# Story Summary — Book 1: The Floundry Affair

**Purpose:** Quick-reference continuity document for Claude Code. Consult this file at the start of any drafting or revision session to establish context without re-reading all chapter drafts. For detailed revisions or line-level continuity checks, consult the full chapter drafts directly.

**Last updated:** Epilogue final (2026-03-10)

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## 1. Story Timeline Overview

| Chapter | Title | Days Covered | Elapsed (from Day 1) |
|---------|-------|-------------|---------------------|
| Ch01 | The Day Job | Day 1 | Day 1 |
| Ch02 | The First Date | Days 2–6 | Day 6 |
| Ch03 | Thursday | Days 8–9 (Thu–Fri) | Day 9 |
| Ch04 | The Interview | ~Day 13 ("the 15th") | Day 13 |
| Ch05 | Two Weeks | Days 13–27 | Day 27 |
| Ch06 | Two Days | Days 27–28 (Thu–Fri) | Day 28 |
| Ch07 | The Greymarch Barrows | Day 28 (Fri night) | Day 28 |
| Ch08 | The Third Door | Day 29 (Saturday) | Day 29 |
| Ch09 | The Return | Day 29 (Saturday, midday–late afternoon) | Day 29 |
| Ch10 | The Bracelet | Days 30–33 (Sunday–Wednesday) | Day 33 |
| Ch11 | The Client | Day 34 (Thursday) | Day 34 |
| Ch12 | The Father | Day 35 (Friday) | Day 35 |
| Ch13 | Three Threads | Day 36 (Saturday) | Day 36 |
| Ch14 | The Descent | Day 37 (Sunday) | Day 37 |

| Ch15 | The Haul | Day 37 (Sunday) | Day 37 |
| Ch16 | The Chain | Day 38 (Monday) | Day 38 |
| Ch17 | The Crash | Days 38–39 (Monday–Tuesday) | Day 39 |
| Ch18 | The Walk-Through | Day 39 (Tuesday afternoon–evening) | Day 39 |
| Ch19 | The Cure | Day 40 (Wednesday morning) | Day 40 |
| Ch20 | The Reckoning | Day 42 (Friday) | Day 42 |
| Ch21 | The Settlement | Days 42–44 (Friday–Sunday) | Day 44 |
| Epilogue | The Category | Months later (deep winter) | — |

**Total elapsed time Ch01–Ch21:** ~42–44 days (~6 weeks). Epilogue jumps months ahead to deep winter.

*For detailed bell/time references and continuity flags, see `/world/timeline-book1.md`.*

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## 2. Chapter Summaries

### Ch01: The Day Job

**Timeline:** Day 1. Sixth bell (pre-opening) through closing at sixth bell evening.

**Summary:** Phelan works at Gavren's Botanical & Sundry, an herbal supply shop on Drenwick's dockside. The chapter establishes his daily routine — inventory, shelf reorganization, customer management — and demonstrates his cold-reading ability through a series of morning customers (dockworker, student, Mrs. Dallery, Merchant's Guild buyer). His internal monologue reveals he applied to the Guild of Necessary Services six weeks ago and received a one-line acknowledgment: "Under review. Do not inquire." Mid-morning, an unnamed woman enters (golden-haired, purposeful, no social performance) requesting binding salts (refined) and silverthorn (powdered root, harvest date Fourteenth of Last Harvest). She identifies a moisture-exposed container by crystal density and selects the correct binding salt container from six options. Phelan's cold-read apparatus fails on her — she has no subtext. She deduces he rearranged the shelves from the mismatch between label handwriting and organizational logic. She leaves without giving her name. At closing, Gavren tells Phelan he knows Phelan is "passing through" and asks for two weeks' notice. The chapter ends at Phelan's shack, where he reviews his house plans (nine revisions, five rooms, workshop with warding anchors) and calculates the cost: ~1,300 silvers vs. his current 12 coppers and a shaved half-silver.

**Characters present:** Phelan Varrant, Gavren Holst (employer), Mere Fields (unnamed), Mrs. Dallery (regular customer), unnamed dockworker, student, Merchant's Guild buyer, healer's apprentice, elderly man.

**Magic/Exploits:** Flaw Sight (passive) — notices a ward-jar on the third shelf has a resonance gap between second and third anchors causing moisture seepage. No active exploits.

**Plot threads opened:** Guild application pending (6 weeks); house/land dream (1,300 silvers needed); Mere introduction (unnamed); Flaw Sight established as constant/involuntary; Gavren aware Phelan will leave. Micro-hook: faint magical trace near shack door — old residue from a warded object, filed and dismissed.

**Chapter-ending state:** Quiet hook. Phelan falls asleep thinking about the unnamed woman.

* * *

### Ch02: The First Date

**Timeline:** Days 2–6. Mere returns Day 5 at half past nine. Afternoon date on Day 5. Guild application now pending 7 weeks.

**Summary:** Phelan spends days 2–4 obsessively planning three scenarios to ask Mere out, including seventeen rehearsals of "Would you like to get coffee sometime?" On Day 5, Mere returns and rejects coffee on principle ("Why would I drink something bitter on purpose?") but counter-offers: she wants to explore arcane district shops. Gavren grants the afternoon off. She gives her name as Mere Fields. At Aldric's Precision Implements, Mere identifies a chisel slip on a self-heating kettle's power word (half a millimeter); Phelan sees the magical consequence (15–20% channeling efficiency loss) but attributes it to "geometry." At Brevian's Fine Enchantments, Mere clinically dissects the shopkeeper's pride piece (a warded jewelry box) in front of customers — noting uneven hinge join, inconsistent lacquer, and 2-degree misalignment in warding anchors, while also praising the three-layer independent anchoring concept. By the canal, Mere reveals she's treating a cursed dog — a fear curse making it terrified of people. She's using binding salts in the water bowl (localized dampening field) and silverthorn extract in food (anxiolytic), managing symptoms not curing. Two prior assessors failed. She needs someone who understands curse architecture structurally. Phelan offers to look at it: "I have some background in how magical workings are structured." They agree to meet Thursday.

**Characters present:** Phelan Varrant, Mere Fields (named), Gavren Holst, shopkeepers at Aldric's and Brevian's.

**Magic/Exploits:** Flaw Sight (passive/active) — sees channeling efficiency loss from chisel slip at Aldric's. Mere's curse management approach described (binding salts + silverthorn).

**Plot threads opened/advanced:** Mere relationship developing (name learned, first date); cursed dog subplot introduced; Mere's home life tension hinted (mother rearranges workspace past sixth bell); Thursday meeting set. Mere mentions someone told her about binding salts' dampening properties (seeds Devod family knowledge). Micro-detail: booted footsteps on mill road at night, catalogued. Coffee-rejection noise parenthetical added.

**Chapter-ending state:** Micro-hook. Phelan falls asleep thinking about flaws — in kettles, in curses, and in bedrooms that feel too small.

* * *

### Ch03: Thursday

**Timeline:** Day 8 (Thursday). Curse-breaking work spans Thursday evening into Friday morning (migraine at second bell). Friday (Day 9): returns to Thresholds, performs the cure. Guild interview letter arrives Friday afternoon — the 15th, ninth bell.

**Summary:** Phelan arrives at Thresholds — Mere's bookshop ("Thresholds — Magical Texts & Theory") on the eastern edge of the arcane district. He examines her door's intent-detection enchantment (8+ years old, re-calibrated twice, third anchor over-tensioned). In the back room, Flaw Sight picks up the curse's full lattice from 12 feet (beyond his normal 10–15 foot range). The curse hijacks the dog's visual processing, reclassifying human silhouettes as predator signatures — three primary anchors, two redundant supports, feedback loop. Built for human perceptual framework but grafted onto canine (50% magical compulsion, 50% confused terror). Phelan realizes the curse is "a wall built across one road while three other roads ran wide open" — only visual is affected; smell, hearing, spatial awareness untouched. He tells Mere he can fix it and needs one day. That night, hyperfocus locks in. He designs a three-layer intervention: modified binding salts amplify scent processing, silverthorn suppresses fear neurochemically, competing sensory data creates structural contradiction the curse can't sustain. Migraine hits at second bell — uses stolen thornwell root from Gavren's stock. Friday morning, he arrives at Thresholds looking terrible. Mere takes his hand without preamble. He performs the cure: modified salt solution in the water bowl. The dog drinks after four minutes. Scent data floods in, contradicting visual override. All three anchors fail in sequence. Curse dissolves. The dog crosses the room and pushes its head against Mere's hand. Twenty minutes later, a guild courier delivers Phelan's interview letter.

**Characters present:** Phelan Varrant, Mere Fields (bookshop owner, holds Phelan's hand), the cursed dog (unnamed at this point).

**Magic/Exploits:** **Exploit #1 — Sensory Channel Mismatch.** Full Flaw Sight engagement (12-foot range). Lateral intervention: amplified competing sensory channels to overwhelm the single visual override. Curse's feedback loop consumed energy fighting contradictory data. Anchors failed sequentially. Hyperfocus crash: migraine, thornwell root, tremor, exhaustion.

**Plot threads opened/advanced:** Cursed dog resolved; guild interview letter received; Phelan-Mere relationship deepens (hand-holding, "Good"); first full exploit demonstrated; hyperfocus/crash cycle shown; Thresholds established as location; stolen thornwell root guilt.

**Chapter-ending state:** Strong dual hook. Dog free and barking. Guild letter in pocket. Tea being made. "The complicated version was better."

* * *

### Ch04: The Interview

**Timeline:** ~Day 13 ("the 15th"). Phelan arrives quarter to nine, interview at ninth bell. Curse broken "four days ago."

**Summary:** Phelan arrives at 14 Greystone Lane, Guild HQ — a building so unremarkable he's walked past it six times in three years. He reads the ward work (detection array, three-layer inscription, secondary window wards recording foot traffic). The receptionist runs the eight-week waiting list filter; Phelan mentions his letter. The interview room is designed for discomfort: bare stone walls, shadow lighting, one chair facing three. **The center man** (~50, gray hair, quiet authority) is the decision-maker. **The questioner** (younger, broader, methodical) runs the list. **The observer** (nothing in front of him, arms crossed) watches for what others miss — Phelan identifies him as the most dangerous person in the room. Background covered: magic since age 12, licensed at 16, Brannick's Academy four years (withdrew — actually outpaced instructors by year three), three years at Gavren's. When asked about combat magic, Phelan lies: "Basic defensive work. Standard curriculum." The observer may have caught the pause. Seventeen minutes in, a staff member enters and whispers — they know about the cursed dog belonging to "Miss Fields," including that two registered curse-breakers failed. Phelan explains his approach but carefully limits what he reveals about Flaw Sight. The center man says the test was judgment — how much Phelan would reveal when pressed. Accepted. Post-interview: Guild Code (Rule 1: never betray good-faith client; Rule 2: never work both sides; Rule 3: don't create problems for other members; Rule 4: everything else is judgment). Guild takes 20%, pays monthly retainer by tier, minimum two engagements per quarter. Receptionist gives first month's retainer: 15 silvers.

**Characters present:** Phelan Varrant, the center man (unnamed, ~50), the questioner (unnamed), the observer (unnamed), the receptionist, staff member/whisperer. Referenced: Mere Fields, Gavren Holst.

**Magic/Exploits:** Flaw Sight (passive) — reads guild building ward architecture. Combat magic concealment — Phelan lies about having only basic defensive work.

**Plot threads opened/advanced:** Guild membership accepted (Tier One); guild structure revealed (20% commission, retainer, code); guild intelligence network demonstrated; Phelan's background filled in (Brannick's Academy, Caldburn hometown, mother living/no contact, no father); combat magic concealment established; observer noticed pause on combat question; house timeline recalculated (13 years from 40). Noise parenthetical at guild acceptance (financial recalculation, thirteen replacing forty). External threat seed: woman in gray coat seen near guild building, then again during walk home.

**Chapter-ending state:** Resolution with forward momentum. 15 silvers, first non-austerity meal. Two-week window before first engagement.

* * *

### Ch05: Two Weeks

**Timeline:** Days 13–27. Two-week notice period at Gavren's. Job brief (NS-7714) arrives Wednesday (~Day 25). Last day at Gavren's is Thursday (~Day 26). Briefing scheduled Friday, ninth bell.

**Summary:** Phelan gives two weeks' notice to Gavren, who is characteristically unsurprised. Gavren gives a parcel of herbs as farewell — thornwell root, dried chamomile, sweetbalm, feverwort, and refined silverthorn — including a replacement for the measure Phelan stole during the migraine. Phelan visits Leon D'Nardis at his rooms above a chandler's shop on the south dockside. Leon is introduced: dark hair, medium/slightly muscular build, five-ten, formerly expensive but now worn clothes. Phelan tells Leon about the guild acceptance and recounts the dog curse in technical terms. Leon shares his cracking of the Vethani Crypts — a sixty-year-old sealed site with fourteen-layer wards defeated by generating 400 simultaneous low-level magical inputs (noise overload). Recovered a Mallory focusing crystal (pre-Compact, original inscription), sold for 1,200 silvers to an anonymous buyer. Phelan floats the idea of Leon joining the guild; Leon firmly declines. Two-week montage: orientation paperwork at 14 Greystone Lane, equipment lending catalogue. Retainer money changes daily life — three meals, new boots, focusing tool case. Two visits to Mere at Thresholds; Sniff (the dog, named for what saved him) sleeps in the shop's front. House plans reviewed — bedroom feels too small. Job brief arrives Wednesday: NS-7714, Tier One Field Retrieval, recovery of Pallowmere Root (actually verdenshade) from the Greymarch Barrows, Lower Fenwick District. Compensation: 40 silvers plus expenses. Phelan tests his fire magic — sluggish, "a whisper where there used to be a shout."

**Characters present:** Gavren Holst, Leon D'Nardis (formally introduced), Mere Fields (mentioned, visits described), Sniff (the dog, named), guild receptionist, guild messenger.

**Magic/Exploits:** Recap of dog cure (Exploit #1). Leon's Vethani Crypts exploit described (Exploit #2 — noise overload, 400 inputs). Phelan's fire magic test: sluggish, weak, unpracticed 4–5 years.

**Plot threads opened/advanced:** Guild career begins; Barrows job (NS-7714) introduced; combat magic rust confirmed; Leon's refusal to join guild; Mere relationship deepening (bedroom too small); Sniff named; Greymarch Barrows foreshadowed (pre-Compact, residual wards, cave stalkers, 3 confirmed kills in last decade). Leon mentions Carterson (ward-resistance compounds, guild quarter edge) — name-drop referral. Dramatized Thresholds visit: amplification sequence discussion with Mere; customer asks about unbreakable curses (seeds Floundry); Mere mentions her father dismissively (seeds Devod).

**Chapter-ending state:** Micro-hook. Phelan produces a weak, flickering fire from his palm. Two days until the Friday briefing.

* * *

### Ch06: Two Days

**Timeline:** Days 27–28 (Thursday–Friday). Thursday: training with Leon at seventh bell, guild equipment catalogue, Carterson's Supplies. Friday: sparring with Leon, visit to Mere at Thresholds (fourth bell), job departure at ninth bell.

**Summary:** Thursday: Phelan asks Leon for combat magic retraining. Leon agrees on transactional terms. Diagnostic session: fire sequences technically correct but slow ("your fire used to move like it was angry about something. Right now it moves like it's filling out paperwork"). Over two hours, Leon corrects the third-form transition (over-rotating) and spots a hitch in fire-to-earth switch (half-second per cycle). One clean four-second sequence runs perfectly before stamina collapses. Assessment: 4–5 clean combat workings before the tank empties. Phelan visits 14 Greystone Lane for equipment catalogue — guild prices are steep (rope 4 silvers, ward-resistance compound 6, medical kit 8, light source 2 = 20 silvers total). He goes to Carterson's Supplies on the guild quarter/dockside boundary. Jonael Carterson ("Carter") introduced: five-foot-five, barrel-built, black hair, black beard, classifies customers on sight. Back room is a meticulously organized logistics operation. Carter already knows the Greymarch Barrows well enough to ask about "the third door on the second floor" and adds a second vial of ward-resistance compound unprompted. Phelan pays 7 silvers. Friday: sparring — Phelan gets 8–10 seconds of integrated melee-and-magic at full effectiveness. Leon reveals he's been to the Barrows: his noise-overload approach failed on the second-floor death ward, which routed all 400 inputs and converted them to heat. This triggers Phelan's noise processing the conversion ratio/leakage theory. At Thresholds (fourth bell), Phelan tells Mere the job is tonight, admits he's not ready. She reframes: "People who think they're ready are the ones who don't come back." On his way out, Mere crosses the room and kisses his cheek — brief, two seconds, returns to shelving. The noise stops entirely for the first time. Departs at ninth bell.

**Characters present:** Leon D'Nardis, guild receptionist, Jonael Carterson ("Carter," formally introduced), Mere Fields, Sniff.

**Magic/Exploits:** Combat training: fire sequences, fire-to-earth switch, melee-magic integration. Combat window: 8–10 seconds effective, then degradation. Leon's death ward intel: ward routed 400 inputs and converted to heat (converter, not wall). Phelan's noise theorizes conversion ratio, 2% leakage, internal circulation "heartbeat," seam vulnerability.

**Plot threads opened/advanced:** Combat readiness quantified (8–10 second window); death ward puzzle framed (routing/conversion system); Carter established as key contact; Carter's unprompted "third door" mention; Mere relationship (cheek kiss, noise stopping); Barrows job departs.

**Chapter-ending state:** Hook. Phelan walks toward the Barrows carrying the death ward problem and Mere's kiss in equal rotation.

* * *

### Ch07: The Greymarch Barrows

**Timeline:** Day 28, Friday night. Nearly two hours walking south from Drenwick. Multiple hours underground. Camps outside Barrows entrance overnight.

**Summary:** Phelan walks south carrying Carter's pack. The noise processes the brief: the actual target is verdenshade (not "Pallowmere Root" as stated — a moss-like plant thriving on accumulated magical residue). Barrows were originally a sealed repository, not storage. Two hours out, Flaw Sight picks up old diffuse magic. He stages a fire-supplies camp 20 feet from the entrance. Through Flaw Sight, the Barrows' ward architecture is enormous — multiple generations, the oldest woven into the stone. Entrance ward degraded to ~20%: six primary flaws (two collapsed anchors, three degradation gaps, one design flaw — detection and response layers share an energy feed creating a half-second latency window). Phelan applies ward-resistance compound, times the patrol cycle, threads through on the third cycle via the widest gap. Inside, he finds a builder's switch — an iron lever that collapses the entrance ward to dormancy. First floor: utilitarian, low ceilings, shelving niches. Three resonance crawlers attack — cat-sized, translucent white, six-limbed, crystalline growths (metabolized magical residue), pack hunters. Phelan kills all three using five combat workings: fire weave, stamp-kick plus fire, close-quarters fire, earth working to block approach, precision fire beam through structural gaps. Neck wound from third crawler sealed with Carter's field kit. Now at ~15% reserves. Verdenshade grows in a circular terminus chamber with blue-green glowing stone — low, almost black, moss-like rosettes feeding on decayed magical residue ("bottled ambient energy with a root system"). Harvests six clusters with intact root systems. Job done. But the death ward on the second floor pulls at his awareness. He forces himself to stop — threading a death ward at 15% would be "suicide with extra steps." Exits, builds fire, eats, rests. Reserves stabilize at ~20%; sleep should bring 70–80%.

