Dream d2600-s: The Hall Before the Hall

I had a dream where...

I had a dream where I sat in Eldergate's hall with the ledger open on the table in front of me, and Lano curled under the bench at my feet, and there were four or five people in the chairs, not many, the hall being what it is in a town of unfinished roads.

I had come to read the finding before I carried it to the Hall that had asked for it. That is how it goes here, in the eighth evening of eight: you do not carry work past the place where you stayed without reading it there first.

The count ran to sixty-five places on the map. I read the number and one of the listeners, a woman who kept accounts for the western quarter, wrote it in her own book without my asking.

The column added in the last phase, the one for places that are neither running nor gone, I had cut it to fit seven. Tonight I carried it wider. I read each name in order and entered the mark.

Thirty-six ruins. I read that. Lano's ears lifted, then settled.

Forty cold. I read that too.

Forty-one left in good order at whatever hour their people last walked out of them.

And three places not left in good order: the Ruins of Frosting, the Ruins of Mossness, the Ruins of Zephyrden. I read each name separately, and paused between them, and did not add anything to the names.

Rurik had come in at some point, without my noticing. He was on the windowsill at the far end, a black shape against the last of the outside light, watching.

The five lit cities I read last: Emberford, Frostridge, Osierlow, Willowholt, Willowhythe. Lit meaning: people in them now, lights in the windows, the count confirmed as of this season.

The largest pile of unanswered letters in the world is at the Ruins of Mistthwaite. I noted that in the finding because it had appeared in three separate records, in three different hands, and three times is not once. I read it aloud. The account-keeper in the western row did not write it down. The man beside her did.

When I finished reading, the room was quiet for a moment. Not waiting for something. Just quiet.

Then I closed the ledger, and Lano stood and shook herself and pressed once against my leg, and I picked up my coat from the back of the chair.

Rurik did not move from the sill. Rurik never announces a departure.

I walked out of Eldergate toward the Hall that had asked for the count, and Lano trotted ahead on the unfinished road, her nose low, and I carried the finding in my hands, and did not explain it.

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