Morning makes the dust glow. Three Lutes sits quiet and square, a tavern holding its breath before the rush. Tamsin drags tables with a shoulder and a grunt, sliding them into rows that make sense to her and will make sense to the crowd when the shouting starts. Lyria chalks a slate on the corner platform, the letters neat enough to shame a scribe. Colin stands on a chair that wobbles and pretends it does not.
"Rule board goes here," Tamsin says, tapping the wall. Her voice is steady. "No blades drawn. Coin before collection. Breakages paid. Cursed goods declared if known."
"Add no food near the lots," Lyria says, without turning. "Grease stains turn honest junk into suspicious junk."
"Add: Be polite," Tamsin says while snapping a rotten stool. "This is a friendly house, after all, and I'm the friendly barkeep on this side of the Grand Exchange."
Lyria writes it exactly as asked. The handwriting is crisp, round in the right places, businesslike without fuss. She underlines friendly house with a small flourish, then wipes a fingerprint from the board with her cuff. It is automatic, like breathing.
Colin riffles a stack of scrap paper and tests an opening. "Ladies and gentlemen, lads and lasses, creatures of impeccable taste…"
"Next," Tamsin says, deadpan.
He tries a museum voice. "Presented to you today, an artefact of culture and…"
"Dry as dust," Lyria says. She does not look up. A smile ghosts along the edge of her mouth.
Colin grins. "Third time lucky." He swaps to his quick chant, the rhythm that once carried through a shearing shed while sheep argued with gates. "Right, who is ready to spend coin they will not miss on things they will swear they needed all along?"
Tamsin lifts a hand and waggles it. "Better. About as good as the last bard that left with a hat full of dust."
Lyria holds up her chalk like a scorecard. "Seven."
"Out of?"
"Ten," she says. "Twelve when you stop standing on the wobbly chair."
He hops down. "I like a challenge."
Tamsin hikes the chair away and replaces it with one that looks like it once fought a war and won. "Try to do your challenges with both feet on the floor."
Tamsin hauls a barrel against the bar to make a collection point for sold goods. Lyria threads ribbon through brass rings and ties a rope to mark the bidding lane, her knots small and tidy. Colin writes a sign that reads: Please do not lick the merchandise. Then stands back and decides to add: Thank you, in smaller letters.
"Commission," Tamsin says, wiping her hands. "House takes fifteen."
"Ten," Colin says cheerfully. "We are building a brand."
"Twelve," Lyria says. "Plus a tavern cut that rises with drink sales."
Tamsin squints at her. There is a glint there that is not suspicion, only memory. "You always did know how to pay a bill twice with the same coin."
Lyria's chalk pauses for a beat. "I know how to keep places open."
Tamsin nods once, slowly. "You kept us open last winter. You can keep track of this."
"Last winter was you," Lyria says, almost too quiet to hear. "I only counted."
Colin pretends to adjust the rope while he listens. Tamsin's braid swings as she moves a table with a knee. Lyria straightens a stack of blank slips and aligns their corners as if sharp edges might keep trouble out. Their rhythm is old. It runs under the words like a bass line.
He rings the bell. Nothing happens.
"It's shy," Tamsin laughs.
"It rings if you insult it," Lyria says, still writing. "Ugly bell."
The bell gives a single bright note, as if pleased that someone finally understands it.
Colin blinks. "Did that just work?"
"It did during winter," Tamsin says. "Bards would not stop tuning it until Lyria called it a tin potato. Then it behaved."
"Tin potato," Lyria repeats, testing the words again. The bell chimes a polite little ding.
"How much can we get this for…?" Colin says while thinking out loud.
"Not for sale." Both Lyria and Tamsin chime at the same time.
Putting his hands up in defence, Colin walks away with a faint grin, picking up a spoon from behind the counter and naming it Gavel. Tamsin watches the shape of the room and shifts the tables exactly half a step to improve the flow.
"I have hosted more fights than weddings," she says, measuring a gap with her palm. "This will probably be both."
"Weddings are just louder sales," Colin says. "You sell the future. You throw in a cake."
Lyria writes Lot 01 on a small card. Her fingernails are short, ink-stained, precise. A memory crosses her face and is gone, the kind that tastes of spilled ink and long nights. "If you put cake on the lot board, it will go first."
"Noted," Colin says, and adds a very small cake to the bottom corner of the chalkboard, just to make her roll her eyes. She does. It is affectionate, which he pockets like a coin.
They pin the first cards to the slate.
Lot 01 Goblin helm
Lot 02 Cracked goblet
Lot 03 Bottle slug
Lot 04 Copper rings
Lot 05 Historic boots
Lot 06 Glow rock
Lot 07 Mystery kettle
Lot 08 Best chicken
Lot 09 Bent knife
Lot 10 Decorative chain
Tamsin reads them like a weather report. "Good mix. Enough harmless goods to keep drinks moving and enough strange goods to make them stand on chairs. Impressive."
"I see you speak forecast. Ever considered a job change?" Colin teases.
"Only if you are looking to replace a limb," Tamsin says back.
"Noted."
They prop the door open. The morning slides inside, along with voices. Interest draws interest. A man with a tray of bread pauses to read the board. A woman with a string basket of apples eyes the rope. By the time the sun finds the middle of the floor, they have a queue. Colin smiles as he recognises a few who have come.
"Is seating provided for chickens?" the farmer asks, solemn as a judge. The chicken in his basket watches Tamsin with the acid disapproval only poultry can manage.
"For buyers, not for birds," Tamsin says. She takes the basket without flinching. "Corner table. It can glare from there."
Lyria writes: Best chicken, on a slip and tags the basket handle. "Seller name."
"Edwin," he says. "The chicken is, Margaret."