**Characters present:** Phelan only (solo). Carter, Leon, Mere referenced.

**Magic/Exploits:** Entrance ward threading (6 flaws exploited, ward-resistance compound, patrol cycle timing). Builder's switch found and used. Resonance crawler combat (5 workings: 3 fire, 1 earth, 1 precision fire). Flaw Sight passive drain in magically saturated environment. Death ward theorizing continues (conversion ratio, 2% leakage, buffer limits) but not attempted.

**Plot threads opened/advanced:** Barrows job completed (6 verdenshade clusters); death ward still intact, pulling at Phelan; combat limitations confirmed (5 workings depleted him); resonance crawlers as dungeon ecology; builder's switch (will matter in Ch08); Barrows' original purpose hinted (more than storage).

**Chapter-ending state:** Phelan camps outside with the job done (40 silvers in the bag) but the death ward unsolved. The death ward waits in the dark ahead.

* * *

### Ch08: The Third Door

**Timeline:** Day 29, Saturday morning. Wakes ~fifth bell (grey dawn). Re-enters Barrows, explores second floor, breaches death ward. Exits and begins walking back to Drenwick.

**Summary:** Phelan wakes with reserves at ~80% (not full due to ambient Flaw Sight drain near the Barrows). Overnight noise processing produced a breakthrough: the ward's imperfect conversion creates continuous internal circulation — a side channel broadcasting the ward's own signature "like a heartbeat." He stashes the verdenshade in a rock crevice, re-enters through the dormant entrance, passes the dead crawlers. Second floor reached via a smooth ramp (bottleneck by design). Construction markedly superior: tighter joints, polished surfaces, operational runic inscriptions drawing energy from ambient field — the building itself is the machine. Pre-Compact by at least a century, possibly two. Three doorways: first two are preservation/archival wards protecting now-empty rooms (contents previously retrieved with proper access). Third door at corridor's end — warmer air, radiating stone. Full Flaw Sight engagement maps the death ward: input channels arranged radially (broad-spectrum), central routing matrix, 26 conversion nodes in three concentric rings transforming input to thermal output. Critical finding: input channels fractionally wider than output. The 2% energy difference circulates internally — the ward's "heartbeat," with a different energy profile than external input. **Exploit #3 — Signature Forgery.** Phelan maps the internal circulation over 8 full cycles (frequency 12.7 cycles/standard interval, seven phase offsets at seven routing junctions). Forges energy matching the ward's internal signature, injects through the 2% seam. Ward accepts as own traffic. Builds to 12% of internal circulation (reserves: 80% → 50%). Shifts routing destination at junction five, redirecting forged energy to instruct conversion nodes to consume the ward's own architecture. Self-sustaining cascade — the ward eats itself. Reserves at ~15%. Behind the door: small chamber (10×10 feet), single stone pedestal, one object — a bracelet. Dark mineral (jet black, possibly obsite), oval stone ~4 inches across that absorbs light. Through depleted Flaw Sight: two functions — (1) focusing matrix that refines magical perception (finer resolution at same energy cost OR equivalent resolution at reduced cost), (2) deeper pre-Compact energy reservoir that passively trickle-charges from wearer's natural recovery (currently empty after centuries). Phelan puts it on. Flaw Sight immediately sharpens. He exits, reactivates entrance ward via builder's switch (calibration delay allows safe passage), retrieves verdenshade, walks back to Drenwick.

**Characters present:** Phelan only (solo). Leon, Carter referenced.

**Magic/Exploits:** **Exploit #3 — Death Ward Signature Forgery & Self-Redirect** (see `/world/magic/exploits-log.md`). Three phases: reconnaissance (passive Flaw Sight mapping), forgery & injection (matched internal signature, fed through 2% seam, built to 12%), redirect (rerouted forged energy to convert ward's own architecture). Ward consumed itself. **Enhancer bracelet claimed:** dual-function pre-Compact artifact — perception refinement lens + passive trickle-charge reservoir. Builder's switch reactivated on exit.

**Plot threads opened/advanced:** Enhancer bracelet — major artifact, pre-Compact, raises questions about what warranted a death ward; death ward defeated (signature forgery as new technique); Barrows' original builder characterized as extraordinary; bracelet's second layer uses pre-Compact notation Phelan doesn't fully understand (flagged for later study); Barrows secured (entrance ward reactivated); return to Drenwick pending.

**Chapter-ending state:** Phelan walks back carrying verdenshade (40 silvers) and wearing the enhancer bracelet, which is slowly drinking from his depleted reserves. "The bracelet draws. Faint. Steady. Patient."

* * *

### Ch09: The Return

**Timeline:** Day 29, Saturday midday through late afternoon. ~3 hours from arrival at Carter's to crash at shack.

**Summary:** Phelan walks back to Drenwick on fading reserves (~12%, bracelet drawing steadily). First stop: Carterson's Supplies. Carter reads Phelan's condition from the timing (Friday night job, Saturday midday return) and inspects the neck wound. Professional care through competence. Gear debrief — everything performed. Carter invites Phelan to return when rested ("I've got a project I want a second pair of eyes on"). Second stop: 14 Greystone Lane. Phelan removes the bracelet before entering, hides it in jacket pocket. Does not report the second floor, the death ward, or the bracelet. Delivers verdenshade only. The Observer formally introduces himself as **Ledger** — guild convention, everyone uses aliases, suggests Phelan pick one. Ledger reads Phelan's physical state with clinical precision: recommends thornwell root (migraine residue) and feverwort (muscle fatigue) — both herbs in Gavren's farewell parcel. Either guild intelligence or personal diagnostic skill; both unsettling. Phelan experiences the specific discomfort of being read by someone with his own level of precision — epistemic vulnerability, being on the other side of the lens. Probes about the Barrows — how Phelan handled the crawlers, steers toward combat magic. Notes the verdenshade's intact root systems as evidence of composure under pressure. Phelan realizes quality of work is itself information. Commission surprise: 40 silvers minus 20% = 32 silvers net (not 40). Phelan hadn't done the math on his own contract. Ledger watches the recalculation without comment. Phelan barely navigates the interrogation — didn't get caught, but Ledger doesn't need a confession. Crashes at shack. Notices bracelet stone has shifted from jet black to very dark red (reservoir charging), and the stone's temperature has developed a faint rhythmic pulse (two data points tracking). Asleep before analysis.

**Characters present:** Phelan Varrant, Jonael Carterson ("Carter"), Ledger (The Observer, formally named), Guild Receptionist. Referenced: Mere Fields, Gavren Holst, Leon D'Nardis.

**Magic/Exploits:** No new exploits. Bracelet stone color shift: black → very dark red (charge indicator, reservoir filling). Temperature pulse developing (second charge indicator). Bracelet removed before guild visit (concealment).

**Plot threads opened/advanced:** Ledger formally introduced (The Observer → Ledger); guild alias thread opened (Phelan told to pick one); combat magic suspicion advanced (Ledger probes, Phelan deflects); Carter invites Phelan back for inscription project (sets up Ch10 scene); bracelet charge indicators established (color shift + temperature pulse); financial correction (32 silvers net, not 40); floor 2 / death ward / bracelet withheld from guild.

**Chapter-ending state:** Phelan asleep in shack, ~sub-10% reserves, bracelet charging (stone dark red). 32 silvers in lockbox. Exhaustion, not analysis. Sets up Ch10 (rested, higher reserves, visits to Mere and Leon).

* * *

### Ch10: The Bracelet

**Timeline:** Days 30–33 (Sunday–Wednesday). Recovery period. Reserves climb from ~60% Sunday to ~85% by Tuesday.

**Summary:** Sunday morning, Phelan stops at Carter's on the way to Thresholds. Carter's back room revealed as a forge-and-inscription workshop — compact, meticulously organized, serious. He's working on a set of four throwing knives with focusing channels and amplification nodes for an unnamed client (concealable magical weapons). Bracelet-enhanced Flaw Sight involuntarily catches a flaw in Carter's inscription work: the third focusing channel converges too tightly at the amplification node — would cause micro-fractures within 40–50 throws. Phelan dumps the fix: widen convergence angle, stagger channel depths for thermal load distribution, improving channeling efficiency by ~12%. Carter's reaction is craftsman's amazement — "I've been staring at that inscription for three days." Offers Phelan store credit (no expiration). Dynamic shifts from customer to asset. Bracelet-enhanced Flaw Sight demonstrated passively — caught inscription flaw at higher resolution than normal Flaw Sight. Carter notices the bracelet but doesn't push when Phelan deflects.

Phelan walks to Thresholds. Sniff greets him in the front room (living at the shop, smelling like old paper). Mere reads his condition and spots the bracelet under his sleeve before he reveals it. She identifies the inscription as pre-Compact by style. Phelan tells her about the second floor, the death ward, and the bracelet's dual function (focusing matrix + trickle-charge reservoir). He confirms the guild doesn't know — Mere files the trust hierarchy without comment. Her key question: "What happens when it's full?" — Phelan hadn't considered the reservoir's full-charge behavior. Mere pulls a pre-Compact theory text from Thresholds' shelves and identifies conditional (*if-then*) logic in the bracelet's notation — modern runes are declarative, this is responsive. The bracelet isn't just enchanted, it's *programmed*. Mere then states: "You hid this from your guild. You haven't shown Leon. But you walked here on a Sunday morning and put it on the counter. You're my partner." The noise stops (Ch06 callback). Phelan confirms: "That's — yes. Accurate." They return to the bracelet's notation. Phelan stays an hour.

Monday–Tuesday: deep Flaw Sight analysis of the bracelet at the shack. Key findings: (1) Focusing matrix is a filter, not a magnifier — sharpens relevant detail, dampens background noise. (2) Reservoir acts as a buffer — smooths Flaw Sight usage spikes, draws from buffer before personal reserves. (3) Two functions are in conversation — a self-optimizing feedback system. Pre-Compact engineering that improves the framework itself, not tricks within it. Working model ~80% complete; remaining 20% lives in conditional notation neither Phelan nor Mere can fully parse. Bracelet stone shifting from dark red to warm amber-red. Forge-and-redirect technique reflected on — with bracelet's focusing, could be refined into a repeatable, precise tool.

Tuesday evening: Phelan visits Leon, brings wine as thanks for combat training. Tells Leon the full death ward story (forge-and-redirect technique). Leon impressed — "You walked up to it and found the one thing it couldn't do." Leon proposes a hybrid concept: apply volume to forged signals — four hundred inputs all matching internal signature, injected through multiple seams. Statistical averaging could mask individual imprecisions, reducing observation cycles needed. Twenty minutes of ADD-brain riffing produces a theoretical brute-force forgery approach. Neither has tested it. Phelan does NOT share the bracelet with Leon — trust has layers (methods shared, tools withheld).

Wednesday: shack realization. The word "partner" changes the requirements — Phelan's brain runs the scenario of Mere visiting (one room, one cot, one chair, plans on the wall) and identifies a structural flaw. Not embarrassment — inadequacy. The shack was designed for someone who'd given up on being visited. Financial math reviewed: 32 net silvers from Barrows + 15 retainer, minus expenses. First real savings, but house at 1,300 still distant. Guild alias thread turned over — nothing fits yet. Wednesday afternoon: guild courier delivers job brief NS-7721. Ned Floundry case — curse classified as unbreakable by the Arcane Compact, two curse-breakers failed, progressive degradation, 4–6 weeks remaining. Fee: 150 silvers (120 net after commission). The noise spins up to full speed.

**Characters present:** Phelan Varrant, Jonael Carterson ("Carter") (at his shop), Mere Fields (at Thresholds), Sniff (at Thresholds), Leon D'Nardis (at his rooms). Referenced: Ledger, Gavren, Mrs. Dallery.

**Magic/Exploits:** No new exploits deployed. Bracelet analysis deepened: focusing matrix = perception filter, reservoir = buffer/spike smoother, dual functions in self-optimizing feedback loop, conditional pre-Compact notation identified (responsive, not declarative). **Theoretical: Brute-Force Forgery** — hybrid concept developed with Leon (volume + forgery), untested. See `/world/magic/exploits-log.md`.

**Plot threads opened/advanced:** Carter relationship deepened (customer → asset, store credit earned); Carter's back room established as forge-and-inscription workshop; bracelet enhancement confirmed in practice (Carter inscription fix); Mere "partner" declaration (noise stops — Ch06 callback); bracelet analysis deepened (filter, buffer, feedback system, conditional logic); Mere's structural/linguistic contribution to bracelet study established; forge-and-redirect recognized as repeatable technique category; brute-force forgery hybrid theorized with Leon; shack realization (structural inadequacy for partnership); **Ned Floundry case formally received** (NS-7721, 150 silvers, unbreakable curse); guild alias still open (nothing fits).

**Chapter-ending state:** Phelan at the shack, 85% reserves, bracelet amber-red and building. Floundry case brief on the table. The noise is no longer manageable. Act 3 begins.

* * *

### Ch11: The Client

**Timeline:** Day 34, Thursday. Seventh bell morning (Ledger visit) through mid-afternoon (return visit to Floundry home at third bell). Multiple locations within one day.

**Summary:** Ledger arrives at Phelan's shack at seventh bell Thursday with a leather folio — guild-assembled intelligence on the Floundry case beyond the client brief. Key intel: Ned Floundry was a Commerce Authority trade inspector who filed reports on vendor irregularities in Compact-contracted supply chains four months ago. Six weeks after the reports, the curse hit. The Compact's "unbreakable" classification came in eleven days — standard assessment runs four to six weeks. Ledger hand-picked Phelan for this case: "This one needs someone who sees things differently." Fee confirmed: 150 silvers, 120 net (standard 20% commission, extended engagement surcharge waived). Ledger notices something changed about Phelan since the Barrows debrief — doesn't identify the bracelet but registers the sharpness.

Phelan visits the Floundry home in the upper guild quarter. Met by the son (~10–11, solemn, "Are you another healer?") and sees the daughter (~7–8) on the stairs with an unread book. **Guild alias chosen under pressure:** "Locksmith" — picked in a noise parenthetical panic when Calla extends her hand and Phelan realizes he forgot to choose one. Calla Floundry: mid-forties, organized, exhausted, controlled composure. She has documents prepared — timeline, curse-breaker reports, Compact classification, expense ledger. Phelan reviews the curse-breaker reports (Practitioner Vellen, week 3; Practitioner Dorath, week 5) and identifies that both used unnecessarily narrow methodology — same dissolution family, same framework, as if working within predetermined constraints. Calla confirms the eleven-day timeline troubled her too. She describes Ned's pre-curse anxiety and reveals: Ned told her to contact **Devod Fields** — a carriage driver whose routes crossed at the shipping warehouses — if anything happened. Phelan recognizes the name (Mere's father) but keeps his expression professional.

When Phelan asks to see Ned, Calla asks him to return at third bell — she needs time to prepare the room (dignity, clean linens). Before he leaves, she retrieves recent paper scraps from a drawer: Ned has been trying to write since the curse took his voice, but the recent attempts are illegible, motor control degrading. "He had beautiful handwriting." Calla's composure cracks here — the writing is the detail that gets to her. Phelan pockets the scraps. Fee confirmed: 150 silvers, half on engagement, half on resolution.

Scene 3 at Thresholds: Phelan briefs Mere on the case — curse designed to silence, not just kill. Drops Devod Fields' name. Mere confirms: "That's my father." Delivers his location (Henwick's yard, south docks, fifth bell; Millford Street above a tanner's) with clinical precision. "He has ideas. Most of them are wrong." Mere tells Phelan to go directly — "He responds better to people than to paperwork." She warns about the bracelet: "You've had it a week. You don't know its limits yet."

Scene 4 return visit at third bell: Phelan sees Ned — lucid, tracking eyes, present behind the silence. Physical deterioration advanced (yellowed skin, hair loss, weight loss). The bedside is covered in dozens of paper scraps — far more than Calla showed him. Phelan sees the full progression: early scraps are clear, precise, heartbreaking (a man still fighting, still coherent); later ones degrade; the recent ones from his pocket are the endpoint. The early scraps are worse in their way — messages nobody with power to help read in time. Phelan's analytical machinery goes quiet — can't reduce this to a pattern.

Bracelet-enhanced Flaw Sight on the curse reveals three nested layers: (1) Surface degradation curse — real, doing real damage, what the curse-breakers saw; (2) Concealment layer — disguised as reinforcement, hiding a second working running different logic on a different energy feed; (3) Third structure beneath — partially resolved, at the edge of the bracelet's enhancement range. The curse is *engineered to appear unbreakable* — built with understanding of how the Compact assesses, how curse-breakers operate, what tools and assumptions they use. Same design philosophy as the Greymarch death ward. The noise shifts from analytical to alarmed.

Phelan writes Ned a note: **I SEE WHAT THEY MISSED. I'M GOING TO FIGURE THIS OUT.** Leaves. The boy nods once. The noise doesn't settle.

**Characters present:** Phelan Varrant, Ledger (at shack), Calla Floundry (at Floundry home), Ned Floundry (at bedside, nonverbal), Floundry son (~10–11, unnamed), Floundry daughter (~7–8, unnamed), Mere Fields (at Thresholds), Sniff (at Thresholds). Referenced: Devod Fields, Practitioner Vellen, Practitioner Dorath.

**Magic/Exploits:** **Flaw Sight + bracelet focusing matrix used on Ned's curse** — initial deep observation. Three nested layers identified. No exploit deployed (observation only). Bracelet stone amber-red, reservoir charged. See exploits-log.md for observation entry.

**Plot threads opened/advanced:** **Guild alias "Locksmith" chosen** (under pressure, noise parenthetical); Floundry case investigation begins (consultation, Calla interview, curse observation); three-layer curse architecture identified (degradation facade → concealment → unknown third structure); Compact corruption thread deepened (eleven-day classification, curse-breakers working within constraints, predetermined assessment); **Devod Fields connected to case** — Ned trusted him, Mere confirmed as his daughter; Ledger's suspicion advanced (notices change in Phelan since Barrows); bracelet used in the field for first time on active curse; Phelan made a promise to Ned (written note).

**Chapter-ending state:** Phelan walking home, noise running at death-ward speed. Three-layer curse identified but not yet analyzed in depth. 4–6 weeks remaining (probably less — deterioration accelerating). Next steps: contact Devod Fields, deeper curse analysis. Scraps in coat pocket. 75 silvers engagement fee incoming (half of 150). Bracelet performing well but limits untested on sustained field work.

---

### Ch12: The Father

**Timeline:** Day 35, Friday. Fifth bell (shack, curse analysis) through midday (Devod's place, Millford Street). Brief Thresholds stop en route.

**Summary:** Two-scene chapter. Scene 1: Phelan processes the three-layer curse architecture from memory at his shack, using the bracelet's focusing matrix for enhanced recall (not re-observation — working from imprint). Maps each layer to a solution approach:

- **Layer 1 (degradation):** Too strongly anchored — stabilizer (Layer 2) repairs faster than dissolution can damage. Even Leon's brute-force technique wouldn't work. The **Sniff parallel** clicks: binding salts dampened the dog curse (Ch03), same principle at industrial scale. **Ghostveil moss** identified — a rare plant from Brannick's coursework (Professor Aldwen's Advanced Environmental Thaumics) that absorbs and dampens ambient magical energy. Creates localised suppression field. Not commercially available — **Compact has systematically acquired all documented growth sites** over five years ("preservation purposes"). The noise flags the coincidence: the organisation that classifies curses as unbreakable also controls the one substance that could counter them. Filed, not proven.
- **Layer 2 (stabilizer):** Forge-and-redirect from the death ward (Ch08). Forge internal-looking data to confuse the stabilizer into attacking its own repair mechanism. Bracelet's focusing matrix essential for precision. Known technique, new target. Confidence.
- **Layer 3 (anchor/dead man's switch):** Flaw visible — anchor losing grip as curse changes Ned's life-force signature — but Phelan has no concept for exploiting gradual drift. Filed. Unsolved. Solution from Devod in Ch16.

