Chapter 1: A Letter from the Capital

Chapter 1: A Letter from the Capital

The footsteps paused outside of Eli's hiding spot.nove(l)bi(n.)com

He ducked his head in the cramped space behind the shelves of scrolls. Dust drifted through the sunlight streaming into the archives from a window high in the stone wall, and tickled his nostrils.

so well give a useless job to a useless scribe," the Head Clerk said, from ten feet away, in the aisle between the shelves. "This is nothing but a waste of time."

Eli breathed through his mouth, trying not to sneeze. He'd never sneezed from the dust in the archives, not once in his six years there. He couldnt start now.

"Yes, Head Clerk," Scribe Lynik murmured, in her soothing voice.

"And by useless," the Head Clerk said, "I refer to Junior Scribe Elishiv."

Behind the shelf, Eli winced.

"He's quite diligent, mir," Scribe Lynika said.

"Is that what he is?"

"He's studying two languages and his arithmetic is strong. He's--"

"Wasting his time learning languages!" the Head Clerk snapped. "He's the oldest junior scribe by ten years."

"And the only one who came to us as an adult. Considering his late start, he--"

"He should focus on his posture."

"Pardon?"

"You know we make a pretty penny renting the junior scribes as foot-servants for galas and balls.

I'm not sure if 'renting' is the right word," Scribe Lynik quietly objected.

"Bah! It took me years to convince the members of what counts as 'society' in this backward fortress-city that hiring scribes as servants was fashionable. Yet Eli hunches."

"Er," Scribe Lynik said.

The Head Clerk smacked his lips. "Like a crab."

He did not hunch! As if trying to prove the Head Clerk wrong, Eli straightened in his hiding spot and knocked a scroll with his shoulder. The scroll shifted. Teetered.

"Gods." Eli slouched in dismay. "That could've gone better."

Scribe Lynik touched his elbow. She was a comfortable middle-aged woman with warm eyes. She'd been kind to Eli ever since he joined the staff after he lost his position as a hayward's helper. And also after hed lost his position as an apprentice cooper. Er, and finally after hed lost his longest-term position, in the local militia, simply because he preferred discussing problems before bashing them about the head and neck with a mace.

"It could've gone worse," she said.

"Yeah, if I'd dropped a shelf on him." For a moment, Eli imagined the Head Clerk crushed beneath the shelves. "Though at least that wouldve offered a silver lining "

She snorted. "As if you'd ever even wish for such a thing."

"I suppose not," he sighed. "So what's the story with this letter?"

"From the capital."

His eyes widened. "The capital capital?"

"Of course not, Elishiv. The provincial capital. Leotide City."

"Oh."

"It's just some upstart bureaucrat from an antiquated and insignificant office requesting information."

"Antiquated and insignificant?" he asked, teasing her a little.

Lynik sniffed faintly. "Her name is Brazika Savradar. She's the Steward of the Office of the Stipend Geld."

"I've never even heard of it."

"Of course you haven't," she said, teasing him back. "You're a half-educated farmboy."

"Er," he said, and didn't mention that he wasn't, in fact, a farmboy.

"But neither have I, that's how we know it's insignificant. Still, do as this Steward asks. There's no reason to anger the provincial capitaland less reason to anger the Head Clerk."

"Will do," he said, tapping the letter against his palm.

After Lynik left, Eli replaced the fallen scroll, brushed dust from his robe--far coarser than the Head Clerk's--and crossed the high, vaulted room toward a row of angled standing desks beside one of the more dimly-lit walls. The other junior scribes, some of them almost a decade younger than Eli, scratched at parchment, copying books for distribution and sale. And maybe even for advancing the general knowledge of the valley, though nobody seemed to care much about that.

He stepped to his desk and opened the letter.