Lyria writes both, which makes Edwin puff with pride and the chicken look even more offended.
A miner steps up with a cloth parcel that leaks light around the edges like a bad curtain. "Reserve price," he says, holding it with both hands.
"Set the lowest number you can live with," Lyria says, voice practical. "If we do better, you do better. The commission is twelve percent. Drink is extra."
He unwraps it. The rock sits in his palm and sulks. When Colin leans closer, a faint sheen runs across its veins, the kind you only see when sunlight hits dust just right. He files it under theatre and does not mention it.
He dims a lantern with his hand and lifts the rock beside it. The room gives a soft collective ooh. The rock does not care, but rocks rarely do.
The miner grins. "Angry," he says, happy as if it were a friend with a familiar flaw.
A woman with a box of copper rings steps up. The rings are pretty at a glance and treacherous after an hour. "If a ring turns your finger green," she says, "is that magic?"
"It is a mark of fortune," Colin says, solemnly. "The metal is jealous. It wishes to join you."
Lyria writes: cosmetic effect, no liability. "Lot 04," she says, and smiles to take the sting from the words.
A boy with boots that have lived three lives and wants a fourth stands on tiptoe to see the board. Tamsin makes him sit, brings water, and checks the boots for nails. "Are you sure?" she says, gently. "You cannot buy a memory back."
He shrugs and drinks the water too fast. "They stink," he says. "I am selling the smell."
"Historic boots," Lyria writes, and the boy brightens.
Milo arrives with his sack of wonders, eyes wild, hair convinced of gravity's failure. He lays items out as if they will arrange themselves into a map. Goblet. Bent knife. Bottle with the slug that might once have been a slug before ambition. Goblin helm that wears dents like medals. A ring that flashes blue out of pure spite, then sulks.
"We will get a lot of stories out of this," Colin says.
"Do you want me to do the story?" Milo says, already halfway to telling it.
"You will get a piece of the story," Colin then whispers. "Tell me everything now. Then tell it again out there, but louder."
Milo nods so hard, the bottle wobbles. The thing inside glistens, faint as a breath on glass. Colin feels the old itch to name what he sees and decides to call it shine, which is not a lie and not the whole of it.
Colin looks to the barrel and scratches his head. They need more space, but a barrel will not suffice. Tamsin disappears behind the bar, returns with a key ring the size of a bracelet, and unlocks a door Colin had taken for a broom cupboard. It is a broom cupboard. It is also a stairwell that goes down to a room that smells of potatoes.
"We used it during the bard festival," Tamsin says. "Storage. Refuge. Prison for two hours when a troupe fought over a rhyme."
"That was not a rhyme," Lyria says, following with a handful of tags. "That was a debt."
"Felt like a rhyme," Tamsin says, and swings a crate aside with one arm. "Right. Lots go here, left to right by number. No one touches them without a slip."
They file things on shelves while Lyria writes tags and sticks them with wax she warms in her palm. Colin helps in a way that mostly involves staying out of the way. He handles a helm, and a mouse skeleton falls out, delicate as lace. Lyria tags it Lot 00 for luck, then drops it into a bin with a small apology.
People come with questions and leave with answers. A trio of dwarves argue about whether auctions are just gambling with chairs, then rethink it when they see the rule board and rope. An orc wants to know if yelling at the bell helps bids or if he would be too loud. The bell obliges by chiming when Lyria mutters tin potato under her breath. A demon trader glides through with a velvet case of tiny drawers and a smile that says trouble has manners. Tamsin looks at the case the way a mother cat looks at a bath and says, "Not today." The trader bows and leaves a card that smells faintly of smoke.
By noon, the slate shows ten lots and a short waiting list. The rope looks official. The room smells of soap, chalk, and ambition. Colin feels the day tilt toward the future and stands there, ready.
The door opens on a draft and a shadow. It does not slam. It declares. A man in tidy grey steps through with a badge bright on his chest and a clipboard held like a verdict. Two assistants follow, faces set to neutral.
"By the authority of the Guild of Standard Appraisers," the man says, and the tavern hears the capital letters at once, "you are operating an unlicensed sale. All consignments will be held for valuation and fees."
The room goes tight. Edwin shifts the chicken basket closer to his boots. The dwarves stop arguing long enough to see if a fight will happen. Milo's hand hovers over the bottle as if the slug might offer legal advice.
Tamsin steps from behind the bar with the slow certainty of someone who knows exactly where the floor gives. She plants herself between the storeroom and the grey coat. Hands on hips and ladle within reach. "You can wait by the board like everyone else."
Lyria slips a stack of intake slips onto the table nearest the rope. She taps the posted terms with the end of her chalk. "Private event. Documentation is in order. You are welcome to observe."
The guild man's eyes flicker. He sees the neat columns of seller names and reserve prices. He sees the rope, the rule board, the bell, and the ledger. Not only that, but he looks at Lyria for one beat longer than politeness, as if hunting a memory.
"We have met," he says.
"Once," Lyria says. She does not explain, and the chalk does not shake.
Colin smiles like he is already on stage, because he is. "Welcome. In fact, you have arrived just in time for a demonstration." He points to the glowing rock on the table, wrapped in cloth. "Perceived value in the wild. We gather, we look, we decide. The number becomes real because enough people agree to make it so."
"Value is set by expertise," the man in grey says.
"Value is set by buyers," Colin says, friendly as a summer. "Expertise is a useful story to help them decide."
The assistants bristle. The guild man takes one long step toward the cellar door. Tamsin does not move, but the space between them closes like a book.
"By the authority…"
The bell rings. One clear note, as if a small truth has spoken.
Every head turns. Even the chicken.
The guild man recovers and lifts his clipboard. "This auction is shut."
Tamsin says, very calm, "Try me."