Two threads converge on Devod Fields: Calla's dead-drop instruction (Ch11) + need for someone who knows where ghostveil moss grows wild. Mere's botanical expertise needed for preparation (harvesting precision critical — incorrect handling destroys dampening properties).

Brief stop at Thresholds: Mere gives practical intel on Devod (schedule, habits, "He responds better to people than to paperwork"). Doesn't go — her avoidance of Devod is active and ongoing. Describes his environment with clinical precision frozen at twelve: "He's not disorganised. He just has more plans than hours."

Scene 2: Phelan visits Devod at Millford Street (above tanner's — Harwick). Environmental storytelling: single room, carpentry bench, tools from three trades, half-finished projects on every surface. "Not a slob's clutter. A tinkerer's overflow." Devod introduced: mid-fifties, wiry, perpetual energy, hands always moving. Reads Phelan's guild affiliation on sight.

**Case intel:** Ned and Devod crossed paths regularly at shipping warehouses. Became friends over shared breaks. Ned confided about vendor irregularities — same company across four categories ("nobody diversifies into both canal-dredging equipment and decorative stonework unless they're diversifying into washing money"). Ned filed Commerce Authority reports. Nothing came out. Six weeks later, the curse. Ned anticipated trouble — told Devod to contact Calla if anything happened.

**Velken's Drift:** When Phelan describes the environment ghostveil moss needs, Devod recognises it immediately. Abandoned magical ore mine, ~3 hours SE of Drenwick by carriage. Magical ore extracted for decades, closed 15–20 years ago. Residual magical energy so dense in lower shafts that compass enchantments stopped working. Devod knows upper levels from delivery days — layout, access, structural condition. Lower levels flooded.

**The pivot — Devod mentions Mere:** After describing the mine, Devod suggests someone for botanical work — "my daughter, actually." A father's pride slipping through before he's thought about it. Phelan's non-reaction reveals he already knows her: no follow-up questions (What's it called? Where? What's her name?). Devod catches the absence: "You already know her." Tests proximity with specific questions only someone close to Mere would know — Pre-Compact section stocking, shelf reorganisation when thinking. Phelan answers with too much detail for a customer. Devod reads people like his daughter reads shelving systems. Phelan confirms: "She's my partner." Devod weighs the word. "Mere doesn't say that unless she means it."

**Charlette Fields revealed:** Devod opens up because he trusts the one person connected to Mere who might change things.
- **Charlette owns Thresholds.** Mere built the business — curated inventory, built clientele, designed systems. Mother holds the deed. "The deed is the leash."
- **Layered, escalating rules.** Income taken as "household contribution." Schedule monitored. Social contact controlled. "Each rule sounds reasonable if you only hear one of them… Now stack them. All of them. Every day. For twelve years."
- **The ultimatum (Mere age 12).** Two years post-divorce. Charlette told Devod: stop all contact, or she'd move them somewhere he'd never find them. Custody was hers. He calculated the odds — compliance kept Mere in Drenwick, within reach. Fighting meant Charlette would run (family in northern provinces). He chose proximity over contact.
- **Mere doesn't know.** She thinks he chose to leave. Her disconnection is built on a lie she doesn't know is a lie.

**The noise goes quiet.** Third kind of quiet — not hyperfocus (analytical), not Mere's kiss (emotional). The cold reader encountering a system he can't be detached about. His partner's life: owned work, taken income, dictated schedule, estranged father driven away. The estrangement Phelan read as Mere's choice was built on Charlette's lie.

**Unsent gifts:** Phelan notices parcels on a shelf — twelve years of wrapped birthday/holiday presents, paper yellowing at different rates, age-appropriate progression. A father who didn't know what a teenage girl wanted but tried anyway, every year.

**Financial math shifts:** The noise runs numbers — not just the house anymore. What would it cost to get Mere independent? Rent, deposit, income while rebuilding. 32 silvers in lockbox + 75 incoming + 75 on resolution - guild percentage = ~120 net. Two financial goals where there used to be one. Neither solved yet.

**Expedition planned:** Three people — Phelan (magic/combat/Flaw Sight), Mere (botanical expertise), Devod (navigation). Carter for supplies.

**Characters present:** Phelan Varrant, Mere Fields (at Thresholds, brief), Sniff (at Thresholds, sleeping), Devod Fields (at Millford Street). Referenced: Ned Floundry, Calla Floundry, Leon D'Nardis, Charlette Fields (named for first time), Professor Aldwen, Carter.

**Magic/Exploits:** No new exploits deployed. Bracelet-enhanced memory recall used for curse architecture processing (observation mode, not active exploitation). **Ghostveil moss** introduced as key countermeasure — dampening agent for Layer 1 solution. Compact suppression of ghostveil moss growth sites flagged as suspicious pattern.

**Plot threads opened/advanced:** Floundry case solution paths mapped (Layer 1: ghostveil moss, Layer 2: forge-and-redirect, Layer 3: unsolved); **Charlette Fields named and revealed** — owns Thresholds, systematic control of Mere, forced Devod out via ultimatum; Devod Fields met and established as ally; Velken's Drift mine identified as expedition target; mine expedition planned (team: Phelan, Mere, Devod + Carter supplies); Compact corruption deepened (ghostveil moss acquisition pattern); financial goal now includes Mere's independence; house plans "look different now."

**Chapter-ending state:** Phelan walking home, noise on two parallel tracks — Layer 3 unsolved (anchor drift, no concept for acceleration) and Mere's situation (Charlette, the deed, twelve years of control). House plans on the wall. Kitchen faces east. "The plans looked different now." Expedition to plan. Two unsolved problems. The noise doesn't settle on either.

---

### Ch13: Three Threads

**Timeline:** Day 36, Saturday. Morning at guild HQ (14 Greystone Lane), tenth bell planning meeting, Saturday afternoon at Carter's shop. Mine expedition set for tomorrow (Sunday, fifth bell).

**Summary:** Four-scene chapter. Scene 1: Phelan arrives at the guild Saturday morning. The receptionist tells him Ledger left something on his desk. It's formal Compact correspondence — the Floundry curse has been classified as unbreakable, and continued "unauthorized interference" may constitute a regulatory violation under Section 14(c). Ledger has clipped a note: guild position backs the client under "never burn a client who paid in good faith." The guild is backing principle, not sentiment. Phelan pockets the correspondence and walks out.

Cassius Rykhard ("Cass") is waiting two doors down — not in front of the guild (provocation), but nearby (suggestion). Late thirties/early forties, tailored doublet, Compact sigil on leather cuff with three channel depths (filed by Phelan as significant — decorative sigils don't need three depths). Cass uses first-name familiarity, calibrated handshake, professional warmth. A masterclass in indirect approach. He frames the Compact's position: institutional clarity, cases that are classified should stay classified. Then offers a "reassignment fee" — twenty-five gold (2,500 silvers). The noise immediately runs the math: 1,300 for the house, leaves 1,200 for Mere's independence (rent, deposit, her own shop, no leash). Both goals solved. Involuntary architecture of a life not yet built. Phelan says "No." — flat, undramatic, like declining tea. Two reasons (noise): guild code (never burn a good-faith client — a rule he found a guild to match, not one adopted from it), and the leash (accepting makes him a known quantity with a price tag the Compact can pull whenever needed). Cass takes the refusal smoothly, says the offer stands, walks away clean. Phelan files the institutional math: a mid-level official doesn't carry twenty-five gold. That's pre-approved budget money. You don't allocate twenty-five gold to close a genuinely impossible case — you allocate it to stop someone looking at a case that isn't.

Scene 2: Guild planning library, tenth bell. Mere and Devod are already there, on opposite sides of the table, standing (sitting would commit). Maps and mine survey documents spread out. Mere introduces Devod: "This is my father. He has ideas. Most of them are wrong. You should listen anyway." Devod accepts with practiced grace. The professional framework holds — maps, logistics, route planning. Devod provides structural knowledge of Velken's Drift: main access road (southeastern fork, three hours by carriage), upper gallery layout (first gallery wide/reinforced, second branches south and east, third gallery unreliable, lower levels flooded). Mere provides botanical assessment: ghostveil moss won't be in upper galleries (too much airflow), will be at boundary between second and third levels (deep enough for concentration, shallow enough to avoid flooding) — east branch of second gallery. Team roles assigned: Phelan (magic, combat, navigation in high-residue areas), Mere (moss identification, harvesting, preparation), Devod (navigation, structural assessment). Mere sets the timeline: tomorrow, fifth bell departure. Weather holds, road conditions optimal, another week of rain makes switchbacks unreliable. Phelan observes the Mere/Devod dynamic through noise parentheticals — Devod's overcorrected casualness, his calibrated word choices ("my daughter" → "Mere" → pronoun), tracking her when she's not looking. Mere has classified Devod and closed the file — she's not re-examining. Her estrangement is built on Charlette's architecture, and she doesn't know it.

Scene 3: Carter's shop, Saturday afternoon. Closed for regular business but door unlocked — Carter uses Saturdays for uninterrupted workshop time. Phelan requests mine supplies (three people, one day, underground). Carter assembles: ceramic light rods (enchanted, not alchemical — alchemical react badly to ambient magical residue), canary strips (chemical air quality indicators, not magical — work in high-residue environments), rope (50 feet, treated for damp), medical kit (compact), botanical collection kit. Then Carter reveals the focusing ring — a wide band of dark metal with inscribed channels in three staggered depths, the same thermal distribution principle from Phelan's knife fix (Ch09). Carter built it from the depth-staggering principle Phelan identified. The ring acts as a secondary anchor point: fire-weave projects from the ring's focal point instead of directly from the hand, extending controlled range from 5-6 feet to 15-20 feet. Phelan tests it — a whisper of fire stretches to fifteen feet with precision he hasn't felt since eighteen. The ring refines output: "Clean output from dirty input." Carter frames pricing through store credit: "Your store credit covers most of this. I'm charging materials. Time was mine. Technique is yours." Twelve silvers out of pocket. The noise processes: six months' rent, or a focusing ring that turns five feet of rusty combat magic into fifteen feet of controlled range. The Barrows crawler got inside his guard because his range was shorter than its reach — Carter saw the scar and built this instead of mentioning it. Carter warns: don't push past twenty feet until practiced, vibration in the metal means pull back. "Come back from the mine." "I don't build custom inscription work for dead men. Bad for the portfolio." Competence recognizing competence, expressed through craft.

Scene 4: Walk home, Saturday afternoon. Phelan wears the ring, carries supplies. Three threads summarized in noise: the bribe (twenty-five gold, said no), Mere and Devod (first proximity in twelve years, separated by a lie only Phelan knows), and the mine tomorrow. The ring is new capability. Different man than the one who started with twelve coppers — that man saved, this man spent twelve silvers on survival and said no to twenty-five gold on principle. At the shack, house plans on the wall. More moving pieces than comfortable. Wishes he had time for an hour with Leon — Leon would have caught something — but it's late, fifth bell comes early, and a man going underground on too little sleep stays underground. The noise runs. He lets it.

**Characters present:** Phelan Varrant, Guild Receptionist, Cassius Rykhard ("Cass" — formally introduced), Mere Fields, Devod Fields, Jonael Carterson ("Carter"). Referenced: Ledger, Leon D'Nardis, Ned Floundry.

**Magic/Exploits:** No new exploits. Focusing ring introduced — secondary anchor point for fire-weave, extends range from 5-6 feet to 15-20 feet. Built by Carter from Phelan's depth-staggering principle (Ch10 knife fix). Store credit applied. Canary strips noted as chemical (not magical) air quality indicators for high-residue environments. Cass's leather cuff has three-channel-depth inscription (filed as significant).

**Plot threads opened/advanced:** Compact pressure formalized (regulatory letter + bribe); Cassius Rykhard introduced as Compact antagonist (smooth, calibrated, professional — "genuinely" wished luck); twenty-five gold bribe refused (guild code + leash refusal); guild backing confirmed (Ledger's note — principle, not sentiment); Mere/Devod first forced proximity (professional framework holds, undercurrents observed); mine expedition planned for tomorrow (fifth bell, Sunday); focusing ring acquired (twelve silvers, extends combat range); Carter relationship deepened further (ring as gift-through-craft); Leon absence noted (wished for his input, no time).

**Chapter-ending state:** Phelan at the shack, mine supplies packed, ring on finger, twelve silvers lighter, twenty-five gold refused. Three unresolved threads. Tomorrow: underground. The noise runs.

---

### Ch14: The Descent

**Timeline:** Day 37, Sunday. Fifth bell departure, ~eighth bell arrival at Velken's Drift, underground through afternoon.

**Summary:** Five-scene chapter. Scene 1: Cart journey — three hours southeast, Devod drives. Comedy from Devod's nervous chatter (bad shortcut ideas, running commentary) and Mere's monosyllabic vetoes. Phelan cold-reads from the back: Devod adjusts word choice with every response (calibrating without data), Mere's clipped responses aren't punishment (she talks that way to everyone), but Devod reads them as such. The gulf between what Devod hears and what Mere means is exactly the width of Charlette's lie. Landscape shifts from river plain to scrub hills. Devod goes quieter near the mine — different energy when the destination is real. Mine entrance visible via rusted rail ties.

Scene 2: Velken's Drift entrance — environmental storytelling. Abandoned mid-operation: gantry frame with seized pulleys, ore carts on tracks (one loaded, one empty, one tipped with broken axle), notice board with faded shift schedule. Devod confirms Garrick oak support frame is solid, warns about pine sections deeper in. First ceramic light rod lit. **Flaw Sight overwhelmed:** the Barrows were a library, the mine is a foundry floor. Decades of raw, unstructured magical leakage saturating every surface — no patterns, no framework, just omnidirectional noise. Bracelet engages automatically (stone darkens), filters worst but can't eliminate. Flaw Sight is useless here — not degraded, useless. Devod notices Phelan's distress, takes point. Formation: Devod (navigation), Mere (middle), Phelan (rear guard). Upper gallery well-maintained — Garrick oak timbers, chisel marks, professional operation.

Scene 3: Descent to second gallery. Three lessons: (1) Pine timbers groaning, one section with ceiling bowed — Devod steers through confidently, identifies cosmetic vs. load-bearing by sight. (2) Residue pocket — Phelan walks into concentrated pocket in dead-end passage. Flaw Sight flares involuntarily, vision doubles, walls ripple, stomach heaves. Three seconds of total sensory overload. Mere marks the passage with chalk. (3) Sound is unreliable — echoes misleading, dripping water from three directions at once. Devod navigates by memory (paces, landmarks, chisel marks, rail track curves). Canary strips confirm breathable air. At east fork junction, sound from ahead — movement, claws on stone. Devod recognizes it ("That's not rats") and steps in front of Mere with walking stick.

Scene 4: **Fight 1 — four mine dogs.** Mutated by decades of magical residue — jaws too heavy, feet splayed, torso compressed. Hungry, aggressive, not apex predators. Beat 1: First dog charges from 15+ feet. Ring fires — clean, focused beam at 12 feet. Clean kill. **Residue amplifies** — more fire than intended. Beat 2: Second dog from side corridor. **Residue dampens** — fire-weave sputters, weak hit. Ring vibrates (Carter's warning). Melee + weakened fire at close quarters to finish. Beat 3: Two dogs flank from behind. One angles for Phelan (killed at 8 feet, residue neutral). Fourth dog reaches Mere's position. **Devod's moment:** walking stick connects — hard, practiced swing of a delivery driver defending cargo. Knocks dog sideways into Phelan's line of sight. Ring. Fire. Clean. **The tell:** Devod protected Mere, not the equipment. Walking stick went between daughter and threat before his brain caught up. Beat 4: Mere looks at Devod — not gratitude, assessment. Something didn't match her model. Filed. Returns to securing supplies. Noise: (*This is how data changes models. One point at a time.*) Beat 5: Post-fight combat-analysis noise — full technical self-assessment. Range: 12 feet vs. Barrows' 5-6 (crawler that scarred neck wouldn't have gotten close). Integration: melee + fire held under residue pressure, muscle memory carried when magic stuttered. Ring calibration: vibration threshold real, adjust by feel not formula. Reserves: ~70% (30% spent on four workings vs. Barrows 100% for five). Conclusion: not dormant anymore — active inventory, better math than eighteen-year-old self.

Devod's post-fight sincerity: "Poor bastards" about the mutated dogs. Meant it.

Scene 5: East corridor descends to flooded sublevel. **Ghostveil moss located** — pale, fibrous, growing in dense mats at waterline. Faintly luminescent. The residue near the moss is quieter — dampening effect visible even without Flaw Sight. The moss is absorbing ambient magic. Mere assesses: old stock, high concentration, dampening capacity increases with maturity. Harvest requires ~1 hour, controlled light (direct light degrades compounds during cutting), specific angle and tool. Densest growth below waterline. Team begins setting up. **End hook:** voices from the flooded lower levels — human, unmistakable, distorted by water and stone. The mine isn't empty. Devod: "That's not rats either."

**Characters present:** Phelan Varrant, Mere Fields, Devod Fields. Referenced: Carter (supplies, ring, canary strips), Leon (Barrows training comparison), Ned Floundry (urgency — "Ned doesn't have time").

**Magic/Exploits:** **Focusing ring first combat use.** Four fire workings deployed in variable-residue environment. Working 1: amplified by residue (12ft, clean kill). Working 2: dampened by residue (weak hit, melee supplement required, ring vibration at threshold). Working 3: neutral (8ft, clean). Working 4: 10ft off Devod's deflection, clean. **30% reserves spent** (vs. Barrows: 100% for five workings against three crawlers). Ring efficiency confirmed as real, not theoretical. Flaw Sight completely offline in mine — raw residue saturation, no structure to process. Bracelet focusing matrix auto-engaged but insufficient — filters noise from signal, but there's no signal, only noise.

**Plot threads opened/advanced:** Velken's Drift expedition underway (moss located, harvest imminent); focusing ring combat-tested (range confirmed, residue variability noted, vibration threshold real); Flaw Sight limitation in high-residue environments established (forces reliance on team); Devod's protective instinct revealed (walking stick between Mere and threat — muscle memory, not decision); Mere's model of Devod cracking (data point filed, not processed); combat magic rust thread advanced (not dormant anymore — "active inventory," better math with ring + bracelet + experience); human voices in mine = Ch15 bandit setup.

**Chapter-ending state:** Team underground at Velken's Drift, moss located, harvest about to begin. Phelan at ~70% reserves. Human voices from deeper in the mine — not alone. Devod's walking stick still in ready position.

### Ch15: The Haul

**Timeline:** Day 37, Sunday. Continues directly from Ch14 (same underground session at Velken's Drift). Cart ride home arrives Drenwick by late afternoon/evening.

**Summary:** Five-scene chapter picking up from Ch14's cliffhanger (human voices in the mine). Scene 1: Mere harvests ghostveil moss while Phelan guards and Devod watches the corridor. Devod generates bad ideas (taking stone, light rod angle, damming water) — Phelan tracks a running tally. Mere works with clinical precision — the binding salts parallel is explicit (what she did intuitively on Sniff, now at industrial scale). Harvest complete: first application's worth plus extra stock, stored in dampened cloth. Mere finishes just as the voices get closer.

