The warehouse wing had been built for goods that no longer arrived.
The ceiling rose high overhead. Narrow light slots cut near the top of the wall let pale bars of morning light fall across the floor, though by afternoon they provided nothing useful.
Old rope lay coiled against one wall, left where someone had dropped it long ago. Iron fittings still lined the beams above, hooks fixed in place but holding nothing now. Along the far wall, crates sat stacked in uneven rows.
Aestrith looked up first, taking in the height and the iron hooks before lowering her gaze to the cluttered floor.
"This looks cheerful."
"It works." Beorn stepped around a coil of rope without slowing. "High ceiling, thick walls, and no one using the rooms on either side."
"Doesn't explain why we're cutting through the part of the citadel that looks like three different stewards gave up on it."
"Shorter route."
She glanced at a tilted crate as they passed.
"What's in those?"
"Who knows."
"You haven't checked."
"I've been busy. The crates aren't going anywhere."
She walked a few more steps in silence.
"Could be anything. Could be bones."
"Could be. Maybe from a forgotten murder."
Aestrith looked sideways at him, waiting.
Beorn kept walking.
Back on his desk, a stack of candidate applications waited for him. They had been screened only for basic legibility before being passed to his attention. The garrison decree had drawn more responses than he expected. Sorting through them properly would take time he did not have.
"How many?" Aestrith asked.
"A few dozen. More still coming in."
"From where?"
"Mostly the city. A few from outlying settlements that saw the decree posted."
He stepped over a low shelf someone had torn loose from the wall and propped against the base instead of repairing properly.
"Godric thinks three deserve immediate review. The rest he described as fine."
"Encouraging."
"It's a garrison that existed without a commander for years. At this stage, fine is an improvement."
She slowed near a smaller crate resting by the corner. Unlike the others, its construction was careful. Tighter wood. Cleaner joints. The sort of container made for something delicate.
"What about that one?"
"No idea."
"You could open that one."
"Are we curious now?" He spared it a brief glance as he passed. "Maybe after the applications, the contract, the limestone contractor, and the construction effort."
She watched him walk straight past without slowing.
"Right."
The contract with Cerdic was already in motion. The agreement existed on paper. The guild was ready to proceed.
The real problem lay elsewhere.
Before a single shipment moved outside Coss's transport network, the transit agreement with the quarry crews had to be secured. That meant finding the right limestone contractor first.
He needed someone familiar with the quarry roads north of the walls, someone who still had working ties with the crew chiefs and no obligations Coss could lean on.
"He knows you went to the guild," Aestrith said.
"Yes."
Beorn reached the door at the end of the wing and tested the handle. It turned freely.
"He knows I went in and came out. Not what happened inside."
"As soon as lime starts moving toward Cerdic's sites outside his arrangements, he'll know something came from that meeting. So you have a window."
"A narrow one. But I need to find a contractor first."
He pushed the door open and stepped aside for her.
"I have a description of who I'm looking for. Someone with quarry access and no leverage Coss can pull. That's already a short list."
"Shorter than you'd like."
"Everything here is shorter than I want."
The room beyond was small. Probably a counting room once. Maybe an overseer's office.
Marks along the walls showed where shelving had once been mounted and later ripped free. A clean rectangular patch on the floor marked where a desk had stood long enough to shield the stone beneath it.
Now the room held a workbench against the far wall, a lamp already burning beside it, and the objects Beorn had placed there earlier that morning.
Iron pieces of different sizes lay across the surface. A flat plate. A short rod. Two rings. A bar. Several smaller fragments arranged near the front edge.
At the far end of the bench, separated from the iron, three stone samples from the northeastern wall section rested side by side. Their broken edges still showed pale where he had ordered them knocked loose.
Aestrith studied the objects in silence before looking at him.
"You've been planning this for a while."
"A while is an understatement."
She moved closer and examined the stone samples without touching them.
"What do you want?"
Beorn pulled a stool from the corner and set it several feet back from the bench, giving himself a clear view of the setup.
He opened the ledger to a blank page, settled a quill in his hand, and looked at her.
"I need to build a foundry. Something capable of actual production runs."
The quill tapped lightly against the page while he organized the explanation.
"The problem with cast iron is tolerances. You can melt iron in a furnace and pour it into a mold, but the results aren't reliable. Defects appear when the metal cools unevenly or the pressure shifts during the pour."
She waited.
"What I need is a way to keep the metal under steady pressure while it sets inside the mold. The pressure has to remain even across the entire batch. Every mold in the run needs the same distribution while it cools, from the first pour to the last."
He gestured toward the iron pieces.
"That's the part you can help with."
Aestrith picked up the flat plate, weighed it briefly in her hand, then set it back down.
Her gaze moved across the bench as she pieced together the system he meant to build.
"You want me to press over the molds while they're cooling?"
"Over the full batch. If I'm relying on you to stabilize one casting at a time, the system falls apart. The advantage comes from scale."
She stood quietly for a moment, adjusting to the size of the request.
"That's not a small thing."
"No."
"And you want to know what I can actually manage before you design the furnace around it."
"That's the idea."
She exhaled slowly.
"There's something you need to understand first."
Her arms remained crossed as she looked down at the objects on the bench.
"Every time I use this power, it can cause accidents."
Her expression tightened slightly.
She lifted the iron plate again, then returned it carefully to the same place.
"I don't know why. It can lapse back into an explosion, or worse."
Beorn stayed silent. He needed the full rule before responding.
"A small amount is fine," she continued. "But if we use too much, it can flare. Some say it could destroy a city."
She looked directly at him.
Something stirred from the prince's life. A tutor's voice, or something close to it. A half-remembered lesson from when he had been twelve and not paying enough attention.
Sinbound near a settlement, heavy use over days, and then the animals started to kill themselves.
That was how the tutor had phrased it.
The livestock first. Then the people inside the settlement.
At the time he had assumed it was a story meant to frighten children. Clearly he had not listened closely enough.
"How much is too much?"
"It depends. How much I'm using it. For how long. Whether it's only me."
She glanced toward the lamp, then toward the stone walls surrounding them.
"One person working alone in a closed room should be fine."
Her eyes returned to him.
"That's not the situation I'm warning you about."
"So we're fine today."
"Probably."
Beorn lowered the quill to the page again.
The risk mattered, but measurement still came first.
"Then show me your power."