Dawn pared the rooftops to clean edges and drew a pale seam along the courthouse cornice. Han hadn't slept. Hanna met him at the lockhouse with a nod that said the same. Scale's orders waited as a neat slip: escort to the glassmaker who'd signed the bevel mark, seize ledgers and molds, keep the Third in sight.

Kettle Row smelled different before shopbells—wet ash, soda, old brine. The named workshop sat behind a lattice of cooling bars. No shrine, no motto, just a door that believed in bolts. The Glasswright Third lifted a knuckle to knock, thought better, and put his guild token to the frame. A hidden catch accepted the metal and withdrew.

Inside, kilns slept with their mouths open. Trays of panes leaned like cards mid-trick. A single lamp burned without a wick, fed by a slow drip of spirit. An apprentice stood by the annealing cabinet with a sheaf of squares pressed to her chest. She had the rigid calm of someone who'd chosen to disobey and was waiting to discover how it would cost.

"Put them down," Hanna said, not unkindly.

"They're blanks," the girl answered, eyes on the Third. "Waste pieces."

"They're accounts," Han said, already reading the irregular translucency of the top sheet. Wax pencil had been rubbed out, but the pressure still carved a shallow map. He set the quartz insect near and cracked the lid. The faceted head harvested thin light and swept a disciplined thread along the page. Figures breathed up where grease had resistingly thinned: payments tagged to hymn numbers, deliveries to roof conservatories, a stipend marked with a winter rune disguised as a maintenance grant.

The maker arrived from the back in a coat flaked with lime. He might once have been handsome. Guild burns and good beer had negotiated a draw. He took in the Third, took in the city keys at Han's belt, took in Hanna's stance, and chose a quick honesty. "That stipend is real coin," he said. "You don't have to like the tune to cash the note."

"Who underwrites it?" Han asked.

"'Hymnal Repairs Committee'," the man recited with a thin shrug. "Chair signs 'W'. The courier wears no badge, just a winter-gray scarf with a woven line. No name, no office."

Hanna lifted the lamp to the bevel shelves. "You cut panes that forget what they've seen."

"Cut for anyone who pays," he said. "City, temple, wealthy houses. I don't pick what they do with them."

The Third moved to the bench and pulled a leather roll from beneath a plank. He unwrapped three tools—loupe, scribe, square—then stood back, leaving them exposed, an invitation and a confession. "The bevel token is yours," he told the maker. "The token on the back edge isn't."

"Back edge?" the maker repeated, wary.

Hanna lifted a pane with two fingers and angled it just so. Text the size of dust sharpened along the hidden bevel where cut glass kisses its padding. Not a signature—an account mark: a tally shaped like a wind-rose with one petal heavy.

"Credit routing," Han said. "Your work is collateral. If you fail, the petal's bank takes your kiln and calls that prudence."

The man grimaced. "Which bank?"

"Look at the petal," Han said. "It points to Dockside Ninth. The quiet countinghouse with shutters always half-closed."

The apprentice swallowed. "Dockside Ninth holds the hymn fund," she said, softly, as if discovering it for the first time while saying it aloud.

"Good," Hanna said. "You're coming to watch us withdraw its patience."

Scale's writ traveled clean, and Dockside Ninth respected paperwork that might outlive its clerks. The clerk on duty had bailiff hands and a reader's eyes. He opened a drawer with a key on a ribbon and laid out a blue folio without argument. Inside lay vouchers stamped with the winter rune in microscopic variations, each bound to a hymn number and a delivery code. A second fold held promissory letters drawn not on temple accounts but on a municipal sub-fund labeled "seasonal maintenance"—the sort of phrase nobody asks about because everyone wants it to exist.

"Signatures," Han said.

"Abstracted," the clerk admitted. "Our client required blind handling. The city's own signature facsimile, impressed through a lawful intermediary. You're that intermediary today."

Hanna's mouth thinned. "You made city hands stamp without knowing where the ink went."

"We obeyed the face," he said, and instantly looked older.

The folio yielded one more item: a small slate penciled with initials that didn't match the Emeritus, the Choir, or any officer in public view. Not "W"—two tidy letters: R.M. Ticks beside three payments, larger than the rest. Along the margin, a square sketch of a bookstand and a chain.