Scene 2: Five bandits arrive from the south passage via Fenwick bottoms — the same shortcut Devod suggested in Ch14 (dismissed then, now validated by the bandits using it). Loose formation, issued gear (not personal), lanterns not light rods. Leader is a professional — reads Phelan the way Phelan reads him. Terms: "Nobody takes anything out of this mine. Nothing leaves." Contract enforcement, not personal hostility. Phelan reads the moment the leader decides to fight — half-second advantage. **Combat:** Ring-assisted fire takes the crossbowman first (amplified by residue pocket). Defensive screen between blades and Devod's position (7% cost for a 3% working — residue doubles everything). Leader knocked down with fire + elbow strike. Devod uses a mine cart as a barricade — loading dock physics, not combat — pins one blade against the wall. Cudgel man surrenders. Five secured with cargo hitches from Carter's pack. Reserves post-combat: ~25-26% (five fire workings + screen at double residue cost).

**Bracelet wellspring discovery:** Post-combat assessment reveals reserves are higher than the math allows (~32-34% instead of ~20%). The bracelet is warm — active warmth, same sensation as the Barrows' steady draw, but the direction is reversed. In the Barrows, the bracelet pulled from Phelan's reserves (filling its reservoir). Now it's pushing — returning stored energy when reserves dropped below an unknown threshold. A wellspring: patient, autonomous, operating on pre-Compact conditional logic (the *if-then* notation Mere identified in Ch10). This answers Mere's Ch10 question: "What happens when it's full?" It saves for him. Filed — too tired for full analysis, too many questions (threshold? cycle? one-time? intent or emergent?).

Scene 3: Search of bandits yields patrol logs, payment notes, and receipt from **Greenvale Provisions** — a company name Phelan doesn't recognise. Patrol log: dated entries going back months tracking moss growth (coverage, density, growth rates). Terms like "available stock" and "harvestable volume." They're monitors, not collectors — a retrieval team would strip the site when thresholds are met. Efficient, compartmentalised. Phelan shows the receipt to Devod. **Devod recognises Greenvale Provisions** — it's one of "Ned's ghost vendors." Ned tracked companies in Compact supply chains that existed on paper and nowhere else: shipping manifests that didn't match deliveries, purchase orders from addresses that didn't exist, vendor contracts that activated for one quarter and vanished. Greenvale was the second ghost vendor Ned found. Ned filed reports. Four months later, the curse hit. The connection isn't subtext to Devod — it's the sequence of events. Compact conspiracy deepened: the organisation classifying the curse as unbreakable is also running shell companies to control access to the materials needed to break it.

Scene 4: Retreat. Forty yards from the main gallery, the ceiling complains — fire workings destabilised the corridor's twelve-year-old supports. Dust falls. Devod reads the supports the way Mere reads moss and Phelan reads magic: third crossbeam bowed, load-bearing, carrying weight from gallery junction above. Fighting shifted the stone, changed the weight transfer. If the timber gives, eighteen inches of ceiling drops. **Devod's solution (idea #10):** Wheel jack from a mine cart (screw jack for axle repairs, six-inch throw, solid iron base) under a loose beam braced against the ceiling beside the failing crossbeam. Two points of contact instead of one, shares the load. He has the jack free in fifteen seconds, beam positioned in under a minute, jack lifting and load redistributing. Dust stops falling. Team passes through. Jack holds. **Two good ideas out of ten** — the shortcut and the jack. Phelan reframes Devod's ratio: not inefficiency but a search algorithm. Volume produces results when precision isn't available. "The ratio isn't a flaw. It's a method." Mere watches Devod — more data accumulating (walking stick, bandit positioning, jack), inconsistent with her model. Not processing. But the catalogue is getting heavy.

Scene 5: Main gallery — Mere discovers **saturated magical ore** in old extraction carts. Common ore that's been sitting in high-concentration residue for 12+ years, absorbing and overflowing with stored magical essence. Extraordinary for forging, inscription work, magical tooling. Phelan thinks of Carter's forge (raw stock worth more than moss and verdenshade combined). They take ~30-35 pieces (Mere selecting, Devod loading — first sustained cooperation with a rhythm). Phelan does financial math: several pieces to Carter as gift (debt repayment like Leon and the wine), rest through Leon's contacts or Carter's network (can't sell normally — Compact would notice). The ore shifts the house timeline but doesn't solve it.

**Road home (3 hours):** Silence for the first hour. Mere and Devod exchanged more words today than in twelve years — not resolved, started. She watched him protect her, read a ceiling, cooperate on ore loading. Wordless efficiency that looked like memory. "Not resolved. But the door was open, and neither of them had closed it." Phelan reflects: Flaw Sight useless in the mine, combat magic at double cost, bracelet did something unauthorised. The only things that worked were other people's knowledge. That last part — letting others be better at things he can't do — was new.

**Cure status recap:** Layer 1 (ghostveil moss — harvested, secured). Layer 2 (forge-and-redirect — ready). Layer 3 (dead man's switch — still unsolved). Compact evidence: payment notes, patrol logs, shell company, ghost vendors = systematic operation, not institutional inertia. Someone senior authorised it, someone careful maintains it.

**Closing:** "Two for ten. The shortcut and the jack. Devod's ratio, not mine." Cart rolls toward Drenwick. Mere's hand on the moss. Devod humming. Bracelet pulsing. "Tomorrow. Today had been enough."

**Characters present:** Phelan Varrant, Mere Fields, Devod Fields. Five bandits (leader, crossbowman, two blades, cudgel man — all unnamed). Referenced: Carter (rope knots, ring, forge), Leon (400-input parallel), Ned Floundry (ghost vendors, reports, curse timeline).

**Magic/Exploits:** Five ring-assisted fire workings + one defensive screen in combat (variable residue: amplified, dampened, neutral). Reserve cost: ~45% at double residue rate (70% → ~25-26%). **Bracelet wellspring discovered:** reservoir reverses flow when reserves drop below threshold, pushing stored energy back into Phelan. Answers Mere's Ch10 question. Pre-Compact conditional logic confirmed (autonomous, responsive). See exploits-log.md. No Flaw Sight use (still offline in mine).

**Plot threads opened/advanced:** Bracelet wellspring revealed (reservoir reverses flow — saves for him); Compact conspiracy deepened significantly (Greenvale Provisions = Ned's ghost vendor, patrol teams monitoring moss growth, shell companies in Compact supply chains); Devod's two-for-ten ratio reframed (search algorithm, not inefficiency); Mere/Devod relationship advancing (more data, door open, not resolved); saturated ore discovered (financial potential, Carter gift planned); Phelan's reliance on team acknowledged explicitly ("the only things that worked were other people's knowledge").

**Chapter-ending state:** Cart approaching Drenwick, late afternoon. Two of three cure layers solved. Layer 3 still waiting. Compact evidence in pocket. Saturated ore in cart. Bracelet pulsing with questions. Mere/Devod door open. "Tomorrow. Today had been enough."

---

### Ch16: The Chain

**Timeline:** Day 38, Monday. Morning (Leon's rooms), afternoon (guild planning room at 14 Greystone Lane, second bell).

**Summary:** Two-scene chapter. Scene 1: Phelan visits Leon at his rooms above the chandler's shop, Monday morning. Asks Leon to come to the guild planning room for an afternoon session on the Floundry case. Leon resists (hates guilds, declined joining in Ch05) but the puzzle pulls him — three-layer curse architecture, stabilizer monitoring patterns, the forge-and-redirect technique applied to nested systems. Leon agrees under protest. Leon reads the situation: "The fact that you're asking means this is the one you can't do alone."

Scene 2: Guild planning room, second bell Monday afternoon. Four people — Phelan, Leon, Mere, Devod — around the table with curse-breaker reports, bandit evidence, and ghostveil moss. **Leon meets Mere and Devod for the first time.** Leon recognises Mere from Thresholds — has visited twice, knows her pre-Compact notation collection, noticed she rearranges the binding-theory subsection when thinking. Mere gives him the flat attention she reserves for things that just became interesting. Leon connects with Devod immediately over the chalk sorting — recognises restless energy "because he lived three doors down from it in his own head." Leon's performative complaints about the guild (chairs) dissolve once the puzzle engages. Phelan lays out three layers, two solved, one not.

**Bracelet revealed to Leon:** The case demands it — Layer 2's precision requirements can't be explained without the bracelet's focusing matrix. Leon processes the implication (Phelan shared the technique but withheld the tool): "You shared the technique but not the tool." Compartmentalization: personal observation noted, then back to the problem. Trust gradient shifted, not broken. (*He would have done the same. The Mallory crystal buyer, unnamed and unquestioned. Compartmentalization isn't betrayal. It's architecture.*)

**Leon/Phelan riff on Layer 2:** Leon's critical observation — "Systems that monitor other systems can be made to accelerate the very failures they're trying to prevent." The stabilizer, fed forged crisis data via bracelet-precision injection, overloads its repair function and actively tears Layer 1 apart from the inside. The stabilizer is weaponized, not just disrupted. Layer 2 properly solved. Devod asks reasonable but wrong questions during the riff (can't the stabilizer switch off? redirect the excess energy? use water? fire?) — Phelan tracks these as the search algorithm running.

**Mere's conspiracy crack:** Pattern recognition on the curse-breaker reports — both Vellen and Dorath followed identical Compact-approved procedure that doesn't account for nested workings. "Who wrote the procedure?" Flat delivery, devastating implication. The assessment guidelines were written (or maintained) by people who knew the curse's structure. The curse-breakers were set up — "given a map to the wrong room" (Leon). "They were given the only map the Compact distributes. Which is the same thing" (Mere). Leon and Devod react — institutional corruption and personal betrayal respectively. Devod wants to trace Greenvale Provisions but agrees: "After we fix him."

**Sniff parallel acknowledged:** Phelan names the connection aloud — what Mere did with binding salts on the dog curse, they're doing at scale with ghostveil moss. Mere's response: "The principle scales. That's what principles do." Rare moment of Phelan crediting someone aloud. The room notices.

**Devod's breakthrough — "Move the Lock"** (idea #7 of ~10): After six bad ideas (decoys, camouflage, power source cutoff, fire, water — Mere finishes one dismissal with "Exploring options," a warmer gesture than her usual monosyllabic treatment of Devod), Devod delivers the chapter's turning point via cargo analogy — "If you can't unlock the lock, move what it's locked to." Like a boat chained to a dock pylon: move the boat, the chain goes slack. Applied to Layer 3: accelerate Ned's life-force drift (which the curse is already causing) using ghostveil moss at altered concentration, and the anchor loses its grip. **Key technical detail:** The anchor requires signature verification before delivering the kill trigger — a kill mechanism without verification fires into whoever's nearby, and this curse-builder was too precise for that. Same reason a sending-stone won't discharge into the wrong recipient. The verification is both the safety and the exploitable constraint. If the signature drifts past the validation window, the trigger fires and finds nothing it recognises. Kill trigger fires into empty space. **Dual moss use crystallized:** standard preparation for Layer 1 dampening, altered concentration for Layer 3 drift acceleration. One ingredient, two applications. Mere confirms feasibility — needs resonance characteristics from one more bracelet-enhanced bedside observation, then twelve hours for the altered preparation using preserved root structures.

**Leon validates:** "The most elegant piece of lateral thinking I've heard in five years, and it came from a cargo analogy." Actually laughs. Devod confused by the reaction. Mere says "That works" before anyone else finishes processing.

**Execution order crystallized:** Layer 3 first (anchor loosened via drift acceleration) → Layer 2 second (stabilizer weaponized via forge-and-redirect) → Layer 1 last (degradation cracked during moss dampening window, ~30-60 minutes).

**Hyperfocus spiral:** The noise takes over. Parentheticals become main text, physical reality becomes interruption. Phelan maps execution in real-time — timing windows, energy costs (bracelet reservoir and personal reserves), precision requirements, failure modes, contingencies. Floor scenario: nine percent personal reserves. Contingency: Mere maintains dampening field, moss does the work. **Team reactions during spiral:** Mere moves closer (Phelan doesn't notice until her voice registers). Devod asks "How long has he been—" Leon: "Eight minutes" (flat, counting — he's seen this before). Water glass appears on the table; noise catalogues it and discards it as irrelevant. Devod: "He needs to stop." Leon: "He can't. Not until it resolves or he crashes. Let him run. Don't touch him." Leon translates the experience for Devod; Mere has already moved to proximity without being told. "Trust the principle. Trust the team. Trust the chain." **Chapter ends mid-spiral, mid-thought.** Hard cut — the architecture is still building, the corridor keeps extending.

**Characters present:** Phelan Varrant, Leon D'Nardis, Mere Fields, Devod Fields. Referenced: Ned Floundry, Carter, Practitioner Vellen, Practitioner Dorath, Calla Floundry.

**Magic/Exploits:** No new exploits deployed. **Bracelet revealed to Leon** — first time Leon sees the artifact. Layer 2 solution refined: forge-and-redirect weaponizes the stabilizer (Leon's systems-monitoring insight). Layer 3 solved conceptually: ghostveil moss at altered concentration accelerates life-force drift, anchor loses grip. Dual moss preparation identified. Execution order locked. Bracelet reservoir estimated at ~75%, energy budget calculated for full cure sequence.

**Plot threads opened/advanced:** **All three cure layers now solved** (Layer 3 via Devod's "move the lock" concept); bracelet revealed to Leon (trust expanded under pressure); Compact conspiracy deepened further (assessment procedures designed to miss nested workings — institutional complicity, not just institutional pressure); Mere/Devod dynamic advancing (both present at guild, Devod's pride in Mere's competence visible, Phelan files it); Leon fully engaged with the case (guild forgotten, puzzle consumed him); execution order locked (Layer 3 → Layer 2 → Layer 1); hyperfocus spiral sets up Ch17 crash.

**Chapter-ending state:** Mid-hyperfocus spiral. Phelan in the planning room, noise at full volume, mapping the execution architecture. Three solutions locked. The chain is building. "Seventeen variables and twelve unknowns and the solution space is a corridor I can almost see the end of." Ch17 opens with the crash already in progress.

* * *

### Ch17: The Crash

**Timeline:** Days 38–39 (Monday afternoon crash → Tuesday morning/midday waking and recovery). Crash occurs during hyperfocus spiral from Ch16 (Monday, second bell afternoon). Phelan wakes Tuesday morning. ~14 hours unconscious.

**Summary:** Three-section chapter. Section 1 (The Crash): The hyperfocus spiral from Ch16 continues — Phelan is still building the execution architecture (contingency branches, reservoir math, timing windows) when his body fails. The bracelet goes hot — not the steady ambient warmth but a burn. The focusing matrix keeps sharpening the corridor past his physical limit. Sound becomes texture (Leon = rough wool, Devod = sandpaper, Mere = uncategorisable frequency). The noise fragments progressively — full sentences → fragments → single words → silence. Someone catches his head before it hits the floor (smell of old paper and binding salt — Mere). Hard blackout.

Section 2 (Waking/Reconstruction): Phelan wakes on the guild planning room floor, Tuesday morning, with a migraine "that had opinions about his continued existence." Discovery sequence as systems restart: ceiling identification → floor humiliation → light assessment (east windows, Tuesday morning, ~14 hours unconscious). Finds arranged beside him: water, food (bread, dried meat, apple), a folded note, and a ceramic bowl of thornwell root ground to quarter-grain precision. The thornwell root is the emotional key — Phelan recognises the grind (fine, fast-dissolving, precise dosing) as categorically different from his stolen rough-ground dose in Ch03. Mere observed the dog crash, filed the dosing failure, and corrected it. "Efficiency, not emotion" — except efficiency directed at his wellbeing IS care, expressed in the language they both speak. Thornwell root works in two minutes (vs. twenty in Ch03, slept until noon). Mere's note: four sentences, four data points — "Ned stable. Moss prepared. Leon has your diagrams. Eat something." No greeting, no sign-off. Everything he'd need in the order he'd need it. "She wrote this note for the person I am, not the person most people think I should be."

The bracelet stone is a dark, tired colour between amber and black — recovering visibly, warming back toward amber. Wellspring behaviour confirmed repeating (Ch15 mine → Ch17 crash): reserves dropped past threshold, bracelet drained itself to keep him going, now recharging. Recovering faster than Phelan's personal reserves.

Leon arrives carrying tea. "Fourteen hours. That's a record." Phelan corrects: "The Barrows crash was longer." Leon reframes — the Barrows crash was physical (death ward, crawlers, walking home); this was cognitive. "You sat in a chair and thought too hard." Leon transcribed the full execution architecture during Phelan's spiral — three clean sheets, ink on paper, organised from Phelan's mutterings. The chain architecture preserved outside Phelan's head.

**Compact developments (Leon's report):** Three moves overnight. (1) Formal transfer motion to move Ned to Compact medical supervision "for his own safety" — guild blocked it (charter gives contracted practitioner primacy during active engagement, Phelan's contract is clean). (2) Inquiry into Phelan's qualifications filed with guild's oversight liaison — nuisance paperwork, standard harassment toolkit ("file enough inquiries and even a clean practitioner spends more time answering questions than working"). (3) **Compact representative visited Calla Floundry's home.** Offered full Compact resources, sanctioned practitioners, proper facilities. Targeted the fear — dying husband, unvetted practitioner, guild that doesn't play by gentlemen's rules. **Calla held but was shaken.** Ledger went to the Floundry home in person first thing Tuesday morning to steady her — reframing: the Compact classified the curse as unbreakable in eleven days, so what are they offering now? Calla's confidence cracked but not broken. Every day without visible progress lets the doubt grow roots.

Moss update (via Leon and Mere's margin notes): standard preparation complete (Layer 1 dampening). Altered concentration at 70% — Mere started the 12-hour base preparation while Phelan was unconscious because the first 70% doesn't require the final resonance data. "She calculated what she could do without it and she did that" — eight hours not lost.

**Devod arrives** with supplies (canvas bag — food, water, medical kit refill from Carter). Has been running between guild room and Thresholds since yesterday. Carter dropped off supplies overnight — and a note about the bracelet's post-stress harmonic settling patterns. (*Phelan's noise parenthetical bridges the concealment gap: "Hard to keep a focusing matrix hidden from a craftsman when you're unconscious on his floor with your sleeve riding up."*) **Carter now knows about the bracelet.**

**The tenderness scene:** Phelan reads the physical evidence — hand repositioned (palm-up, fingers uncurled, not his defensive reflex), blanket tucked with precision not warmth. Someone sat with him, held his hand, tucked blankets. Someone who wouldn't have done any of it if he'd been conscious. Devod confirms: "She stayed. After everyone else went home for a few hours. She stayed." Devod's face — a father who watched his daughter do something he'd never expected: tenderness. Not skill or competence. The kind she doesn't perform. The kind that exists only when no one is watching. Phelan's noise reconstructs: Devod came back, walked in, saw her being gentle with an unconscious man in a way she'd never allow if observed. "He's carrying it now the way he carries everything about Mere — carefully, silently, with twelve years of guilt and pride and distance compressed into an expression that he thinks he's hiding." He's not hiding it. "I didn't say anything. Some things aren't mine to name."

