couldn't have sat between him and Olsin's neat shoes.
"Bailiff," Olsin said, friendly as a viper in a basket. "I heard you signed a novel day into being. You made a Warden. You picked up a frog. You told my deputy Merek he can sit with puddles and learn manners."
"You heard right," Harrod said.
Olsin's eyes slid to Ryo like a man checking the price of something on a stall. "Warden," he said, polite. "Step aside. Contracted abatement transfers here into proper hands. Lord Gareth will not receive slime on his steps."
Ryo put the bag on the sled, put one palm on it, and looked at the chain draped across the gate. Up close the stamp on each link wasn't two dots. It was a knot-sigil, tight, notched. But in the weld seam of one link—thin, almost a scratch—he saw it: two faint burned dots, like a mark from a maker who sold iron to whoever paid, chain or collar. He filed it.
"We read at the table," Ryo said. "Bring your seal. Bring your lord. We'll lay whistles next to tin and rope and your man's name. We'll lay your two dots by your chain and write where the money crossed."
Olsin's smile didn't move. His eyes did. He looked at Soren. "Clerk," he said. "Come home. Leave this lane-talker to his rope. The hall will decide what gets written. You can keep your job if you put that countersign down and say, 'I was excited and overstepped.'"
Soren lifted the sign with both hands so his wrists didn't shake. He answered without looking at Harrod or Ryo because he knew if he did he might ask for permission. "I stood," he said. "I'm standing. If you want to put that down for me, you'll do it in the book and I'll read it out loud so everyone hears who signed it."
Olsin laughed. It wasn't mean. It was boring. "You're fired," he said, light, like a man tossing a crust to a dog. "You can hand that countersign to Harrod for proper storage."
Mara's pen clicked like a nail. "No," she said. "He can hand it to the Warden or me. We kept the road today while your man blew whistles at a well."
Olsin lifted two fingers. A black coat at the gate took a half step forward with the big yoke-rod, not to attack, to remind everyone who had the shiny piece of iron. Another black coat stepped off his horse with a chain harness, links trailing, loops for knees and elbows like he expected to dress a thing and drag it.
"By the Chainmaster's writ," Olsin said, and this time the words had weight that wasn't his—like a rope through a pulley. "Abatement property is ours on sight. Unmake this line."
Ryo felt it—his escort line, the witness weight, the weir's calm echo—slip like a bar under pressure. Not gone. Pushed. The chain across the gate hummed a note human throat can't make. People shifted. Some took a breath and forgot to let it out.
He put his hand on the sled wood and said nothing holy. He said: "Hold."
The hum slid back a hair, stubborn. Rope remembered his hands. Words also remembered something.
Countermand resisted. Chain writ pressure—external. Reinforcement needed: witnesses, salt, leverage.
"Salt," Ryo said. Anna already had a sack. She drew a thin line on the road three paces from the chain, wide enough for the sled. Sweat cut through the mud at her temple. She didn't wipe it.
Soren lifted his countersign like it was heavier than before. "By Gareth's hand and mine—not Olsin's," he said, and that got a laugh from someone who needed one—"escort line to the hall steps. We read there. We present there. Witnessed."
"Witnessed," Harrod said, stepping with the salt like he'd been doing this his whole life even if he hadn't. The priest dragged the broom bristles in the wet salt and made a thicker white.
The chain's hum stuttered like a man who'd been interrupted mid-word and hated it.
Ryo looked at Olsin. "Bring your chain behind the salt," he said. "You want to own this, you step into our mess. Or are you allergic?"
Olsin's smile showed one extra tooth. He raised his hands slightly like he was blessing fools. "You and your two dots," he said softly enough that only Ryo and Harrod and Anna heard. "You made yourselves something for a day. You want a week? You need a chain. Not a rope. Not a pin. Not a book. Something that closes and stays closed when men like me want it open. You have that?"
Ryo didn't answer. He gestured, and Corlan and the white-shirts hauled. The sled slid. The salt line scuffed. The Lurker hissed. The rope hummed. The chain sang a little louder like it wanted to be a song, not a sound.
"Anna," Ryo said. "Cloth." She knew which. Book or Blood. She slapped it on the sled where the beast's eye could see it if beasts even had that kind of brain. It didn't matter if it did. People did.
