L. Modesitt - Natural Ordermage

“Only exquisite?” came the retort from the woman standing before the heavy iron stove.

“Excellent and exquisite.”

Seorya snorted, a sound barely audible above the crackling of frying bread and fowl.

The two clerks slipped out the rear entrance into the alleyway. Rahl had half-expected garbage and offal in the alleys of Swartheld, but they held only dust and sand and a few small bits of rubbish. Daelyt walked quickly out of the alley and across the street, ducking behind a carriage with filmy side curtains that flowed with the hint of the warm evening breeze and the movement of the carriage itself. The footman was a guard with a falchiona at his belt.

Rahl dashed after Daelyt, catching up with him just in front of the gates to the warehouse area.

The massive dark-skinned guard standing just inside the gates looked toward Rahl.

“Tyboran, this is Rahl. He’s the new clerk.”

The guard studied Rahl for a moment, then nodded.

Daelyt kept walking, explaining as he did. “He doesn’t speak. The mage-guards took his voice years ago for something, but he’s a good guard.”

Mage-guards? And they’d destroyed Tyboran’s voice?

Daelyt stopped before a small door at the south end of the northernmost warehouse. “Just wait. I’ll be right back.” He opened the door and took the narrow steps.

Rahl glanced up. There were three narrow windows on the upper level, close together and overlooking the courtyard. He didn’t see anyone, but he tried to follow the clerk with his senses. He thought Daelyt met a woman at the top of the steps, but that might have been because the older clerk had mentioned his consort.

While he waited, Rahl studied the area. All the wagons had been stored somewhere, and down by the south end of the courtyard formed by the Association building, the two warehouses, the stables, and a head-high stone wall, Guylmor was grooming one of the dray horses.

Daelyt returned empty-handed. “Let’s see if Chenaryl has the papers ready for us.”

Chenaryl was a black-haired, olive-skinned man with deep-set eyes. His shoulders were broad, above a more-than-ample midsection. He was sitting behind a small table just to the right of the open main doors to the second warehouse. He did not rise when Daelyt and Rahl approached, but his eyes lingered on Rahl.

“Rahl’s the new clerk from Nylan,” offered Daelyt in Hamorian.

Rahl was surprised at the awkwardness of the older clerk’s language, but he inclined his head slightly and greeted the warehouse supervisor in Hamorian as well. “I’m pleased to meet you.”

“You sound like an Atlan. Mostly, anyway.”

“So I have been told. I learned from someone who had lived there.”

“How much of the cargo is usable?” Daelyt asked quickly.

“Most of it. Some of the wool spoiled, and some other things. It’s on the declarations.” Chenaryl handed the sheets of paper to Daelyt. “You can have them. Better you than me.”

“I’d rather handle paper than cargo,” replied Daelyt.

Chenaryl nodded slightly. He looked and felt-to Rahl-less than happy, and there was a sense of chaos that suggested untruth in some of what he’d said.

Rahl glanced past the supervisor to a barrel set by itself. The barrel was labeled clearly “Feyn River pickles.” He looked at Chenaryl. “I didn’t know we shipped pickles. I’ve never seen any on a declaration or manifest.”

“We don’t,” explained Daelyt from beside Rahl. “Some outlanders like delicacies, or what they think are delicacies. That was for a small trader who brought it in on a Jeranyi vessel. We’re holding it for him. We store some things for smaller traders-for a solid fee.”

That made sense to Rahl, except Daelyt was shading things, and Rahl couldn’t imagine pickles as a delicacy…but who knew? He nodded. “I have a lot to learn.”

“We all do. We need to get back to work.”

Daelyt turned, and Rahl followed.

“We need to get to work on these,” Daelyt told Rahl, as they left the warehouse supervisor and walked back out of the courtyard and past the silent Tyboran. “The Imperial tariff enumerators will want them tomorrow.”

Daelyt unlocked the front door to the Association building and walked to the long desk. There he used a striker to light the oil lamp, then set the declarations he’d received from Chenaryl on the wood. He pulled out several sets of blank forms from a drawer and set them beside the original forms. Then he rummaged around and came up with another pen and an inkwell, as well as a blotting pad. Those he set to one side.

“You sit on the other side of the lamp. We’ll need two copies, one for the Imperial tariff enumerators and one for our records here. This time, just to make sure you understand, I’ll do the first copy, and you can do the second.”

That made sense to Rahl.

He was halfway through copying the second page of the declaration, with more than a few unvoiced questions, when Director Shyret appeared from his study.

“You’ll have those ready first thing in the morning?”

“With Rahl here, ser, we’ll have them finished tonight and waiting for you in the morning.”

“Good. You’ll show Rahl how to lock up?”

“Yes, ser.”

Shyret nodded and turned without another word.

Rahl returned to copying. When he finally finished, he looked up.

Daelyt was working on something else, but the older clerk immediately closed the leather folder. “You’re done?”

“I am. Where do I put these, now that they’re done?” asked Rahl.

“Oh…I’ll take them. They go on the director’s desk. Once he approves them, and the enumerators get their copy, he’ll file the other one in the wall cases in his study.” Daelyt rose and took the declarations Rahl held.

“Daelyt…I’m confused. The ship’s master does a declaration, and then we do another in Hamorian. Are they filed together? Or separately? Is the difference just that we need one in Temple for the Association, and we need the other one in Hamorian for the tariff enumerators?”

“That’s about it. We also have to remove spoilage, because we’ll get tariffed on it,” replied the clerk. “We need the declarations in Hamorian because the enumerators make a practice of not reading Temple. So we need both sets.” He walked toward Shyret’s study.

Rahl was more than confused. He was worried. He’d remembered clearly that there had been ninety-three bales of black wool, not the ninety on the Hamorian declaration he’d just finished. There had also been twenty kegs of scarletine, rather than nineteen, and sixty kegs of Feyn indigo, not fifty-nine. And Daelyt had been lying. Not about the Hamorians not reading Temple, but about the reason for the two sets…or something about it. Chenaryl and Daelyt had talked about spoilage, and Chenaryl had noted the “spoilage” on the original declaration that Rahl had written out for Galsyn, but Rahl knew he would have sensed such spoilage when the cargo had been unloaded. Not only that, but Daelyt hadn’t answered his question about the separate files, either. Rahl wasn’t about to ask twice. Not at the moment. “Seems like a waste.”

“It probably is, but who listens to clerks?”

Rahl offered a laugh, then waited for Daelyt to return.

It was only a few moments before Rahl heard a second click , and Daelyt was walking toward the clerks’ desk.

“I’m ready to head back to Yasnela.”

“Your consort?”

“She’s the one. Now…let me show you what to do in locking up. First, we check the back outside storeroom door. It should be locked, but you still check. It doesn’t need a bar or bolt.” Daelyt laughed. “It has three locks, and none of us have the keys. Only Director Shyret does.”