**Mere arrives** carrying moss preparations. Systematic scan of Phelan's condition (skin colour, eye clarity, posture, tremor, used thornwell root, eaten bread). Confirms standard preparation complete, altered at 70%, needs resonance data from one more bedside observation. Exchange about the thornwell root: "How did you know?" / "Pattern recognition isn't complicated." The question isn't about the root — they both know that. The noise goes quiet (third callback — Ch06 cheek kiss, Ch10 "partner," now this). "Something passed between us that wasn't in the words" — the accumulated evidence of care (thornwell root, folded blankets, note, preparation started without data) expressed through systematic precision because that IS how she loves, and the word "care" is too small and too imprecise for what it actually means.

Section 3 (Planning/Timeline): An hour later. Thornwell root has beaten the migraine to manageable. Reserves at ~30% (low, functional). Bracelet continuing to warm. Room settled into a functional operation — Leon annotating diagrams, Mere monitoring altered preparation with pocket watch and temperature chart, Devod in his corner being available without being in the way.

**Timeline pressure:** Ned stable but degradation still running. Last symptom cascade four days ago (motor control, left hand — Day 35/Ch12). Intervals shortening — next cascade in 2–3 days. Tomorrow morning: bedside observation (bracelet-enhanced, minimal reserves, mapping anchor resonance only). Mere's altered preparation finishes 1–2 hours after data delivery. Then: break the curse. One day of margin, maybe two. "Almost ready. 'Almost' with a dying man is a dangerous word."

Compact inquiry moves slowly if Ledger manages it, but it's on record. The Calla approach is the real threat — if they're not at Ned's bedside within 48 hours with visible progress, the doubt grows roots. Phelan takes stock: the world didn't end while he was on the floor. Leon held the technical thread. Mere advanced the preparation. Devod stayed. Carter resupplied. Ledger defended. The chain didn't break. The team is a design, and the design works even when the designer is face-down on hardwood. "Trust the chain. You said it in the spiral. You meant it as mathematics. Turns out it's also true."

**End hook:** "Tomorrow morning. Bedside observation. Then Mere completes the altered preparation. Then we break the curse." Leon nods. Mere doesn't look up. Devod: "I'll drive." Bracelet warms. Almost ready.

**Characters present:** Phelan Varrant, Leon D'Nardis, Mere Fields, Devod Fields. Referenced: Jonael Carterson ("Carter"), Ledger, Calla Floundry, Ned Floundry, Cassius Rykhard (implied via Compact moves).

**Magic/Exploits:** No new exploits deployed. **Bracelet wellspring confirmed repeating** — second instance of reservoir flow reversal (first: Ch15 mine combat). Reserves dropped past threshold during hyperfocus spiral, bracelet drained to keep Phelan going, now recharging faster than personal reserves. Post-stress harmonic settling patterns noted by Carter (first external observation of bracelet behavior). **Bracelet safety limitation identified:** the focusing matrix doesn't know when to stop — it kept sharpening the corridor after Phelan's body was failing. No built-in user protection, or it hasn't been found. Pre-Compact engineering built for practitioners who may have had different limits.

**Plot threads opened/advanced:** **Compact pressure escalating** — three simultaneous moves (transfer motion blocked, qualification inquiry filed, Calla approached directly). Calla shaken but holding. Ledger deployed to steady. Timeline pressure: 48 hours before doubt grows roots. **Bracelet concealment narrowing further** — Carter now knows (saw inscription while Phelan was unconscious). Only guild/Compact still excluded. **Bracelet wellspring** confirmed as repeating behavior (not one-time). Recovery speed faster than wearer's. **Cure timeline crystallized:** tomorrow morning observation → Mere's final prep → cure execution. 1–2 days margin against Ned's next symptom cascade. **Mere/Phelan emotional deepening** — thornwell root precision, hand-holding while unconscious, noise going quiet for the third time. Care expressed as systematic competence. **Devod/Mere** — Devod witnessed Mere's tenderness (staying, hand-holding) and is carrying it. Phelan sees and doesn't name it.

**Chapter-ending state:** Tuesday midday, guild planning room. Phelan at ~30% reserves, bracelet warming toward amber. Standard moss prepared. Altered at 70%, needs resonance data. Tomorrow: bedside observation, then altered prep completion, then the cure. Compact ticking. Ned ticking. One-two days of margin. "Almost ready."

* * *

### Ch18: The Walk-Through

**Timeline:** Day 39 (Tuesday), afternoon through evening. Continues from Ch17 (Tuesday midday). Phelan rises from the guild planning room floor, walks to Floundry home with Mere (afternoon), returns to guild for team briefing, disperses to shack at dusk.

**Summary:** Four-scene chapter. Scene 1 (Guild Room → Departure): Phelan assesses his recovery state — reserves at ~35%, bracelet stone tired amber, Flaw Sight functional (tested on planning room ward-work), migraine fading. Mere has returned from Thresholds with altered preparation at 70%. They agree the bedside observation must happen today — Ned's intervals are shortening, the Compact's 48-hour window is ticking. Phelan lays out the plan: observe Ned's anchor resonance, Mere takes data to Thresholds, Phelan returns to brief the team.

Scene 2 (Floundry Home): Phelan spots Cass conducting professional surveillance from across the street — café pillar, clear sightlines on Floundry front door. Not approaching, observing. "The observation clock and the Compact clock were the same clock now." Calla opens the door before they knock — watching from the window, thinner than five days ago. Ned has deteriorated: grey-yellow skin, hair loss in patches, half-beat tracking delay, left hand curled involuntarily (can't hold a pen), shallow breathing approaching laboured. Phelan uses bracelet-enhanced Flaw Sight for a controlled, surgical observation — data extraction only, no deep analysis. Three data points gathered: anchor recalibration speed (0.7 cycles/interval, decaying from 0.9), grip tolerance (validation window contracted ~12% since Thursday, anchor tightening parameters), bond weakness threshold (~18% margin between current match and validation failure, natural failure in 10-14 days). Reserves dip ~5%. Mere translates raw observation into preparation parameters in real-time — derived values in margins before Phelan finishes speaking. She confirms two hours to complete the altered concentration targeting drift acceleration of 0.4 cycles minimum. Mere leaves for Thresholds. Phelan writes Ned a second note: "We know what to do. Tomorrow morning." First note said "I" — this one says "we." That was the difference five days had made.

Scene 3 (Guild Briefing): Ledger intercepts Phelan in the hallway — Calla is "holding" but the Compact's home visit shook her (used children's names). Qualification inquiry moving slowly (Ledger managing pace). Ledger will be at Floundry home by seventh bell tomorrow. The planning room has been transformed — Leon has annotated the diagrams with colour-coded energy-budget overlays (blue/reservoir, red/personal, green/bracelet). Jonael arrives with logistics supplies (water skins, light rods, medical kit) — staging the bedroom by seventh bell. Devod brings food from a bakery ("Eat something. All of you"). Mere returns during the second pastry — altered preparation will complete within the hour, Devod assigned to collect by seventh bell tomorrow. She addresses Devod by name with a specific task — "registered in the room as the quietly significant thing it was."

Full team briefing: Phelan walks through the three-layer plan. **Layer 3 first** — starts with Devod's concept and gives him public credit ("Idea number seven"). Devod goes still — "the particular stillness of a man who'd heard something he'd been waiting years to hear." Room recalibrates Devod (Jonael's reassessment, Leon straightening). Mere's reaction: fractional shoulder shift, chin up — processing her father's concept as the foundation of the cure. Phelan's noise reads it and can't quite file it. Technical explanation: the anchor is a dead man's switch that verifies Ned's signature before firing. The moss at altered concentration suppresses resonance between anchor and signature — blinds the anchor. Tracker over-corrects, loses signal, gap widens until validation fails. Kill trigger fires into empty space. Layer 3 neutralised without direct contact. **Layer 2:** forge-and-redirect adapted from death ward. Feed stabiliser false crisis data, overload its own repair channels. Reserves math: 22-28%, two-second injection windows, 15 minutes sustained. **Layer 1:** simplest step at lowest capacity — standard moss dampening, conventional curse-breaking.

Roles assigned: Leon — external stability monitoring (15-second warning if Layer 2 feeds back). Jonael — logistics, security, Compact blockade. Mere — both moss applications (timed), Ned's physical monitoring (12% deviation baseline). Devod — support, runner, reinforcement.

Mere has moved closer to the table than any prior meeting — "not at the edge of the room, not in the doorway." The spatial shift noted.

Scene 4 (The Shack): Team disperses. Mere walks with Phelan — long way through guild quarter to docks, comfortable silence. First time anyone has been inside the shack besides Phelan and occasionally Ledger. Shack described: one room, cot, table, one chair, lockbox, Gavren's herb parcel, house plans on the wall. Phelan predicts Mere will see the poverty, the gap between plans and reality — predicts embarrassment, pity, recalculation downward.

**Mere doesn't see the shack. She sees the plans.** Walks past the cot, the bare walls, stops at the drawings. Studies the structure — identifies kitchen facing east, asks about the load-bearing wall (structural or relocatable), notes workshop ventilation dead-spot from fixed wall position, identifies drainage grade issue on east side (French drain system needed if clay soil). She's redesigning his house. "Not the concept. Not the dream. The *structure*." Phelan's prediction-error: the cold reader who reads everyone got read instead. "Something that doesn't have a category. Something the filing system wasn't built for." "When you do," she says about soil testing. Not *if*. When. Mere takes the chair without asking, studies plans from a better angle. She stays — no announcement, no social scaffolding. Studies revision nine, checks preparation calculations. Phelan on the cot, bracelet warming, stone shifting closer to amber. The noise converged — "the way light converges through a lens, not to spread but to burn." Tomorrow.

**Characters present:** Phelan Varrant, Mere Fields, Leon D'Nardis, Jonael Carterson, Devod Fields, Ledger. Seen: Calla Floundry, Ned Floundry, Cassius Rykhard (surveillance). Floundry children absent (school or relative's).

**Magic/Exploits:** Bracelet-enhanced Flaw Sight used for surgical bedside observation — three specific data points extracted (anchor recalibration speed, grip tolerance, bond weakness threshold). Controlled engagement, clean disengagement — no spiral, no hyperfocus. Reserves dipped ~5% (from ~35% to ~30%). No new exploit techniques. See exploits-log.md for observation entry.

**Plot threads opened/advanced:** **Ned Floundry case** — all data gathered, altered preparation completing, team briefed and assigned, cure set for tomorrow morning (Wednesday). **Promise to Ned** — second note ("We know what to do. Tomorrow morning."), shift from "I" to "we." **Compact surveillance** — Cass conducting professional observation of Floundry home (not approaching, watching). **Compact pressure on Calla** — used children's names (cartography, not negotiation). Ledger managing qualification inquiry pace. Ledger will block Compact at Floundry home tomorrow. **Devod credit** — formal public credit before full team for Layer 3 concept. Room recalibrates Devod. **Mere/Devod** — she addresses him by name with a specific task (the first direct functional inclusion). Her reaction to his credit: fractional, processing, filed for later. **Phelan-Mere relationship** — Mere enters the shack. Prediction-error beat: cold reader predicted wrong for the first time. She sees the plans, not the poverty. Redesigns the house. "When you do." Stays without announcing it. **The house/land dream** — plans examined by someone else for the first time. Ventilation flaw identified. Drainage issue flagged. The plans are now shared.

**Chapter-ending state:** Tuesday evening, Phelan's shack. Reserves recovering (~30%+), bracelet stone shifting closer to amber. Altered preparation completing at Thresholds (Devod to collect by seventh bell). Standard moss prepared. Team briefed: Leon (monitoring), Jonael (logistics/security), Mere (moss applications + vitals), Devod (support). Ledger at Floundry home by seventh bell. Cure execution tomorrow morning (Wednesday). Mere is in the shack, studying the house plans. The noise is converged. Tomorrow.

* * *

### Ch19: The Cure

**Timeline:** Day 40, Wednesday morning. Phelan wakes at shack (Mere already gone), walks to Floundry home (quarter to seventh bell), cure execution through morning.

**Summary:** Climax chapter — the three-phase cure. Phelan wakes alone in the shack, reserves at 75% (bracelet buffered overnight recovery). Mere's annotations on revision nine still on the wall — ventilation baffle, French drain, bathroom relocation. He looks at the plans three seconds longer than he should have, then walks out.

Walk to the Floundry home. The noise is running but narrower — all seventeen parallel threads compressed to one output. He passes the canal bridge without cataloguing its ward-work for the first time in months. Arrives quarter to seventh bell. Ledger at the front door — children sent to Calla's sister yesterday, no Compact presence this morning, immediate perimeter clean. Jonael has staged Ned's room since sixth bell (light rods, water, medical kit, clear corridor). Leon at the window with colour-coded overlays. Devod on a stool by the door with supplies. Mere at the bedside — arrived before everyone, two moss preparations laid out (bowls distinguished by a scratch on the rim), notebook, pocket watch.

Ned worse — grey-yellow skin deepened, hair loss expanded, breathing closer to laboured, half-beat tracking delay, left hand curled.

**The noise goes quiet — fourth time, but categorically different.** Not a pause (cheek kiss, partner declaration, thornwell root). The noise recognises every thread feeds to the same output. It becomes the work, and in becoming the work, disappears. The parentheticals vanish entirely during execution — **first and only time in the book.**

**Phase 1 (Layer 3 — Anchor Drift):** Mere applies altered moss concentration to Ned's anchor points (temples, throat, collarbone hollow, wrists). **Mere's one crack:** at the hollow of Ned's collarbone, her hand pauses fractionally — steadiness maintained rather than automatic. Phelan files it, doesn't comment. Bracelet-enhanced Flaw Sight tracks the anchor's validation frequency (0.7 cycles, decaying). The moss suppresses resonance between anchor and Ned's signature — narrow-band intervention, not broad dampening. Anchor recalibrates, locks, drifts. Each cycle less certain. Margin: 18% → 15 → 12 → 9 → 7 → 5. Anchor fires verification sequence — signature has drifted past validation window. Kill trigger fires into empty space. Layer 3 goes dark. Devod's concept: move the boat, the chain goes slack. **Reserves: 67%.** Twenty minutes. Bracelet buffered the cost.

**Phase 2 (Layer 2 — Stabiliser Weaponisation):** Forge-and-redirect adapted from the death ward. Phelan injects forged crisis data through the stabiliser's monitoring channels — two-second windows, sub-second precision. Forged data mimics catastrophic Layer 1 collapse. Stabiliser overcompensates, dumps repair energy at emergency speed, overloads its own channels. **Reserves draining faster than calculated** (51% cost vs. 22-28% estimate). During Phase 2, **Compact confrontation occurs downstairs:** four hired hands (no badges, unmarked coin — plausible deniability from Cass). Jonael meets them at the bottom of the stairs — one punch drops the first. Devod joins from the room — walking stick to forearm (cudgel drops), then collarbone. Two remaining back toward the front door — Ledger steps out of the kitchen hallway. Opens his jacket to reveal four throwing knives in a chest harness (Carter's channelled blades, convergence nodes — the anonymous client's side project). **NOTE: The jacket contents are READER-ONLY information — omniscient narrative, not Phelan's POV. No character on the team except Ledger knows what was in the jacket. Phelan was in hyperfocus, Leon was monitoring the lattice at the window, Jonael and Devod were in the hallway and saw only "Ledger opened his jacket" from the front. Do not have any character reference the knives in dialogue or internal monologue.** Ledger lets the silence do the arithmetic. Steps aside. They leave. Phelan never stopped forging — the injection window didn't wait. Stabiliser collapses at fifteen minutes. **Reserves: 16%.** Bracelet nearly depleted.

**Phase 3 (Layer 1 — Degradation Dissolution):** Standard moss applied by Mere (same principle as binding salts / Sniff, scaled up). 30-60 minute dampening window. Phelan at 16% reserves, bracelet dark, focusing matrix barely functional. Personal reserves only. Standard curse-breaking: find structural weak points, apply pressure. Concentric rings of runic energy with force lines — many already shredded by the stabiliser's death throes. Textbook dissolution: wedge into gaps, widen fractures, let stress cascade. Reserves: 8 → 6 → 5 → 4 → 3. Vision tunnelling. Blood where he bit his cheek. Mere: "Twelve minutes remaining on the dampening window." Last anchor dissolves. Lattice shudders and collapses. For one moment, the full three-layer architecture is visible in the act of failing — beautiful. Then gone. Weight lifts. Air changes.

**Ned breathes.** Deep, slow, immediate. The half-beat delay is gone. Grey-yellow skin remains (biological damage, not curse — heals on biology's schedule). Awareness direct and immediate.

**The collapse and trust beat:** Reserves at 2-3%. Point of light narrowing. Phelan decides not to fight it — different from every prior crash where he clawed at consciousness. The chain held. The people held. "For once in my life, the calculus of control versus trust resolved on the side of trust." He lets go. Mere catches him — cool, steady, precise hands. "I've got you." The filing system has built a category since binding salts, cheek kiss, "you're my partner." The category doesn't have a name. "The thing itself existed whether you named it or not." Point of light closes. The hands stayed.

**Characters present:** Phelan Varrant, Mere Fields, Leon D'Nardis, Jonael Carterson ("Carter"), Devod Fields, Ledger. Downstairs: Calla Floundry, four hired hands (unnamed). Seen: Ned Floundry. Referenced: Cassius Rykhard (sent the hired hands), Practitioner Vellen, Practitioner Dorath, Sniff.

**Magic/Exploits:** **Three-phase cure executed successfully.** Phase 1: anchor drift via altered moss concentration (Devod's concept, Mere's preparation, Phelan's guidance). Phase 2: forge-and-redirect weaponisation of stabiliser (Leon's insight, bracelet precision). Phase 3: standard dissolution of exposed degradation curse (binding salts/Sniff principle scaled up). Bracelet fully depleted. Reserves: 75% → 67% (Phase 1) → 16% (Phase 2) → 2-3% (Phase 3). No parentheticals during execution — noise became the work. See exploits-log.md.

**Plot threads opened/advanced:** **Ned Floundry case — RESOLVED** (curse broken, all three layers defeated). **Promise to Ned — RESOLVED** (kept). **Compact confrontation** — four hired hands defeated by Jonael, Devod, and Ledger without disturbing Phelan's work. Cass sent amateurs via plausible deniability. **Ledger revealed as armed (READER-ONLY)** — Carter's channelled throwing knives (the anonymous client was Ledger). No team member knows what was in the jacket — omniscient narrative beat, not character knowledge. **Phelan-Mere relationship** — deepest emotional beat. Trust > control for the first time. "I've got you." Hands stayed. Category without a name. **Mere's one crack** — fractional pause at collarbone, steadiness maintained rather than automatic. Filed, not commented on. **The noise** — unprecedented silence during execution (parentheticals disappeared entirely, first time in the book).

**Chapter-ending state:** Wednesday morning, Floundry home. Phelan unconscious (2-3% reserves, crash). Mere holding him. Ned breathing freely — curse broken. Team intact. Compact's hired hands defeated/fled. Bracelet dark, depleted. The cure — three methods for three problems, each contributed by a different person — worked. "The hands stayed."

