After Demis finished his meeting with Gerren, he made his way to the room Gerren had paid for.
When he stepped inside, Mared was already waiting for him.
She sat on the edge of the bed with her hands folded in her lap and her blanket gathered close around her shoulders. When she looked up at him, her face had gone tight.
"You didn't tell me that you meant me to have me work for him."
Demis shut the door behind him and sniffed. "Ma', Master Gerren is alright. He isn't from Bren, so he doesn't care about that."
He jerked his chin toward her blanket, toward the mark she always kept half-hidden beneath the fold.
Mared did not seem eased by it. Her fingers tightened once on the blanket, then she shook her head.
"Alright," she said. "But only if it is regular work."
"It is," Demis replied. He stayed by the door for a moment, then stepped further into the room. "There's plenty of work for people who can read, write, and reckon. Master Gerren is a merchant. He sells paper, but now he's looking into iron too. He needs bookkeepers and people to manage things."
Mared watched him for a moment without speaking.
"If he is selling paper to the Castle," she asked at last, "why does he not care who I am?"
Demis gave a short sniff that was almost a laugh.
"Ma', Castle Blackfyre needs paper more than it needs to care about someone like you."
Mared frowned at that and lowered her eyes for a beat.
"Still," she said, looking back up at him, "does it not trouble you? If he wants dealings with the castle, he should care."
Demis shrugged.
"Like I told you, Ma', Master Gerren isn't really here for the castle. He wants coin."
"Is he not here for the lease requests, like the other merchants?"
"That was what brought him," Demis said. "Now he cares more about the iron."
Mared lowered her gaze again. Her thumb rubbed once over the edge of the blanket before she looked back at him.
"Alright. I am only worried about you, Demis. I am already a washed-up old woman. I do not want what happened to me happening to you."
Demis rubbed at his nose with the back of his hand and shifted his weight.
"I learned to read because of you, you know."
Mared's expression softened a little.
"I barely taught you anything."
"You taught me the letters."
That drew a tired smile from her.
"Alright, alright," she said. Then she pushed herself up from the bed with one hand and stepped closer. "You are done with your meeting now. Come here."
Demis stood still while she looked him over.
"There's still blood on your mouth," she muttered. "And mud on half your clothes."
She shook her head and reached up with the damp cloth she had waiting beside the basin. She caught his chin between her fingers and wiped at the corner of his mouth. Demis let her. He kept his eyes low while she worked at the dried blood and the dirt along his cheek.
Then, all at once, he spoke.
"I'm going to finally go to the meetings in Helio for children, Ma."
The words came out in a rush, as if he had been holding them behind his teeth.
Mared did not answer at once. Her hand only paused against his face for a moment before she went back to wiping away the mud.
Demis looked for any sign of objection, any anger in her face, but there was nothing.
"Ma', do you really bear no grudge against Castle Blackfyre?"
Mared shook her head, though she kept wiping at his cheek.
"How many times must I tell you, Demis? I bear no ill will against them."
Demis just stared at her. It was not really incredulous, only searching.
"Ma'," he said after another sniff, "have you ever thought of leaving Bren?"
"And go where?" Mared asked.
"Anywhere. It's hard for you here."
Mared gave a quiet breath through her nose.
"I have lived here all my life," she said. "And I mean to die here."
Demis looked down for a moment, then back up.
"What if I leave, Ma'? Would you come with me?"
This time, Mared stopped wiping. The cloth stayed against his cheek while she thought.
"And where would you go, you naughty boy?"
"I'm going with Master Gerren when he leaves."
Mared's hand dropped from his face. She stared at him for a long moment.
"That would mean he would have to pay for you. From your guardians."
"Yes," Demis said, nodding.
"He is willing to pay a sum for you?"
Demis nodded again. "Uh-huh. And I told him you're going too."
Mared blinked at that.
"I… I don't know."
"Please, Ma'?" Demis said. "Maybe you'll have it better wherever we go."
Mared said nothing at first.
"We're going to be traveling merchants," Demis went on. "Master Gerren says he needs capable stewards. I told him you used to run a Home. He was interested right away."
Mared looked down at the cloth in her hand. For a moment, she only stood there, thinking.
Then she gave a small nod.
"Alright," she said. "If you will go, then I will too. I think someone should make sure you stay out of trouble."
Demis chuckled.
"Alright, off you go now. Wash up," Mared said.
Demis nodded.
Demis thought about Mared. He wanted to make sure that, at all costs, Mared would get to live a better life than she did in Bren. With Gerren giving him an opportunity, he wanted to jump at it at all costs.
Duke Enranth Terros was led down into the lower chamber beneath the old counting house just after dusk.
The room had once been used for storage. The shelves had been cleared. A broad worktable now stood at the center beneath three hooded lamps. Their light pooled over the object laid out there in pieces—timber frame, iron pressure arm, metal fittings, a bed of smooth wood with grooves cut into it too evenly to be ordinary joinery. Nothing about it looked valuable enough to justify the trouble it had taken to steal.
