Hajin ran his thumb along the slate's edge and felt chalk dust stick to his skin.
Marrick dragged a pen across another page of regional tax records beside him.
The scribe looked exhausted enough to fall asleep standing up.
The figures still moved beneath his hand. Every shortage grew more urgent whenever a new wagon arrived.
The tally listed roughly ninety surviving men who knew how to swing a pickaxe.
Not one of them knew how to build a forge capable of melting anomaly-grade iron.
"The southern village has three carpenters," Marrick said, keeping his eyes on the ledger. "Two lost fingers in mine collapses, and the third is past his seventieth winter."
He turned the ledger page over with one tired hand. "Raw lumber arrives from the caravans tomorrow, but we have nobody to cut it into defensive stakes."
Hajin asked the next question while staring at the slate.
"What about the masons, if we even have any left?"