* * *

### Ch20: The Reckoning

**Timeline:** Day 42, Friday. Two days post-cure. Morning through late morning.

**Summary:** Professional closure chapter. Opens with brief recovery montage — Mere managed the third crash (protocol established: thornwell root at quarter-grain, water, silence), bracelet stone shifted from black to "deep, tired colour" (between amber and depletion), reserves ~40%, Flaw Sight sluggish (ward-work registers as "smudged outlines" — "like looking through dirty glass"). Phelan visits the Floundry home: Calla meets him (siege broken, white-knuckle tension gone, children coming home tomorrow). Ned upstairs — awake, aware, but hearing/throat damaged (weeks-months recovery), left hand still curled (motor control cascade damage). Guild has arranged a healer (institutional care — "never burn a good-faith client" extended to aftercare). **Ned can't speak but his hand works.** Two written notes: (1) gratitude — "You kept your word. Thank you." (trade inspector's precision, six words). Phelan pockets it — same pocket where the illegible scraps lived. Full circle. (2) Compact intel — vendor scheme details: company names, transaction patterns, the trail Ned followed before the curse. Not proof (records in Compact offices), but a roadmap. **Book 2 seed.** Phelan reads it, the noise engages, folds it away. "Not today." Brief moment with Ned — eyes clear, no delay, a nod that's enough.

Guild HQ debrief with Ledger: completion fee collected (60s net). **Compact fallout:** Cass reassigned to Thorngate office (four days north, trade oversight) — quiet, fast, no formal action. Phelan reads it correctly: they didn't punish Cass, they removed him. Corruption intact. System protecting itself. Qualification inquiry and transfer motion withdrawn — "administrative correction." Compact's public position: honest assessment error, system works. Greenvale Provisions evidence filed with Ledger — "File it. We'll need it." (Future tense — guild playing longer game.) Ledger: "The guild has noticed." One line. Enough.

Chapter ends with Phelan walking home, Ned's notes in one pocket, the Compact's silence in the other. The noise running differently — not scatter, something focused. "The lattice had more visible flaws than before. The question was whether to pull the thread."

**Characters present:** Phelan Varrant, Calla Floundry, Ned Floundry (nonverbal, hearing-impaired), Ledger, Guild Receptionist. Referenced: Mere Fields (managed crash, left before Phelan woke), Cassius Rykhard (full name established — reassigned to Thorngate), Leon D'Nardis (diagrams still on planning room wall).

**Magic/Exploits:** No new exploits. Flaw Sight passive but sluggish (~40-50% reserves). Bracelet recovering slowly (stone dark, barely warming).

**Plot threads opened/advanced:** **Ned Floundry case — CLOSED** (professional closure, fee collected). **Compact corruption — ADVANCED** (Cass removed not punished, scheme intact, Ned's intel received). **Greenvale evidence — ADVANCED** (filed with guild, "We'll need it"). **Guild standing — ADVANCED** ("The guild has noticed"). **Ned's written intel — PLANTED** (Book 2 seed: roadmap to Compact vendor scheme).

**Chapter-ending state:** Professional closure complete. 120s net collected. Compact corruption acknowledged but deferred. The institutional lattice has visible flaws. The noise runs differently — focused.

* * *

### Ch21: The Settlement

**Timeline:** Days 42–44 (Friday–Sunday). A few days of settling after professional closure.

**Summary:** Personal closure chapter — the book exhaling. Scene 1: Carter's shop. Phelan brings saturated ore. Eight gift pieces as repayment ("Like Leon and the wine"). Carter's reaction: hands go still (the tell), picks up first piece, craftsman's hyperfocus. "This is master-grade." Professional restraint barely containing excitement. Ideas forming about what he could forge with material that carries its own magical signature. Remaining ~27 pieces to sell through Carter and Leon's channels — not illegal, but Compact would ask questions that lead back to Velken's Drift. Estimated value: 200-400 silvers over months (conservative). Carter also gives Phelan a new leather tool roll — noticed the old one was worn, built a replacement without mentioning it. Competence expressed through craft.

Scene 2: The math. Phelan at the shack with house plans and financial page. Full reckoning: ~140s liquid, ore income ~300s projected, monthly retainer 10.5s net, house target 1,300s. Gap: ~1,100s. But the trajectory changed — years, not decades. Twenty-five gold callback (2,500s refused Ch13) — the math doesn't regret it, the noise doesn't regret it, but it notices. **Key emotional beat:** the house isn't a fantasy anymore. It's a plan with a timeline. And the plan changed — not a house for one person anymore.

Scene 3: Team beats. **Leon:** evening visit, wine (reciprocity), copied colour-coded diagrams from planning room. Case debrief from technical angle. "You didn't stop." / "The window didn't wait." Forge-under-fire discussion → brute-force forgery hybrid closer to viable. Friendship expressed through shared obsession. **Devod:** morning with a cart, helps with ore logistics. Knows covered storage, transport contacts — idea #2 of 10 (first involved disguising ore as decorative stonework — Carter vetoed). Has house ideas: pilings not slab (good), reclaimed Henwick timber (good), goats (reaching). 2 out of 10. Present without forcing it — helping with the house plans he hasn't been invited to comment on. The door is open.

Scene 4: The Mere beat — emotional resolution. Mere arrives at the shack, sits in her chair, sees the financial page. "You did the math." / "I always do the math." Pulls house plans toward her (not asking permission — shared). Identifies pipe run failure point, proposes fix (washbasin to north wall, six feet more pipe, eliminates ceiling crossing). **"The kitchen should face east."** Not "your kitchen." Not "our kitchen." Statement of fact. She's talking about the house as though she's already part of it. Phelan doesn't correct, doesn't comment. Files it in the category that doesn't need a name. **The noise settles.** Not silent — never silent. But manageable. Focused. Like sediment finding the bottom. *(The land. The plans. The kitchen facing east. The numbers that almost work. Almost.)* End of chapter. End of the case.

**Characters present:** Phelan Varrant, Jonael Carterson ("Carter"), Leon D'Nardis, Devod Fields, Mere Fields.

**Magic/Exploits:** No new exploits. Bracelet recovering (stone warming).

**Plot threads opened/advanced:** **Saturated ore — RESOLVED** (split: Carter gift + Leon/Carter sales channel). **House/land dream — ADVANCED** (math changed from "someday" to "years," plan is real, shared with Mere). **Phelan-Mere relationship — ADVANCED** ("The kitchen should face east" — the love story in one sentence). **Mere/Devod — ADVANCED** (door open, functional relationship, house ideas). **Brute-force forgery — ADVANCED** (closer to viable per Leon's assessment).

**Chapter-ending state:** Personal closure complete. The book's main arc resolved. Ore moving through channels, financial trajectory changed, team ecosystem established. Mere at the table. Kitchen faces east. The noise settles.

* * *

### Epilogue: The Category

**Timeline:** Months after the cure. Deep winter.

**Summary:** Coda chapter (~2,700 words). Beat 1: The new home. Chandler's Row, guild quarter border. Two rooms and workshop space, proper walls, stone foundation. Mere lives there (established fact, not narrated). Her books on the shelf, moss preparations in the workshop corner, Sniff has a corner. House plans on the wall — revision 10, Mere's annotations now integrated into drawings (not just margins). She left Charlette 3 months ago on her own terms — packed, walked out, four sentences about it shared with Phelan. Thresholds still Charlette's (deed = leash, fight unresolved — Book 2). Rented kitchen faces west. Mere noted it exactly once. House plans show east.

Beat 2: Training with Leon. Sixth bell daily. Chandler's shop courtyard (two coppers/day for noise and scorch marks). Fire sequence: 12 seconds integrated (up from 8-10 in Barrows). Not through talent — through work. Pragmatic motivation (cure nearly killed him, guild work is dangerous). Leon as daily partner deepens bond — riffing, shared shorthand, friendship through sweat and fire. **Leon seed (Book 2):** someone asked about the Vethani Crypts / Mallory crystal buyer. "People ask." Leon not worried. Phelan's noise files it — not urgent, present. The careless sale (1,200s to anonymous buyer, no questions) may have consequences.

Beat 3: Guild standing (brief). Cases are different — higher stakes, better pay. Ledger delivering briefs to home address (three weeks running). New case brief on the table: not Tier One classification, not forty silvers. Higher fee, higher expectations.

Beat 4: The case brief — ending. Phelan reads the new case. Bracelet warm amber, full. The noise engages — not scattered, focused. Purposeful. The noise has changed: "Like the difference between a river flooding and a river channelled." **Final noise beat:** *(The case. The numbers. The training. The kitchen that faces east. The category that doesn't need a name. The chain that held. The chain holds.)* Something like contentment, if contentment had sharper edges. "Worth the trouble. / I turned to page two."

**Characters present:** Phelan Varrant, Mere Fields (present through domestic fact), Leon D'Nardis (training), Sniff (corner). Referenced: Ledger, Charlette Fields, Devod Fields.

**Magic/Exploits:** No new exploits. Bracelet at full amber. Fire combat improved (12 seconds integrated). Reserves 92%.

**Plot threads status (end of Book 1):**
- Ned Floundry case: **RESOLVED** (Ch19)
- Saturated ore: **RESOLVED** (Ch21)
- Greenvale Provisions evidence: **ADVANCED** (filed with guild)
- Compact corruption: **ADVANCED** (Cass removed, scheme intact, Phelan has Ned's intel)
- Cassius Rykhard: **ADVANCED** (reassigned to Thorngate, knows who The Locksmith is)
- House/land dream: **ADVANCED** (math works, timeline shortened, plan is real and shared)
- Phelan-Mere relationship: **ADVANCED** (living together, kitchen faces east)
- Mere/Devod: **ADVANCED** (door open, functional relationship)
- Charlette Fields: **ADVANCED** (Mere left, Thresholds still Charlette's — Book 2)
- Bracelet: **OPEN** (series mystery, fully recovered)
- Leon's Vethani sale: **PLANTED** (Epilogue seed for Book 2)
- Brute-force forgery: **OPEN** (theoretical, closer to viable)
- Ledger's investment in Phelan: **ADVANCED** (higher-tier cases, guild backing)

**Chapter-ending state:** Deep winter. Phelan settled — new home, partner, daily training, rising reputation. New case brief engaging the noise in a new way. The noise has changed — not just scattered processing, but a tool he's learning to use. Door opening, not cliffhanger. "Worth the trouble. / I turned to page two."

---

## 3. Running Character Tracker

| Character | First Appearance | Current Status | Relationship to Phelan | Last Seen |
|-----------|-----------------|----------------|----------------------|-----------|
| Phelan Varrant | Ch01 | **Epilogue:** Settled. Moved to Chandler's Row with Mere. Training daily with Leon (fire: 12s integrated). Reserves 92%, bracelet full amber. Guild sending higher-tier cases. Noise has changed — purposeful, directed. New case engaging. | Protagonist | Epilogue (Chandler's Row, deep winter) |
| Mere Fields | Ch01 (unnamed), Ch02 (named) | **Epilogue:** Living with Phelan at Chandler's Row. Left Charlette 3 months ago on own terms. Books, moss preparations, annotations on house plans (revision 10, integrated into drawings). Thresholds still Charlette's — fight coming. | Partner (declared Ch10), love interest, bracelet study collaborator | Epilogue (Chandler's Row, deep winter) |
| Gavren Holst | Ch01 | Active — running Gavren's Botanical & Sundry | Former employer, parted on good terms | Ch05 (farewell, last day) |
| Leon D'Nardis | Ch05 | **Epilogue:** Daily training partner (sixth bell, chandler's courtyard). Friendship deepened through shared work. Someone asked about Vethani Crypts / Mallory crystal buyer — "People ask." Not worried. Phelan's noise filed it. | Close friend, training partner, intel source. Knows forge-and-redirect technique AND bracelet. | Epilogue (training courtyard, deep winter) |
| Jonael Carterson ("Carter") | Ch06 | **Ch21:** Received ore gift (8 master-grade pieces). Professional restraint barely containing excitement. Plans for what he could forge. Built Phelan a tool roll (noticed need, said nothing). Coordinating ore sales with Leon. | Professional contact → asset → trusted friend (ore gift, tool roll, mutual competence-respect) | Ch21 (Carter's shop, Friday–Sunday) |
| Sniff (the dog) | Ch03 (unnamed), Ch05 (named) | **Epilogue:** Has a corner at Chandler's Row. Heavier now. Folded blanket, water bowl, territorial calm. | Mere's dog, Phelan broke his curse | Epilogue (Chandler's Row, deep winter) |
| The Center Man | Ch04 | Active — Guild leadership | Guild interviewer, decision-maker | Ch04 |
| The Questioner | Ch04 | Active — Guild panel | Guild interviewer | Ch04 |
| Ledger (The Observer) | Ch04 (unnamed), Ch09 (named) | **Ch20:** Debrief at guild HQ. Paid completion fee. Delivered Compact fallout: Cass reassigned north, inquiry withdrawn. "File it. We'll need it." (Greenvale evidence — guild playing longer game.) "The guild has noticed." **Epilogue:** Delivering higher-tier case briefs to Phelan's home address. | Guild contact, assessor, invested in Phelan's trajectory. Armed (channelled knives). | Epilogue (referenced, deep winter) |
| Guild Receptionist | Ch04 | Active — 14 Greystone Lane | Professional contact | Ch13 |
| Mrs. Dallery | Ch01 | Active — regular customer at Gavren's | No direct relationship | Ch01 |
| Ned Floundry | Ch04 (referenced), Ch11 (seen) | **Ch20:** CURSE BROKEN. Awake, aware, eyes clear (half-beat delay gone). Hearing/throat damaged (weeks-months). Left hand curled. Right hand works — **wrote two notes:** (1) gratitude, (2) Compact intel (vendor scheme roadmap — Book 2 seed). Guild healer arranged. | Client (via Calla). Trade inspector. Ally with Compact knowledge. | Ch20 (Floundry home, Friday) |
| Calla Floundry | Ch11 | Active — in kitchen during cure with Ledger. Children at her sister's. White knuckles, untouched tea. Husband's curse broken. | Client. Mid-forties, organized, exhausted. | Ch19 (Floundry home kitchen, Wednesday morning) |
| Floundry son | Ch11 | Active — ~10–11, solemn, too-old assessment | Ned & Calla's son. "Are you another healer?" | Ch11 (hallway) |
| Floundry daughter | Ch11 | Active — ~7–8, wide still eyes, unread book | Ned & Calla's daughter. Sits on stairs. | Ch11 (stairs) |
| Devod Fields | Ch12 (named Ch11) | **Ch21:** Helped with ore logistics — cart, covered storage, transport contacts. Has house ideas (pilings not slab, reclaimed timber, goats). 2 out of 10 good. Present without forcing reconnection with Mere. Door open. | Mere's father. Part of the ecosystem now — case intel, mine navigation, Layer 3 concept, ore logistics. | Ch21 (shack, Saturday morning) |
| Cassius Rykhard ("Cass") | Ch13 | **Ch20:** Reassigned to Thorngate (four days north) — quiet, fast, no formal action. System protecting itself, not enforcing justice. Knows who The Locksmith is. Book 2 antagonist. | Compact antagonist. Reassigned but dangerous. | Ch20 (referenced — reassigned to Thorngate) |
| Charlette Fields | Ch12 (named, off-page) | Active — Mere's mother. Owns Thresholds (the leash). Systematic controller: income, schedule, social contact. Forced Devod out via ultimatum when Mere was 12. Family in northern provinces. | No direct relationship yet. Phelan now knows the scope of her control. | Ch12 (referenced by Devod) |
| Practitioner Vellen | Ch11 (referenced) | Active — registered curse-breaker | Attempted Floundry curse at week 3, failed. Guild of Arcane Practice. | Referenced Ch11 |
| Practitioner Dorath | Ch11 (referenced) | Active — registered curse-breaker | Attempted Floundry curse at week 5, failed. Guild of Arcane Practice. | Referenced Ch11 |

---

## 4. Open Plot Threads

**OPEN** — Thread introduced, not yet resolved or significantly advanced.
**ADVANCING** — Active development across chapters.
**RESOLVED** — Completed.