Brann stepped in without being invited. He put his shoulder into the rope with Toller. He looked at Olsin. "You take my mark," he said. "You can keep it. I'll take a different job. I'll stand on this."
Olsin looked almost delighted. "Good," he said. "Now I know who needs to pay his tithes at the door."
They inched forward. The chain pin moved like he was going to lower the big yoke. Harrod said, very softly, "Try."
The yoke paused. The man holding it had good instincts for when he was about to die in front of a full audience.
They reached the chain. Ryo stopped the sled so the Lurker's nose was three handspans from it. He lifted his chin at Olsin. "Chain," he said.
Olsin cocked his head. "Say please."
Ryo didn't. He looked at Harrod.
Harrod blew a breath out like a prayer with mud in it. "Chain down," he said, loud. "By liability line, by my seal."
Silence held. Olsin smiled like he was going to enjoy choosing not to. He didn't get the chance to enjoy it. The hall door banged open and a man Ryo didn't know stepped out fast, not dressed for comfort—mail under a travel cloak, left hand gloved, right hand bare with ink stains. He had Lord Gareth's nose if noses were a thing you could own and pass on. He had a seal ring, and he had eyes that had a night in them that hadn't been this one.
"Chain down," the new man said, not loud, not asking. He wore authority like a shirt, not a cloak. He looked at Olsin without smiling. "Now."
Olsin's jaw moved once, a small click like a man biting his tongue. He flicked two fingers. The chain men lifted the heavy links up and let them fall behind. The link with the faint two dots came past Ryo's shoulder with a whisper that promised to cut someone else another day.
Ryo pushed. The sled crossed the threshold stone. The Lurker's hiss echoed under the arch in a way that made servants behind the man with ink-stained hand flinch.
"Inside," the ink-hand said. "We'll talk where walls can hold a word."
"Here," Ryo said. He didn't move his feet onto lord's stone. He pointed at the steps. "Table."
A beat. Then the man nodded like he'd expected that. He turned his head a fraction. "Bring a trestle," he said into the space behind him. A boy ran. Olsin stood a half shadow back from his man, smile gone.
The trestle came fast. Mara slammed her ledger down, not graceful. She smoothed the page. Soren set his countersign next to the great seal. Harrod's seal sat there too, wax wet on it from the last mile. The chain link's hum faded like rain does in a room.
"Name," Ryo said to the ink-hand. "So I know where to put it."
"Gareth's son," he said, dry. "You can call me Werron. Lord's heir. I read what my father signs even if he likes to pretend ink happens somewhere else."
Olsin didn't look at Werron. He looked at Ryo like a man memorizing a rat's path through a pantry.
Werron's eyes cut to the sled. "That is…" he started.
"Evidence," Mara said. "Abatement beast. Collared. Trained at our weir. Whistles taken. Tin disks. Two dots." She didn't let him finish his thought. She didn't care if he needed adjectives.
Werron nodded once, quick. He looked at Harrod. "You wrote liability."
"I did," Harrod said. "I'll pay for it if it breaks your lower gate."
"It won't," Ryo said. "If your men keep their thumbs out of loops and their mouths off whistles."
Werron's mouth twitched. "All right," he said. "Read."
Soren read. Again. He read Merek's name and Tomas's. He read Olsin's order at the bend. He read the chain writ words and where they'd slid on salt. He read the cistern, the girl, the eel. He read Brann's suspension, to Brann's face, with no apology.
Werron listened and didn't move. Olsin stood still and said nothing aloud, but his fingers clicked once on his coat seam, counting. The chain men looked at their yoke like it should have something to do while words happened.
When Soren finished, the air felt new. Werron looked at Olsin and said, quiet, "Is any part of that false."
Olsin smiled the small smile that made Ryo want to put him under a rope just to see what sound he'd make. "The parts that read like a story instead of an entry," he said.
Werron nodded like he expected that dodge and hated having to pretend it was clever. He put his hand on the table and left a little wet print. "Fine," he said. "Here's what we do. Two-dots Tomas goes in our stocks so I can count his teeth in the morning. Merek sits next to him because my bailiff says so, and I don't argue with the man who has to take curses for my father after dark."
