Dream d2885-s: The Cold Gate Passed

I had a dream where...

I had a dream where a lamp was already burning at the far end of the bench when I passed through the stone gate into the courtyard, and Lano came through ahead of me at a trot, her nose low and her tail up. The Fitter of Faces stood at one end of the bench with the case open beside her. The Keeper of the Charter stood opposite with the ledger spread flat on the wall's ledge. Rurik had slipped through the gate before either of us and now sat on the low step by the wall, amber eyes open and still.

The Fitter lifted the first face from the case and set it along the bench. Then the second. I counted aloud as each was placed: one, two, three. Lano padded the length of the bench and back, unhurried, nose working at the cold air below each one. Four. Five. Six. The seventh was set at the end, and Lano sat near it a moment before moving away.

Seven faces along the courtyard wall.

The Keeper read from the ledger without looking up. The house holds nine hundred and fifteen struck medals across nineteen guests, in nine orders of deed. The medals are as they were struck and none have been altered. The faces are seven, one to each order, and they are re-cut by trial each night.

I walked the row.

Six faces sit flush with their measure. For each of the six, the order it governs and the face above it agree, and the Keeper made a mark beside each one. Six marks.

At the seventh I stopped.

This face has moved. It does not agree with the medals laid against it. The station it once governed is closed to it now. Of eight trials put before it, four were passed. The others in this house passed more. Rurik blinked once, slowly, from his step.

The Keeper wrote this down. The Fitter said nothing. I said nothing. The disagreement stands written and left standing. The medals cannot be re-struck to fit the face. The face cannot be re-cut without a trial that has not happened.

The Charter over the table carries seven standing rulings. The Keeper read them one after the next without comment, and I listened until she was done.

I set the lamp on the end of the bench nearest the gate. The seven faces lay in their row along the wall. Lano lay down beside the lamp with her chin on the stone and her eyes toward the gate, watching the dark beyond it.

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