- **ADVANCING** | **Guild career** — Phelan accepted Tier One (Ch04). First job (Barrows) completed (Ch07–09). Second job: Ned Floundry case completed (Ch10–19). **Ch20: "The guild has noticed."** **Epilogue:** Higher-tier cases, better pay. Guild standing shifted — reputation as "The Pirate Locksmith who broke an unbreakable curse" has moved through the network. | Introduced Ch01, advanced Ch04–Ch10, Ch20, Epilogue.
- **ADVANCING** | **The house/land dream** — Target ~1,300 silvers. **Ch21: trajectory changed** — "years, not decades." ~140s liquid + 200-400s ore projected + retainer + higher-tier case fees. Gap narrowing. Devod's pilings idea accepted. Kitchen faces east in every version. **Epilogue:** house plans revision 10, Mere's annotations integrated. Rented place on Chandler's Row (interim — kitchen faces west, noted once). The dream house is a plan with a timeline now. | Introduced Ch01, advanced Ch04–Ch05, Ch10, Ch12–Ch13, Ch18, **Ch21, Epilogue**.
- **ADVANCING** | **Phelan-Mere relationship** — Full arc Ch01–Epilogue: unnamed customer → name → hand-holding → cheek kiss → "You're my partner" → trust > control (Ch19 crash) → **"The kitchen should face east" (Ch21)** → **living together (Epilogue)**. The category doesn't have a name. Never needed one. | Introduced Ch01, advanced every chapter. Major milestones Ch10, Ch17, Ch19, **Ch21, Epilogue**.
- **ADVANCING** | **Flaw Sight concealment** — Phelan hides true extent from guild and most people. Carter told "geometry" (Ch09). Mere knows (Ch10). Leon knows (Ch16). **Carter now knows about the bracelet (Ch17)** — saw inscription work while Phelan was unconscious ("Hard to keep a focusing matrix hidden from a craftsman when you're unconscious on his floor with your sleeve riding up"). Sent observations on post-stress harmonic settling. **Only guild/Compact now excluded.** All inner circle (Mere, Leon, Carter, Devod) aware. | Introduced Ch01, advanced Ch03–Ch04, Ch09–Ch10, Ch16–Ch17.
- **ADVANCING** | **Combat magic** — **Epilogue:** Daily training with Leon (sixth bell). Fire sequence: 12 seconds integrated (up from 8-10 in Barrows). Not through talent — through work. Pragmatic motivation (cure nearly killed him at 2-3%). Stamina expanding. Combat is now a maintained, practised capability. | Introduced Ch05, advanced Ch06–Ch07, Ch09, Ch13–Ch15, **Epilogue**.
- **OPEN** | **Enhancer bracelet** — Pre-Compact artifact. **Epilogue:** fully recovered. Stone warm amber. Reservoir cycles autonomously (charge/discharge/recharge) "like breathing." Series mystery — what is it, who made it, what is its full potential? Known to inner circle. Hidden from guild/Compact. | Introduced Ch08, advanced Ch09–Ch10, Ch15, Ch17, Ch19, **Epilogue**.
- **ADVANCING** | **Ledger's suspicion** — Observer (now Ledger) caught Phelan's combat magic pause (Ch04). Probes directly in Ch09 debrief. **Ch11: notices something changed about Phelan since Barrows** — can't name the bracelet but registers the sharpness. Hand-picked Phelan for Floundry case ("someone who sees things differently"). Waived surcharge = invested. | Introduced Ch04, advanced Ch09, Ch11.
- **RESOLVED** | **Ned Floundry case** — All three layers solved (Ch16), executed (Ch19). Three-phase cure: L3 anchor drift (Devod's concept, altered moss), L2 stabiliser weaponisation (forge-and-redirect, bracelet precision), L1 dissolution (standard moss dampening + conventional breaking). Curse broken. Ned breathing freely, awareness immediate. Phelan at 2-3% reserves, crashed. Compact hired hands defeated during execution. | Referenced Ch04, advanced Ch10–Ch18, **resolved Ch19**.
- **ADVANCING** | **Mere's mother (Charlette Fields)** — **Epilogue:** Mere left Charlette 3 months ago — packed, walked out, own terms. Thresholds still Charlette's (deed = leash). Mere still doesn't know about the ultimatum. The fight over Thresholds is Book 2 territory. | Introduced Ch02, major reveal Ch12, **advanced Epilogue**.
- **ADVANCING** | **Barrows' original purpose / Pre-Compact knowledge** — Second floor construction suggests extraordinary pre-Compact engineer. Bracelet's conditional notation suggests pre-Compact practitioners had fundamentally different (superior?) approach to magic. "The Compact didn't invent Runic Flow. They inherited it. Standardized it. Locked it down." What was lost? | Introduced Ch07–Ch08, advanced Ch10.
- **ADVANCING** | **Guild intelligence network** — Knew about dog cure within four days (Ch04). Ledger's herb recommendation in Ch09. Not demonstrated in Ch10. | Introduced Ch04, advanced Ch09.
- **RESOLVED** | **Guild alias** — Ledger tells Phelan to pick an alias (Ch09). Phelan turns it over in Ch10 — nothing fits. **Ch11: chosen under pressure** — Calla extends her hand, noise panics, lands on "Locksmith" (verdenshade association — "dark, low-growing, thrives where nobody else looks"). First use with a client. | Introduced Ch09, resolved Ch11.
- **RESOLVED** | **Carter's store credit** — Used toward focusing ring purchase (twelve silvers out of pocket after credit applied). | Introduced Ch09, resolved Ch13.
- **OPEN** | **Brute-force forgery (hybrid concept)** — **Ch21:** Leon says "closer to viable" after seeing forge-under-fire performance. Still theoretical, untested. Future tool. | Introduced Ch10, advanced Ch21.
- **PLANTED** | **Leon's Vethani sale (Book 2 seed)** — **Epilogue:** Someone asking about Vethani Crypts / Mallory crystal buyer through a broker. Leon: "People ask." Not worried. Phelan's noise filed it. The careless sale (1,200s to anonymous buyer, no questions) may have consequences. | **Planted Epilogue**.
- **ADVANCING** | **Charlette Fields / Mere's independence** — **Epilogue:** Mere left Charlette 3 months ago. Thresholds still Charlette's (deed = leash). Fight unresolved — Book 2. | Introduced Ch02, major reveal Ch12, **advanced Epilogue**.
- **ADVANCING** | **Compact corruption / Floundry conspiracy** — **Ch20:** Cass reassigned north (removed, not punished). Scheme intact. Compact's position: "honest assessment error." Greenvale evidence filed with guild — "We'll need it." Ned's written intel (vendor scheme roadmap) in Phelan's pocket. **Phelan has decided not to pull the thread — yet.** The institutional lattice has visible flaws. | Introduced Ch11, advanced Ch12–Ch13, Ch15–Ch18, **Ch20**.
- **RESOLVED** | **Devod Fields contact** — Ned told Calla to contact Devod Fields if anything happened. **Ch12: Contact made.** Phelan visited alone. Case intel received, Velken's Drift identified, Charlette revelation, expedition planned. Devod confirmed as ally — mine navigation, case intel, trust through shared concern for Mere. | Introduced Ch11, resolved Ch12.
- **RESOLVED** | **Velken's Drift mine expedition** — **Ch14: underway.** Arrived, descended, four mine dogs fought (30% reserves). **Ch15: completed.** Moss harvested by Mere (first application + extra stock). Five bandits engaged and defeated (ring combat + Devod's mine cart barricade). Bracelet wellspring discovered. Patrol documents and Greenvale Provisions evidence recovered. Ceiling structural failure resolved by Devod's wheel jack fix. Saturated magical ore discovered and loaded (~30-35 pieces). Team returned safely. | Introduced Ch12, resolved Ch15.
- **ADVANCING** | **Mere's estrangement from Devod** — **Ch21:** Devod helping with ore logistics, has house ideas. Present without forcing it. The twelve-year gulf isn't bridged — being built across, one plank at a time. **Epilogue:** door open, functional relationship growing (implied by Devod's continued presence in ecosystem). Mere still doesn't know about the ultimatum — Book 2 territory. | Introduced Ch12, advanced Ch13–Ch18, **Ch21**.
- **RESOLVED** | **Promise to Ned** — Ch11: "I SEE WHAT THEY MISSED. I'M GOING TO FIGURE THIS OUT." Ch18: "We know what to do. Tomorrow morning." **Ch19: Kept.** Ch20: Ned's written note — "You kept your word. Thank you." Full circle (Phelan pockets gratitude note in same coat pocket where illegible scraps lived). | Introduced Ch11, advanced Ch18, **resolved Ch19**, callback **Ch20**.
- **ADVANCING** | **Cassius Rykhard** — **Ch20:** Reassigned to Thorngate (four days north). Quiet, fast, no formal action. Institutional knowledge = **Book 2 antagonist.** Knows who The Locksmith is. | Introduced Ch13, advanced Ch18–Ch19, **Ch20**.
- **RESOLVED** | **Saturated magical ore** — **Ch21:** 8 pieces gifted to Carter (master-grade, repayment). ~27 pieces to sell through Carter/Leon channels (quiet sales, specialty buyers, no Compact attention). Devod provides transport logistics. Estimated 200-400 silvers over months. Ore thread closed — proceeds will trickle in. | Introduced Ch15, **resolved Ch21**.
- **ADVANCING** | **Greenvale Provisions / patrol evidence** — **Ch20:** Filed with Ledger at guild. "We'll need it." Guild playing a longer game. Combined with Ned's written intel (vendor scheme roadmap). Book 2 territory. | Introduced Ch15, **advanced Ch20**.
- **RESOLVED** | **Focusing ring** — **Ch14: combat-tested (mine dogs).** **Ch15: combat-tested (bandits).** Five fire workings + screen in sustained human combat. Ring strain noted (vibration starting in metal). Performance confirmed across both engagements. | Introduced Ch13, resolved Ch14–Ch15.
- **RESOLVED** | **Cursed dog** — Fear curse broken via sensory channel mismatch (Ch03). Dog named Sniff, lives at Thresholds. | Introduced Ch02, resolved Ch03.
- **RESOLVED** | **Guild application** — Submitted ~6 weeks before Ch01. Interview Ch04. Accepted. | Introduced Ch01, resolved Ch04.
- **RESOLVED** | **Gavren's notice period** — Two weeks served (Ch05). Parted on good terms with herb parcel gift. | Introduced Ch04, resolved Ch05.
- **RESOLVED** | **Death ward (Greymarch Barrows)** — Breached via signature forgery exploit (Ch08). Ward consumed itself. | Introduced Ch06 (Leon's intel), resolved Ch08.
- **RESOLVED (READER-ONLY)** | **Carter's anonymous client (throwing knives)** — Ch09: Carter working on a set of four throwing knives with focusing channels for an unnamed client wanting range and discretion. **Ch19: revealed to the READER as Ledger** — four channelled throwing knives in chest harness, Carter's work. **No character on the team knows this — the jacket contents are omniscient narrative, not character knowledge. Do not reference in dialogue or internal monologue.** | Introduced Ch09, resolved Ch19.

---

## 5. Phelan's Financial Ledger

| Chapter | Income | Expenses | Notes |
|---------|--------|----------|-------|
| Ch01 | — | — | Starting position: 12 coppers + 1 shaved half-silver (~2–3 meals). House cost: ~1,300 silvers. 40 years at current rate. |
| Ch02 | — | — | No changes. Focusing rods noted at 2 silvers each (overpriced 40%). |
| Ch03 | — | Stolen thornwell root (guilt, no cost) | No income. Thornwell root taken from Gavren's stock during migraine. |
| Ch04 | 15 silvers (guild retainer, Tier One) | — | Monthly expenses: rent 2s, food 1.5s, incidentals ~1s. Savings rate: ~8s/month. House timeline: 13 years. First non-austerity meal purchased (bread, cheese, apple, dried meat). |
| Ch05 | Full pay for notice period (amount unspecified) | New boots, focusing tool case (amounts unspecified) | Gavren's herb parcel gift. Retainer math: 10.5s reserve after month 1, 21s after month 2. |
| Ch06 | — | 7 silvers (Carter's gear) | Guild equivalent would have been 20 silvers. Half the job's pay saved. |
| Ch07 | 40 silvers earned (verdenshade, pending delivery) | — | Gross from Barrows job before commission. |
| Ch08 | Enhancer bracelet (unpriced artifact) | — | "Forty silvers that would keep the rent current and leave enough to actually eat." |
| Ch09 | 32 silvers (verdenshade delivered, 40 minus 20% commission) | 7 silvers (Carter's gear, paid Ch06) | Net from Barrows job: 32s income - 7s gear = 25 silvers net gain. Phelan hadn't accounted for commission until payday. Store credit at Carterson's (unspecified, no expiration). |

| Ch10 | Floundry case accepted (150s gross, 120s net — pending) | Rent (~2s), food (~1.5s) | Wine for Leon (decent bottle, ~1s). Running expenses deducted. 32 silvers in lockbox still. Floundry fee would shift house math from "thirteen years" to "maybe less." |

| Ch11 | 75 silvers (engagement half, pending) | — | Floundry case formally engaged. 75s retainer incoming (half of 150). Remaining 75s on resolution. |

| Ch12 | — | — | No new income or expenses. Financial math shifts internally: Phelan now running two goals — house (1,300s) AND Mere's independence (rent + deposit + income bridge). "Two financial goals where there used to be one, and one-twenty doesn't solve either of them." |
| Ch13 | — | 12 silvers (focusing ring, materials cost after store credit) | Store credit from Ch09 applied. Twenty-five gold bribe refused. Ring extends fire combat range. |

| Ch14 | — | — | No new income or expenses. Mine expedition uses supplies purchased in Ch13. |
| Ch15 | ~30-35 pieces saturated ore (unrealised value) | — | Ore value unknown but "worth more than the moss and the verdenshade combined." Several pieces earmarked for Carter (gift/debt repayment). Rest to sell through unofficial channels. Can't sell normally — Compact would notice. "The ore changes the numbers. Not enough to reach 1,300. But enough to shift the timeline." |

| Ch17 | — | — | No new income or expenses. Recovery chapter. Financial state unchanged from Ch15 estimate. |
| Ch18 | — | — | No new income or expenses. Briefing/preparation chapter. |
| Ch19 | 75 silvers (completion half, pending) | — | Floundry case resolved. Second half of 150s fee now due (75s, 60s net after 20% commission). |
| Ch20 | 60 silvers (completion half collected, after 20% commission) | — | Fee collected from Ledger at guild debrief. Total case: 120s net. |
| Ch21 | Ore sales projected (~300s over months) | — | 8 pieces gifted to Carter (repayment). ~27 pieces to sell through Carter/Leon channels. Conservative est: 200-400s. Carter estimates master-grade value. New tool roll from Carter (gift). |
| Epilogue | — | Rent increase (Chandler's Row, two incomes) | Moved to proper rented place. Two rooms + workshop. Guild delivering higher-tier cases (better fees implied). |

**Running estimate (end of Book 1):** ~140 silvers liquid (collected). Ore sales projected at 200-400s over coming months (conservative 300s working figure). Monthly retainer: 15s. Monthly expenses: ~4.5s (rent likely increased with Chandler's Row — offset by two incomes). House target: 1,300 silvers. Gap: ~1,100s from liquid, narrowing with ore income and higher-tier case fees. Trajectory: "years, not decades." **Twenty-five gold (2,500 silvers) refused** (Ch13) — would have solved both goals. The math doesn't regret it. The noise notices.

---

## 6. Emotional/Relationship State (as of Epilogue — End of Book 1)

- **Mere Fields:** **Living together** at Chandler's Row. Left Charlette 3 months ago on her own terms. The relationship arc from Ch01 to Epilogue: unnamed customer → name exchange → hand-holding → cheek kiss → "You're my partner" → trust > control (Ch19 crash) → **"The kitchen should face east"** (Ch21) → living together (Epilogue). The category doesn't have a name. Never needed one. Thresholds still Charlette's (deed = leash). That fight is coming — Book 2. Mere's annotations on house plans now integrated into the drawings, not just margins.
- **Leon D'Nardis:** **Daily training partner** (Epilogue). Friendship deepened through daily work — riffing, shared shorthand, mutual competence-respect expressed through sweat and fire. Ch21 debrief: "You didn't stop." / "The window didn't wait." Brute-force forgery hybrid closer to viable. **Epilogue seed:** someone asking about Vethani Crypts / Mallory crystal buyer. "People ask." Leon not worried. Phelan's noise filed it. The careless sale may have consequences in Book 2.
- **Jonael Carterson ("Carter"):** Ch21: received master-grade ore gift (8 pieces) — professional restraint barely containing excitement. Plans for what he could forge. Built Phelan a new tool roll (noticed need, said nothing). Coordinating ore sales with Leon. Competence expressed through craft — the only language both speak fluently.
- **Ledger (The Observer):** Ch20: "The guild has noticed." "File it. We'll need it." (Greenvale evidence — guild playing longer game.) Epilogue: delivering higher-tier case briefs to Phelan's home address. The guild sees Phelan differently now.
- **Ned Floundry:** Ch20: awake, aware, recovering. Two written notes — gratitude and Compact intel. The intel is a roadmap to the vendor scheme. **Ally with knowledge** for Book 2.
- **Calla Floundry:** Ch20: siege broken. Children coming home. Guild healer arranged. Professional closure.
- **Devod Fields:** Ch21: helping with ore logistics, has house ideas (2 out of 10 good — pilings, reclaimed timber). Present without forcing it. The door is open with Mere — functional relationship growing. Not bridged, not abandoned. Being built across, one plank at a time.
- **Cassius Rykhard:** Ch20: reassigned to Thorngate (four days north). Quiet, fast, no formal action. **Institutional knowledge = Book 2 antagonist.** He knows who The Locksmith is.
- **Charlette Fields:** Epilogue: Mere left 3 months ago. Thresholds still Charlette's. Fight unresolved — Book 2 territory.
- **The Guild:** "The guild has noticed." Higher-tier cases. Better pay. The name "Pirate Locksmith" has moved through the network. Phelan still withholding second floor, death ward, and bracelet from guild.
- **Team dynamic (end of Book 1):** The team that assembled for the Floundry case didn't dissolve — it became infrastructure. Carter moves ore and builds equipment. Leon trains and coordinates grey-market sales. Devod provides logistics and transport. Mere provides botanical expertise and shared domesticity. The chain held during the cure. The connections hold after it.