Severin stood waiting at the far side of the table with his hands clasped behind his back. Beside him was a craftsman from Holdorn, a square-shouldered man with scarred hands and soot, black under his nails. He kept his eyes on the device but bowed when the Duke entered.
"Your Grace," Severin said.
Enranth gave a short nod. His guards remained outside.
He stepped up to the table and looked down at the contraption.
"This is it?" he asked flatly. "This is what I paid cores for?"
Severin inclined his head. "It is the device our allies recovered from the ambush."
Enranth reached out and pressed two fingers against one of the timber arms. It was well made, yes. The joints were tight. The apparatus looked impressive, but it was still just wood and iron.
"A frame," he said. "A lever. A fitted bed." His eyes narrowed. "I expected something that would justify the reports."
He looked up at Severin.
"You told me Blackfyre had built a mechanism that could copy books by the hundreds. This looks like a cooper's failed vice."
The craftsman shifted his weight but kept silent.
Severin answered carefully. "Your Grace, we know this device is involved in the copying process. But we still do not understand the whole of it. Even the merchants who acquired the leases have kept the method close."
"So we stole half a machine and none of the part that matters."
"Yes, Your Grace."
Enranth's gaze dropped to the table again. Beside the frame lay rows of small metal punches, each engraved with a character. He picked one up, turned it once between his fingers, then set it back down with a sharp click.
"And what does the craftsman say?"
Only then did Severin gesture toward the man beside him.
"Master Endar has examined the tolerances."
The craftsman bowed shallowly. "Your Grace."
"Well?" Enranth asked.
Endar looked at the device, not the Duke. "It is made with care. The pressure arm is built to strike with consistency. These fittings are not decorative. They keep the movement true."
Enranth folded his arms.
"And what does it do?"
Endar hesitated. "That I cannot yet say for certain."
Enranth's eyes sharpened.
"You cannot say."
"No, Your Grace." Endar swallowed once. "It is too small for one use, too exact for another. The punched metal set suggests repetition. Precision. Some process where alignment matters. But without the missing materials, I cannot tell you what final purpose it serves."
"That is not an answer."
"It is the best one I have with what is in front of me."
Before Enranth could answer, Severin spoke again.
"From our reports and from the intercepted requests, we know there are two materials bought alongside the press."
Enranth looked at him. "Ink," he said. "What else?"
"Prepared resin sheets."
Enranth's brow furrowed.
"You believe those belong to this device?"
"It is our present judgment," Severin replied. "The merchants always purchase the machine with ink and those sheets. The recovered frame alone does not complete the process."
Enranth stared at the contraption for another moment, then struck the edge of the table once with the side of his hand.
"So while we know what it is for, we still do not know how it is used."
Severin did not answer at once. Then he nodded.
"Useless," Enranth muttered.
The word landed flat in the room.
He stepped back from the table and turned away a pace, cloak dragging across the stone.
"We risked cores for timber and fittings. They lost the chance to retrieve more. And now you tell me what sits on my table is a puzzle-box with no key."
Severin waited for the anger to crest before speaking.
"Your Grace, Gerren is already on the matter."
Enranth stopped and looked back over his shoulder.
Severin continued. "He has placed himself among the merchants in Bren for exactly this reason. He is closer to the source than any of our other channels. He has already confirmed that whatever gives the machine its true value was not recovered in the ambush."
Enranth gave a short snort. "What use is a merchant whose ties to Holdorn are already plain?"
"His reports carry more than market gossip," Severin said. "You have read them yourself."
Enranth said nothing at first.
Severin went on. "We now know more of what is happening in Bren than we did before. The kiln. The unceasing bellows. A furnace that does not sleep. Limestone is delivered alongside ore. Guild complaints. Kanzlei resentment. He is seeing the changes from inside the movement of trade."
Enranth's irritation did not leave, but it narrowed.
"Are we to prod them?" he asked.
"In due time, Your Grace," Severin replied. "You may be certain they will play their part."
Enranth looked back at the machine.
"We need to copy the contraption," he said. "Or at least copy what it does. If we can make use of the same method, then we may yet turn it to our advantage. Perhaps even to the Emperor's greed."
"Not from this alone," Endar said carefully. "Not without the other device, the ink, or the sheets."
Severin shook his head.
Enranth looked at him. "What do you mean?"
"We may not need their exact frame," Severin said. "If Gerren learns the process of how the copies are finally made then we may build our own method from the principle."
Enranth looked again at the repeated metal punches, at their narrow stems and uniform forms.
"So Blackfyre's miracle is not this frame," he said slowly. "It is the rest of the method."
"Yes, Your Grace."
This time, he studied the object more coldly. If he could crack the process, then the machine could be turned into something else entirely. Something more than copying, rather, for leverage.
And if that road led upward through greed, then he already knew which greed to trust most.