The King Who Broke Heaven’s Tithe

Chapter 27 The Share and the Whole

Caster Vey carried no sword. He let his guards explain why he did not need one.

They spread across the yard while he examined the iron band around the upper stone. One put a hand on the water gate. Asha knocked it away with her shovel.

“Ask before you stop a turning load.”

The guard looked to Caster, who inclined his head as though granting a courtesy he had invented.

Hessa brought the loan bark from her kitchen. Selka stood beside her, hands visible. Daren stayed near the frame, where he could watch the workers and the door together.

“The stone was damaged before we touched it,” Hessa said. “Your share is being weighed.”

“My share includes recovery of losses.”

“Not every sack in Harrowmere.”

Caster opened his leather case and produced a second document bearing a red court mark.

“Emergency custody. The Summit requires secure grain movement while the high roads are under strain.”

Daren looked at Selka.

She asked to read it. Caster studied her face, and recognition sharpened his polite expression.

“Magistrate Thorne.”

“No longer.”

“Then you have no standing to interpret a court order.”

“She can read,” Hessa said. “That’s the standing I need.”

Caster hesitated before handing over the document. Several villagers had gathered within hearing. Refusal would have cost him something, though Daren could not yet tell how much.

Selka read twice.

“It grants custody of grain already pledged for Summit transport,” she said. “It does not make unpledged grain yours.”

“The village pledged repayment.”

“A tenth of the processed barley and the fixed measure named here.” She placed the two records together. “You’re making one description swallow another.”

Caster smiled slightly.

“Your office found that reading acceptable last winter.”

Jun stared at Selka.

Daren felt the accusation land. He waited. Defending her before she answered would only make the answer harder to hear.

“Yes,” Selka said. “I approved claims using it.”

“Then you admit its authority.”

“I admit what I did.”

Her voice remained level, but Daren could see her fingers pressing the bark flat against the table.

Hessa asked the guards whether any of them had been sent to collect grain not named in a pledge. They looked at Caster instead of answering. That was not victory. It was a narrow place to stand.

Caster offered terms. He would overlook the alteration if Harrowmere surrendered its finished grain now. He would leave enough for seven days’ food and assess further need afterward.

Hessa asked the factor to name the households that would receive the seven days' allowance. He said that would depend on need and cooperation.

Daren saw her understand the trap. A family could lose its food by objecting to the count, and anyone who objected would be blamed for hungry children afterward.

“Then our tally stays here,” she said.

Caster tapped the leather case. “You would rather risk disorder?”

She turned toward the workers, who were standing among tools they could not afford to abandon. “We have managed a flood, a broken mill, and a winter measure. You are not the first difficult thing to arrive.”

A woman behind Hessa made a small, furious sound.

“And spring?” Asha asked.

“Seed allowances will be considered.”

“No.”

The word came from several mouths at once.

Daren saw the guards change their footing. He shifted his weight off his bad knee and put one hand on the frame. If fighting started, the narrow shed would break the advantage of their numbers, but villagers stood directly behind him. Someone would be trampled before a blade was drawn.

He spoke to Caster.

“Your share is here. Take the measured amount, with witnesses. Let the rest remain until another court hears your expanded claim.”

“And who feeds the Summit while villages argue?”

“Who feeds the village while you decide?”

Caster looked at Daren fully for the first time.

“Holt.”

The name moved through the yard.

Daren did not deny it.

“There is no truce protecting you now,” Caster said.

“Then be clear what you’re doing. Collecting barley or making an arrest?”

It was a risk. Caster’s guards could have answered with their spears. Instead, the factor glanced toward the households gathered outside, weighing a fight against the grain he actually had authority to carry.

He chose the grain.

For the next hour, every measure passed beneath Hessa’s rod and Jun’s tally. Caster took his original share and the fixed payment. He refused to sign away the additional claim. Hessa refused to acknowledge it.

No one pretended the dispute was ended.

Before leaving, he stopped beside Daren.

“The ridge road has other obligations besides yours.”

Daren watched his wagons depart.

Asha came to stand beside him. “You have made buying from us expensive.”

“I know.”

“Do you? Your people are behind a ruined wall. Mine live along a road.”

He had no useful defense against that.

Inside the shed, Vann was preparing his cart. Noon had come and gone during the weighing. Daren unfastened his spear and offered it without being asked.

The carter took it, tested its balance, and leaned it against his own load.

“I’ll wait until morning,” he said. “Now I have a reason you’ll finish.”

Jun appeared at the door, pale beneath her anger.

“The steward’s men are at the western crossing. They’ve unhitched the relief cart.”

“What relief?”

“Four households coming back from the upland plots.”

Outside, a bell began ringing along the millrace. Someone was shouting for ropes.