---

## 7. World Facts Established in Prose

### Magic System
- Flaw Sight range: typically 10–15 feet; extended to 12 feet on the dog curse (noted as unusual)
- Flaw Sight is involuntary/constant — always aware of nearby magical flaws (distracting, exhausting in arcane-heavy environments)
- Active Flaw Sight triggers ADD-like hyperfocus; major exploits cause hard crash (exhaustion, temporary inability, sensory distortion, migraines)
- Thornwell root treats migraines
- Ward-resistance compound dampens magical signature
- Resonance crawlers: cat-sized magical parasites, translucent white, six-limbed, crystalline growths, pack hunters — attracted to magic, use ambush geometry
- Verdenshade: moss-like plant feeding on decayed magical residue, concentrates ambient energy ("bottled ambient energy with a root system")
- Pre-Compact notation differs from current; second layer of bracelet uses notation Phelan can't fully read
- Builder's switches exist in old repositories as maintenance overrides
- Intent-detection enchantments exist (Mere's door at Thresholds)
- Binding salts create localized dampening fields (~1 meter radius)
- Silverthorn has anxiolytic properties in animals
- Enhancer bracelet stone color shifts from black → dark red → amber-red as reservoir charges (visual charge indicator)
- Enhancer bracelet focusing matrix: perception filter (not magnifier) — sharpens relevant detail, dampens background noise. "Like the difference between squinting and wearing glasses." (Ch10)
- Enhancer bracelet reservoir: acts as buffer — smooths Flaw Sight usage spikes by drawing from buffer before personal reserves. Recharged passively from natural recovery. (Ch10)
- Enhancer bracelet dual functions in self-optimizing feedback loop — focusing matrix adjusts based on reservoir charge state, reservoir draw rate adjusts based on focusing matrix activity. Responsive, not static. (Ch10)
- Pre-Compact notation uses conditional (*if-then*) logic — modern runes are declarative ("this rune does this thing"), pre-Compact is responsive. Identified by Mere's grammar analysis. (Ch10)
- Pre-Compact engineering represents fundamental improvements to the framework itself, not tricks within it. "The Compact didn't invent Runic Flow. They inherited it. Standardized it. Locked it down." (Ch10)
- Focusing channels in weapons: inscribed along blade spines, carry magical workings during throw, amplify on impact via convergence nodes
- Channel depth staggering improves amplification efficiency (~12%) and prevents micro-fracture fatigue
- Feverwort treats muscle fatigue (Ledger's recommendation, Ch09)
- Forge-and-redirect technique (Ch08) recognized as a repeatable category, not one-time improvisation. Bracelet's focusing matrix could refine it. (Ch10)
- Brute-force forgery: theoretical hybrid concept (Leon + Phelan, Ch10). Volume of forged signals through multiple seams, statistical averaging masks imprecisions. Untested.
- Nested curse architecture: curses can be layered — surface working conceals deeper structures running different logic on different energy feeds. Concealment layers can disguise themselves as reinforcement. (Ch11)
- Bracelet-enhanced Flaw Sight can partially resolve structures beneath concealment layers, but depth has limits — third layer of Floundry curse only partially resolved (Ch11)
- Degradation curses target specific systems in sequence — voice, hearing, motor control, organ function. Can be engineered to kill slowly as an example/warning. (Ch11)
- Compact "unbreakable" classification can be fast-tracked (11 days vs. normal 4–6 weeks) — may indicate predetermined assessment (Ch11)
- Curse-breakers (Guild of Arcane Practice) operate within "Compact-sanctioned methodology" — standard dissolution approaches in defined families. Methodology can be artificially narrowed. (Ch11)
- Commerce Authority licenses trade inspectors for shipping and warehouse oversight (Ch11)
- **Ghostveil moss:** Pale, fibrous growth that colonizes environments saturated with decayed magical residue (old mine shafts, collapsed wardlines). Absorbs ambient magical energy and creates localised dampening field that suppresses active magical workings. Preparation is critical — incorrect harvesting (wrong cuts, direct light during drying, substrate contamination) destroys dampening properties. Not commercially available — **Compact has systematically acquired all documented growth sites** over five years ("preservation purposes"). Professor Aldwen's Advanced Environmental Thaumics (Brannick's, ~year 3). (Ch12)
- Bracelet-enhanced memory recall: the focusing matrix sharpens not just live perception but echoes/imprints — details that would blur overnight hold their edges. Enhanced replay, not re-observation. (Ch12)
- Stabilizer layer (Layer 2 of Floundry curse): dedicated repair mechanism, not a detection ward. Monitors Layer 1 and repairs damage faster than dissolution can inflict it. Brute-force (Leon's 400-input method) gives it 400 things to fix instead of one — it fixes them all. (Ch12)
- Anchor/dead man's switch (Layer 3): bonded to life-force signature at fundamental level. Anchor losing grip because curse itself changes Ned's signature — calibration drifting. Drift too slow to exploit — anchor recalibrates faster than Ned changes. (Ch12)
- Focusing ring: secondary anchor point for fire-weave projection. Wide band of dark metal with inscribed channels in three staggered depths (thermal distribution principle from Ch09 knife fix). Fire-weave projects from ring's focal point instead of directly from hand, extending controlled range from 5-6 feet to 15-20 feet. "Clean output from dirty input." Vibration in the metal = convergence destabilizing, pull back. Don't push past twenty feet until practiced. Built by Carter from Phelan's depth-staggering principle. (Ch13)
- Canary strips: chemical (not magical) air quality indicators. Change color if oxygen drops below safe levels. Work in high-residue environments where enchanted monitors fail. (Ch13)
- Ceramic light rods: enchanted (not alchemical). Alchemical light rods react badly to ambient magical residue. (Ch13)
- Flaw Sight in high-residue environments (no structure): completely useless, not merely degraded. Raw unstructured magical leakage has no patterns/framework to process — "all noise, no signal." Bracelet focusing matrix auto-engages but insufficient (filters noise from signal, but there's no signal). Different from the Barrows (structured ward architecture = complex but navigable). (Ch14)
- Ambient magical residue affects spell output unpredictably: same working can be amplified or dampened depending on local residue concentration. Pockets are inconsistent — no way to predict effect in advance. (Ch14)
- Focusing ring vibration in high-residue environments: convergence destabilizes more readily. Vibration threshold lower than in clean environments. (Ch14)
- Mine dogs: natural animals mutated by sustained magical residue exposure. Oversized jaws and feet, compressed torso. Not magical constructs. Hunt in packs using flush-bracket-swarm geometry (same architecture as resonance crawlers). (Ch14)
- Garrick oak: timber used for load-bearing mine supports. "Harder than iron when it's cured." Pine used for secondary/cosmetic supports. (Ch14)
- Velken's Drift interior: upper gallery 8ft wide × 7ft high, chisel marks from hand excavation before magical extraction. Sound carries wrong — echoes misleading, multiple phantom directions. Residue pockets in dead-end passages cause sensory overload (3 seconds: vision doubling, nausea, Flaw Sight involuntary flare). (Ch14)
- Ghostveil moss appearance: pale, fibrous, dense mats at waterline. Faintly luminescent (blue-white pulse). Dampening effect visible — residue near moss is quieter. Dampening capacity increases with maturity. Old stock = high concentration. Harvest requires controlled light (direct light degrades dampening compounds during cutting), specific angle and tool. ~1 hour for sufficient quantity. (Ch14)
- Ghostveil moss harvesting technique: cut at substrate line with thin-bladed tool, angle precisely where moss meets stone, separate fibrous mat without tearing deeper root structures that carry dampening compounds. Store between dampened cloth. Temperature, light exposure, vibration all matter. Incorrect handling destroys properties. (Ch15)
- Enhancer bracelet wellspring behavior: reservoir reverses flow when wearer's reserves drop below an unknown threshold — pushes stored energy back instead of drawing. The bracelet had been charging from Phelan's natural recovery for days (the "slow leak" noticed in Ch08). When reserves dropped past the threshold, it reversed. Autonomous, patient, operating on pre-Compact conditional (*if-then*) logic. Unknown: threshold trigger point, whether it cycles (repeating) or is one-time, reservoir capacity, whether this was the original maker's intent or emergent behavior from old runic architecture. (Ch15)
- Saturated magical ore: common ore that's been sitting in high-concentration magical residue for 12+ years absorbs and overflows with stored magical essence. Extraordinary raw stock for forging, inscription work, magical tooling. "Worth more than the moss and the verdenshade combined." Exists in abandoned mine carts at Velken's Drift because nobody's been down there to realise what long-term saturation does to common ore. (Ch15)
- Ghost vendors: companies that appear in Compact supply chains but have no physical reality — shipping manifests don't match deliveries, purchase orders from nonexistent addresses, vendor contracts that activate for one quarter and vanish. Ned Floundry tracked at least three. **Greenvale Provisions** is the second one he found — appeared in a requisition chain for something the Compact was buying through three intermediaries when direct purchase would cost half. (Ch15)
- Compact moss monitoring operation: patrol teams walk regular routes through "abandoned" mines on a schedule, filing dated reports on moss growth (coverage, density, growth rate per visit). Terms: "available stock," "harvestable volume." When thresholds are met, a separate retrieval team strips the site. Monitors never touch the moss themselves — compartmentalised. Regular ongoing contract payments, not one-time job fees. (Ch15)
- Cargo hitches (quick-tie): knots that tighten under tension and release with a single pull from the right angle. Delivery restraints for loads that might shift. Used for binding people in field situations. Carter taught Phelan during packing session (Ch13 referenced). (Ch15)
- Mine cart screw jacks: used for lifting carts during axle repair. Six-inch throw, solid iron base. Can be repurposed as emergency structural bracing — positioned under a beam against a ceiling to redistribute load from a failing crossbeam. (Ch15)
- Defensive screen working: flat plane of heated air that doesn't stop a determined charge but forces a different angle. Cost varies by environment (7% in high residue vs. 3% normal). (Ch15)
- Anchor signature verification: kill mechanisms in curses require signature validation before delivering — a kill trigger without verification fires into whoever's nearby. Precise curse-builders key the anchor to the target's life-force signature, which is both a safety mechanism and an exploitable constraint. If the signature drifts past the validation window, the trigger fires and finds nothing it recognises. Same principle as sending-stones not discharging into wrong recipients. (Ch16)
- Enhancer bracelet wellspring confirmed repeating: second flow reversal observed (first: Ch15 mine combat, second: Ch17 hyperfocus crash). Reserves dropped past threshold → bracelet drained itself to sustain Phelan → now recharging faster than personal reserves. Repeating conditional behaviour, not one-time. (Ch17)
- Enhancer bracelet safety limitation: the focusing matrix does not have a built-in mechanism to stop when the user's body is failing. It kept sharpening the corridor after Phelan was past his physical limit. Pre-Compact engineering built for practitioners who may have had different limits, or who were expected to know their own. "Like giving a man drowning a longer rope — he can reach further, but the water's still the same depth." (Ch17)
- Enhancer bracelet post-stress harmonic: after heavy use and depletion, the bracelet exhibits harmonic settling patterns as it recovers. Observable by a skilled craftsman (Carter noted the phenomenon). (Ch17)
- Hyperfocus crash (cognitive vs. physical): Leon distinguishes between crashes from physical depletion (Barrows: death ward + crawlers + walking home) and pure cognitive overload (Ch17: sustained hyperfocus from a chair). Cognitive overload crashes are worse — the body has no physical justification for shutting down, the bracelet enabled thinking past the physical limit. (Ch17)
- Thornwell root dosing precision: quarter-grain measure, fine grind = dissolves faster, hits blood quicker. Blunts migraine spike in ~2 minutes without drowsiness. Rough grind at imprecise dosage = 20 minutes to work, causes drowsiness, oversleep. Mere's preparation vs. Phelan's stolen dose (Ch03). (Ch17)
- Compact harassment toolkit: filing enough regulatory inquiries that even a clean practitioner spends more time answering questions than working. Standard bureaucratic attrition — not trying to prove incompetence, trying to make the paperwork cost more than the case is worth. (Ch17)
- Guild charter primacy: contracted practitioner has primacy during an active engagement — guild charter blocks Compact transfer motions if the engagement contract is clean. (Ch17)
- Anchor degradation data (Floundry curse, Ch18): recalibration speed decaying from 0.9 to 0.7 cycles/interval over 5 days, grip tolerance contracting ~12%, bond weakness threshold at ~18%. The anchor is slowing and tightening — compensating for drift but losing ground. Natural failure in 10–14 days at current rate. Altered concentration needs drift acceleration ≥0.4 cycles to outpace recalibration ceiling. (Ch18)
- Compact surveillance methodology: professional observation positions (café pillar, clear sightlines, peripheral coverage of approach angles). Duration-based (long enough to finish a drink). Not improvised — planned deployment. (Ch18)
- House plans (confirmed details, Ch18): kitchen faces east, load-bearing wall between workshop and main room is structural (foundation anchors for warding system run through it — relocating would mean re-routing entire warding infrastructure), primary vent on west face, workshop ventilation dead-spot in northeast corner due to fixed wall (needs secondary vent or redirecting baffle), drainage grade on east side needs French drain if clay soil. Nine revisions, at least six visible in sequence. Bathroom placement visible in revision six. Plans pinned with four tacks replaced every third month (river damp eats the metal). (Ch18)
- Shack (confirmed, Ch18): one room, cot against wall, table, one chair, shelf (Gavren's herb parcel, books, lockbox), house plans on far wall. Quarter-acre between river and mill road. No decoration, no personal touches. (Ch18, consistent with Ch01)
- Stabilizer weaponisation: a monitoring system that watches other layers and repairs damage can be fed forged crisis data, causing it to overcompensate and dump repair energy into a layer that isn't actually failing. The excess energy with nowhere productive to go overloads the channels — the stabilizer tears apart the thing it was protecting. "Systems that monitor other systems can be made to accelerate the very failures they're trying to prevent." (Ch16)
- Ghostveil moss dual preparation: same ingredient at different concentrations serves two purposes. Standard preparation = broad dampening agent (suppresses ambient magical energy, creates 30-60 minute window). Altered concentration = narrower band targeting the resonance between anchor and life-force signature specifically, accelerating natural drift. Living preparation required for altered use (not dried, not standard extraction). Preserved root structures essential. 12-hour preparation time. (Ch16)
- Compact assessment procedures: Compact-distributed curse-breaking methodology doesn't include detection protocols for nested structures. Both licensed practitioners who attempted the Floundry curse followed identical procedure by design — the procedure was written (or maintained) by people who knew the curse's architecture. Institutional complicity embedded in methodology, not just in classification. (Ch16)
- Hyperfocus spiral duration/cost: sustained hyperfocus costs 5-8% reserves per hour. Observable to others — eyes unfocused, unresponsive to direct address, physical world registers as "shapes not sentences" and "texture not meaning." Cannot be interrupted voluntarily — resolves on its own or crashes. Leon has witnessed this before. (Ch16)
- Forge-and-redirect in live curse execution: actual reserves cost can significantly exceed theoretical estimates. Phase 2 of Floundry cure cost 51% (67%→16%) vs. planned 22-28%. Real-world execution against adaptive systems running on living targets is harder than theory. Two-second injection windows, sub-second precision, 15 minutes sustained. (Ch19)
- Noise silence during focused work: when all processing threads converge on a single output, the parentheticals disappear entirely — the noise becomes the work and, in becoming the work, disappears. Categorically different from the pauses caused by unexpected emotional input (cheek kiss, partner declaration). First and only occurrence during the three-phase cure execution. (Ch19)
- Ledger is armed **(READER-ONLY knowledge):** carries four channelled throwing knives in a chest harness — Carter's work (focusing inscriptions along spines, convergence nodes near tips). The "anonymous client" who commissioned the throwing knives (Ch09) was Ledger. **Phelan identified the knives as Carter's work (Ch19 internal monologue). Leon explicitly does not know (Ch21). Other characters' awareness unconfirmed. Phelan has not discussed this knowledge with anyone on-page.** (Ch19)
- Compact deniability tactics: when escalating from surveillance to action, the Compact sends hired hands with no badges, no documentation, no identifying marks, paid in unmarked coin. The authorising official is not present at the scene. Plausible deniability at the cost of sending amateurs to do professional work. (Ch19)
- Compact institutional self-protection: when an operation is exposed, the Compact reassigns the responsible official rather than investigating or disciplining. Qualification inquiries and regulatory motions are withdrawn as "administrative corrections." Public position: "honest assessment error, the system works." The corruption remains intact — the individual is removed from proximity to the evidence. (Ch20)
- Ned Floundry's written intel (Ch20): three companies (including Greenvale Provisions), minimum three intermediary layers per transaction chain, purchase volumes consistent across four quarters (continuous operation, not one-time). Requisition chains through intermediaries, purchase orders from nonexistent addresses. Systematic extraction through Compact supply infrastructure. Not proof (records in Compact offices), but a roadmap. Book 2 seed.
- Floundry home (additional detail, Ch19): Ned's bedroom staged for the cure — two ceramic light rods eliminating shadows, water skins and ceramic pitcher on side table, medical kit open, clear corridor from door to bed to window. Three-storey (consistent with Ch11). (Ch19)

### Geography
- Drenwick: dockside district (Phelan's shack, Gavren's shop, Leon's rooms above chandler's shop), arcane district (Thresholds bookshop, Aldric's, Brevian's), guild quarter (Carterson's Supplies on boundary), upper guild quarter (Floundry home — aspirational streets below the hill district)
- Floundry home: upper guild quarter, three stories, timber and brick, decorative stonework, study extension, front garden with iron gate, five-point warding installation (~300 silvers + annual upkeep). 8+ rooms. (Ch11)
- Henwick's yard: south docks, Devod Fields' employer (carriage/delivery routes). (Ch11, referenced)
- Millford Street: tanner's shop (Harwick) on ground floor, Devod Fields lives above. Exterior staircase, warped door frame, single large room. Tannin and ammonia smell. (Ch11 referenced, Ch12 described)
- 14 Greystone Lane: Guild of Necessary Services HQ
- Greymarch Barrows: south of Drenwick, nearly two hours' walk past the canal bridge, Lower Fenwick District
- Brannick's Academy: where Phelan studied (4 years, withdrew)
- Caldburn: Phelan's hometown, mother living there, no contact
- Vethani Crypts: Leon's prior job site (14-layer wards, 60 years old)
- **Velken's Drift:** Abandoned magical ore mine, ~3 hours SE of Drenwick by carriage. Crystallised ambient energy extracted for decades, closed 15–20 years ago when main veins exhausted. Upper levels structurally sound (Devod knows layout from delivery days). Lower levels flooded when pumping stopped — nothing below third gallery reliable. Residual magical energy so dense in lower shafts compass enchantments stopped working. Target for ghostveil moss expedition. (Ch12)
- **Saltern Cliffs:** Coastal growth site for ghostveil moss, "acquired by the Compact for preservation purposes." (Ch12, referenced — Professor Aldwen)
- **Brenwick:** Location of second ghostveil moss growth site, also decommissioned by Compact. (Ch12, referenced)
- **Thorngate:** Northern Compact administrative hub, four days by carriage from Drenwick. Northern trade oversight. Where careers go to cool down or disappear. Cassius Rykhard reassigned here post-Floundry case. (Ch20)

### Economy
*Full reference: `/world/economy.md` — consult for all pricing and financial details.*
- Currency: coppers, half-silvers, silvers
- 12 coppers ≈ 2–3 meals
- Rent (dockside shack): 2 silvers/month
- Food (eating properly): 1.5 silvers/month
- Guild retainer (Tier One): 15 silvers/month
- Guild commission: 20% of job fees
- Tier One job example: 40 silvers (field retrieval), 150 silvers (extended engagement / curse-breaking)
- Rent referenced ("forty silvers would keep the rent current and leave enough to actually eat")
- House construction estimate: ~1,300 silvers (800 materials, 60 permits, 200 warding, 300 labor)

### Society
- Guild of Necessary Services: front office at 14 Greystone Lane, filtering receptionist, eight-week "waiting list" filter, four rules (good-faith clients, no double-dealing, no messes for members, judgment), 20% commission, monthly retainer by tier, minimum 2 engagements/quarter, members use aliases (guild convention). Extended engagement surcharge exists but can be waived. (Ch11) "Never burn a good-faith client" extends to aftercare — guild arranged a healer for Ned post-cure (twice weekly until recovery stabilised). Not standard for every case. (Ch20)
- Arcane Compact: governing body for magical practice. Classifies curses. Fast-track classification possible (11 days vs. 4–6 weeks standard). (Ch11)
- Guild of Arcane Practice: professional guild for curse-breakers and registered practitioners. Members operate within Compact-sanctioned methodology. (Ch11)
- Commerce Authority: licenses trade inspectors. Ned Floundry's employer — shipping and warehouse oversight, dock quarter. (Ch11)
- Arcane Practice Oversight Act, Section 14(c): regulatory framework the Compact uses to threaten practitioners interfering with classified workings. (Ch13)
- Compact dual-seal sigil: indicates correspondence has gone through at least two levels of institutional review. (Ch13)
- Brannick's Academy: magical education institution
- Mrs. Dallery visits Gavren's every Godsday morning
- "The 15th" referenced as a date but no month/year system established
- Bell system for time (see timeline-book1.md for full reference)

### Characters (biographical facts stated in prose)
- Phelan: early-to-mid 30s, magic since age 12, licensed at 16, Brannick's Academy 4 years (withdrew year 3 equivalent), from Caldburn, mother living/no contact, no father
- Mere: runs Thresholds bookshop (eastern arcane district), expert in physical quality assessment (crystal density, grain patterns, tolerances), blunt/direct, treats cursed animals. Can read pre-Compact grammar patterns (structural/linguistic, not magical). Identified conditional logic in bracelet notation (Ch10).
- Leon: rooms above chandler's shop (south dockside), formerly expensive clothes now worn, independent operator, taught fire spells by Phelan at school, cracked the Vethani Crypts
- Carter: runs Carterson's Supplies (guild quarter/dockside boundary), five-foot-five, barrel-built, black hair/beard, photographic memory for logistics, knows the Barrows. Back room is a forge-and-inscription workshop — builds magical devices (including throwing knives with focusing channels for an anonymous client — revealed to the READER as Ledger in Ch19, but no character knows this). Craftsman, not just shopkeeper.
- Ledger: medium height, lean build, guild alias. The Observer from Ch04 interview panel. Guild intelligence — reads physical symptoms and behavioral data with clinical precision. Phelan's direct contact post-first-job.
- Gavren: runs Gavren's Botanical & Sundry (dockside), punctual, methodical, perceptive, gave herb parcel at farewell
- Devod Fields: mid-fifties, wiry, perpetual energy, hands always moving. Carriage driver (Henwick's yard). Lives alone above tanner's on Millford Street. Single room, tools from three trades, half-finished projects. Divorced from Charlette Fields. Forced out of contact with Mere via ultimatum when she was 12. Keeps twelve years of unsent birthday/holiday gifts on a shelf. "Ninety percent noise, ten percent signal." (Ch12)
- Charlette Fields: Mere's mother. Owns Thresholds (Mere built the business, Charlette holds the deed). Systematic controller — income extraction ("household contribution"), schedule monitoring, social restriction. Forced Devod to cut all contact via ultimatum (Mere age 12) or she'd disappear with Mere. Family in northern provinces. Mere doesn't know about the ultimatum. (Ch12, off-page)
- Professor Aldwen: taught Advanced Environmental Thaumics at Brannick's Academy. Referenced ghostveil moss growth sites that were later acquired by the Compact. (Ch12, referenced)
- Cassius Rykhard ("Cass"): Compact official, full name established Ch20. Ordered Ned's curse, sent hired hands during cure (Ch19), offered 25-gold bribe (Ch13). Reassigned to Thorngate (Ch20). Knows who The Locksmith is. **Book 2 antagonist.** (Ch13, Ch19, Ch20)
- Ned Floundry: Commerce Authority trade inspector. Cursed for investigating vendor scheme irregularities. Post-cure (Ch20): hearing damaged, throat damaged, left hand curled (motor control cascade), but eyes clear — half-beat delay gone. Writing with right hand. (Ch11, Ch20)
- Calla Floundry: Ned's wife. Managed crisis with filing systems and clean sheets. Post-cure (Ch20): siege broken, children returning. (Ch11, Ch20)

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*This document should be updated after each new chapter draft. Cross-reference with `/world/timeline-book1.md` and `/world/magic/exploits-log.md` for detailed tracking.*