"Reading Room," the Third said. "Temple annex where doctrine entertains donors."

"Donors don't draw wages," Hanna said.

"They receive consideration," the clerk tried.

"They receive command," Han corrected, sliding the slate into the evidence pouch. "We'll borrow their quiet room."

On the way, the city woke: ovens banging loaf tins, porters bargaining at a whisper, tower crows testing air with lazy arcs. A woman in a shawl handed the apprentice a cup of barley coffee without being asked. The maker walked between Han and the Third, shoulders negotiating guilt and relief.

The annex waited behind a yard where gravel had been taught to look expensive. A porter with velvet sleeves tried to explain appointments to Hanna's back as she pushed the door with her knuckles. Scale's writ walked past him without touching the floor.

Inside, windows courted soft light. Chairs pretended to be kindly. A man sat where donors prefer to be greeted—midroom, neither humble nor grand. No sash. No file. A winter-gray scarf, exactly as the glassman had described, knotted in a neat, forgettable style. He didn't reach for a bellpull. He did not appear surprised.

"R.M.?" Han asked.

"Reading Master," the man said pleasantly. "Most visitors call me that."

"Most visitors don't fund self-erasing approvals," Hanna said.

He tilted his head, studying her as one studies the edge of a tool. "Most visitors prefer success to scruple," he said. "Shall we sit?"

Scale did not sit. She stood where sunlight forced a clean shadow from her boots. "Your committee diverted municipal maintenance into doctrinal operations," she said. "Name your principal."

"Winter," he said.

"Winter is not a person," Han replied.

"Winter is a convenience," the Reading Master said, still pleasant. "Names are seasonally adjusted."

Hanna took two steps and stopped where she could smell his breath. "Conveniences don't instruct banks to hold guild kilns as collateral."

"They do," he said, and that small truth lit a crueller one: he liked being necessary.

The Third set the bevel pane on the table and asked, almost gently, "Why stamp a wreath with a false tooth?"

"So the honest version would look suspect when we wanted it to," the Reading Master said. "Men will doubt what resembles guilt more readily than they doubt comfort."

"Comfort ends today," Scale said. She raised the writ. "Under this authority, your ledgers, slates, and any instrument bearing civic seals are impounded. You will come to the Plaza at noon and answer where the signatures learned your hand."

"You'll have an audience," he said.

"You'll have a record," she said.

He looked past her to the windows and the courtyard gravel and the sky choosing a bluer blue. No flinch, no plea, just a long internal sorting. "If I don't appear?"

Hanna shrugged. "Then we fetch you and call that courtesy expired."

He smiled at that—genuinely, almost admiring the efficiency of it—and let the guards take his elbows without dramatics. As he passed, the scarf's weave caught light and showed a thread dyed darker than slate: not ornament, code. The apprentice saw it and touched her sleeve—the smallest mirror of the motion—and blinked as if a scrap of courage had discovered her pocket.

Back at the lockhouse, the folio joined the pouch already bulging with panes, slates, vouchers, routing chart. The quartz insect rested, lid tight. Scale signed one more receipt with a pen that didn't try to be ceremonial. The beadle, who hadn't been invited but arrived anyway, posted himself at the door that led to the stair.

Han leaned to Hanna. "The scarf thread—did you catch the pattern?"

"Three dark knots," she said. "An appointment code."

"Noon was theater," Han said. "He expects retrieval before then."

"From above or below?"

"From inside," Han answered. "Someone with keys and a hymn on their breath."

"Then we stand where keys try to act like weather," Hanna said, rolling her shoulders under a coat that had learned to hold steel without announcement.

The Plaza would fill again. Bells would keep honest time. Winter would test its luck. And if any hand tried to move what had been sealed, it would find other hands already waiting—quiet, watchful, done with shortcuts.

By midmorning, ovens would color streets, and carts would angle toward markets, but the lockhouse stayed awake behind its calm door. Hanna adjusted her coat; Han traced the new seal once, then let it be. Somewhere, a scarfed messenger rehearsed excuses. Somewhere else, an index of consequences learned breath slowly.

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