Harem System novel · Chapter 13 of 24

Chapter 13: Marshal's Seal

The marshal was waiting at the Ward steps at dawn, alone, with her sister's bread bag over one shoulder.

"I didn't sleep," she said. "I kept thinking about that stamp."

"You should go home," Nils said.

"I'm going to the Gate. So are you."

He looked at her.

"The matron pulled my stamp."

"The matron owns the queue stamp," the marshal said. "She does not own my seal."

She pulled a flat brass seal on a cord from under her tabard.

"Any marshal can seal one party through one floor on her own name. If it goes wrong, it's my post."

"I can't ask you to do that."

"You fed my sister bread crumbs in the dirt while a hundred people watched. I'm not asking you. I'm telling you."

Ruenna came out of the Ward behind him, pulling on her jacket.

"I like her," she said.

Liriel was the last through the door, with a notebook in her hand and no sleep in her face.

"Eight days," she said quietly. "Seven by tonight."

"I know."

"Veyra is stable on crystals, and I'll watch her. You have two hours of rest on that floor, flat on your back, eyes closed."

"Liriel."

"That's my term. I'll know if you skip it. I'll chart it on your face."

He nodded.

The queue at the Gate was already long, and it went still when he walked up the steps.

Two women in green-and-black coats stood near the front.

One of them laughed out loud.

"Pulled," she said. "Whole queue saw it. Go home, nurse."

The marshal turned her head slowly.

"Say that again in front of my seal."

The woman's smile stayed on her face, but it stopped meaning anything.

The marshal pressed the brass seal into the wax on his papers and signed over it.

"Party of two, floor two, under Marshal's seal," she said, loudly enough for the line to hear. "Next."

Nobody in the queue said anything.

The inner doors opened.

Floor two was a long flooded hall with black water to the knee and stone pillars running down the middle.

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