Merek's eyes sharpened with interest. He was going to remember that Werron and Harrod had a thing that didn't involve Olsin.
Werron looked at Ryo. "The beast sits in the courtyard at the end of a rope you hold. I want it alive for a day because there are men who only hear when something breathes in the next room. After that, I don't care if it swims down my hall or burns. You can kill it at my word."
Ryo nodded once. That fit his hands.
Werron lifted his chin at Olsin. "You will show me the invoice you signed for five collars," he said. "You will tell me why you wrote rats when you paid for wolves. If you lie, I'll know. If you don't lie, I'll know who did. And I'll ruin them if I can't hang them."
Olsin's smile didn't change. The skin under his eyes did a small, mean thing. "Of course," he said. "Tribunal at noon."
"Now," Werron said. He put a hand to his temple and massaged like he had a headache made of ledgers and rain. "Bring me the crate with whistles."
A black coat moved. Ryo put his palm on the crate and didn't let it go until Werron's ink-stained hand was actually on the wood. Then he let it go. The ink hand had callus. Ryo filed that.
The chain outside the gate shifted like a snake someone had stepped on. The hum returned, small. Olsin had not moved. His ring finger had. A thin chain, almost a necklace, lay hidden under his sleeve. He'd twisted it once.
The little chain at Olsin's wrist pulsed like a heartbeat. Ryo's wrists tingled. He felt—not hands—pressure, like a door closing algebra, like a knot being tied around air. His fingers twitched open by somebody else's idea.
Tribunal binding: attempted. External authority. Resist? Cost: leverage, blood.
Ryo closed his hand around the stocks pin at his belt and jammed the flat against his wrist bone hard enough to make his nerves remember who owned them. The pressure paused like a mind deciding if a finger belonged to it.
Anna saw Ryo's hand jerk. She looked at Olsin's sleeve and saw the tiny movement. She didn't ask permission. She slapped Olsin's wrist with her fat-stinking rag.
Olsin hissed and jerked back on instinct. The chain under his cuff slid, lost a tooth of purchase on him, and the pressure on Ryo's hands snapped like a rotten thread.
Harrod barked a laugh he tried to hide as a cough. Werron's eyes cut to Olsin's wrist and then to Ryo's palm and then to the chain at the gate. His mouth tightened.
"Unmake my line," Olsin said, pleasant, to the space between Ryo and his rope. He did it with softness, not with voice, like a man humming to a dog. The chain at the gate sang in answer.
Ryo didn't answer with a word. He put the Book or Blood cloth on the trestle and slid it under Werron's hand so his palm rested on the words. Werron looked down, read the letters without making his mouth move, and then set his palm flat like weight.
Adjudication reinforcement: granted by heir. Chain writ mitigated.
The chain's hum died a fraction. The courtyard felt like a room with a door that latched.
"Sit," Werron said to Olsin. Not shout. Command like a man whose head hurt and had no time. "And take that pretty chain off your wrist or I make you."
Olsin smiled too widely to be completely sane and unhooked the tiny chain with two fingers like he was taking off a lover. He set it on the edge of the trestle. The little links looked like jewelry for a child. They smelled like rain on iron and coins.
Ryo picked it up between two fingers. He turned it. There, inside one link, scratched shallow: two dots.
Mara's pen didn't pause. "Two dots on chain," she said. "Read into the book."
Olsin watched Ryo like a man watches a door he is going to walk through later after he has lit the house. "You think you can keep this," he said, all charm scraped away. "You think your line will matter tomorrow. We are the chain. We always win because people like being told what to do when the telling feels like safety."
Ryo didn't look up. "Maybe," he said. "Today, we're louder."
He put the tiny chain in his bag next to the tin and the collar. The bag felt heavy with the kind of weight no scale uses.
The Lurker thumped once, hard, like it had decided to make every man at the table look at it at the same time. Werron stared at it, jaw set. "Fine," he said. "Kill it when we're done." The hall doors behind him opened again without anyone touching them, and a woman in wet grey stepped in, hair braided tight, a chain mark at her throat burned into skin, not silver. She took in the sled, the beast, the book, the cloth, and then smiled like a knife. "Chainmaster's factor," she said. "I'll be taking possession now." The chain across the gate hummed higher, wires in a storm, and the courtyard salt line smoked.