The Magistrate's View

Magistrate Vey’s windows looked over the whole harbour. From that height, the lower wards appeared as a pleasant arrangement of roofs, with little to suggest that people lived beneath them.

The magistrate was smaller than Iona expected. Her hair was cut close to her head. There was a patch of ink on the side of one finger, and a plate of untouched food beside her papers.

She did not seem like a woman enjoying an easy afternoon.

“Sit,” she said.

Iona sat. Tarin remained standing until Vey looked at him.

“You have used a suspended office to remove civic property.”

“I used my own name.”

“That isn’t a defence.”

“I know.”

Vey turned to Iona.

“And you are telling households to disregard the levy.”

“I’m showing them what the levy is paying for.”

“Their survival.”

“Through a design that’s breaking.”

“A design that has kept this city dry for eighteen years.”

Iona put a copy of the old master’s record on the desk.

“The bells were serviceable.”

Vey did not read it. She knew what it said.

“The bells were in the hands of people who could decide not to ring them.”

“They still would be, if we restored them.”

“Exactly.”

Outside, a gust drove rain against the glass. Vey waited for it to pass.

“Before the consolidation, I was a junior clerk. I sat through meetings in which the ward councils threatened to withdraw their watch. Over wages. Repairs. Representation. Some demands were reasonable. Some were impossible to meet before the next tide. Do you understand what it is to have the sea used as an argument?”

Iona thought of her mother choosing a memory while men removed the shutters.

“Yes.”

Vey looked at her for a long moment.

“Central collection made the supply predictable.”

“For you.”

“For everyone who depended on it.”

“Not everyone paid the same way.”

“No tax is painless, Mistress Venn.”

“Then it ought to be possible for the people setting it to feel it.”

Tarin moved beside her, but did not interrupt.

Vey opened a drawer and took out a smaller document.

“You’re a skilled craftswoman. We need skilled people. There is a place for you in the Office, with workshop rooms in the upper ward. Your mother could live with you. The household would be exempt while you served.”

The offer struck precisely where it was intended. A dry room. Good equipment. Her mother’s memories left alone. No more choosing which pieces of their lives could be turned into another season of safety.

Iona looked at the paper long enough for Vey to notice.

“You would still be repairing the heart,” the magistrate said. “Doing useful work. This need not become a quarrel between people who want the same thing.”

“The heart needs six other bells.”

“It needs to survive the storm.”

“More glass and more memories won’t change what it’s being made to carry.”

“We have reserves.”

Tarin spoke then.

“Not enough. You have my measurements.”

“Your measurements allow for the worst case.”

“The weather is beginning to resemble it.”

Vey pressed her fingers together.

Vey had read the figures. The explanation she had chosen let her carry on as before.

Iona slid the offer back across the desk.

“You can’t employ enough people to make this fact go away.”

Vey’s face closed.

“I can have the clappers returned.”

“You can send people to take them,” Tarin said. “From crews preparing to use them in a storm. I would like you to consider what that order asks of your staff.”

The magistrate stood.

For a moment Iona expected the officers outside to come in. Instead Vey reached towards Tarin’s brass key.

“Your authority ends here.”

He took the cord from his neck and laid the key on her desk. A pale line marked the skin where it had rested.

“You’ll answer for the property you’ve removed,” Vey said.

“Yes.”

“You should both understand that being allowed to leave does not mean you’re absolved.”

Iona stood.

“Neither does holding the key,” she said.

In the corridor, Tarin put a hand against the wall. It was the first time since they entered that he had looked uncertain on his feet.

“Are you all right?” she asked.

“I’ve worn that since I was twenty-four.”

“Do you want it back?”

He considered the question instead of giving the answer she hoped to hear.

“Part of me does.”

She moved closer.

“Then I’d rather hear that than a speech about how little it matters.”

He looked at her, his expression tired and unguarded.

For a moment she nearly touched the pale place at his throat.

Then the harbour bell rang, and both of them turned towards the sound.