The Steward’s Levy at Hessle Bar

The steward came down to Hessle Bar in a borrowed boat with the toll-lord’s new levy rolled under his arm, and Prudence Yarrow knew by the ribbon on it that her afternoon was spoiled.

“One part in a hundred on any great crossing,” Ambrose Kettlewell read, then looked at her gate ledger. “And here’s one. Three hundred and forty-five coins and change, from one hand to another. The Foundry carried it.”

“It paid two drops a span,” Prudence said. “Same as the eel-wife behind it. Same as the band in grey.” She turned the page so he could see. Two thousand five hundred and twenty carried, and a long stretch of them in identical cloaks, so the chest might have gone to any of them or to nobody he’d ever meet. “It’s across. Brannoch Vell’s crew forged it in while you were rowing. You want your hundredth, go and unforge it.”

Kettlewell studied the old toll chain lying slack across the landing, rusted to the posts since before the First Houses. He had been told to bring back either coin or a name. “Write me who owns it, then. The lord can send to them.”

Prudence wrote the figure exactly, to the last thousandth, because any Wakeful in the land could check it. Beside it she wrote nothing.

He sat a while on the bollard, then rolled the levy up again, ribbon and all, and asked what the boat back cost. She charged him the full fare.