Chapter 9: The Law of Silence
The food district occupied the level below, where a row of connected stalls lined the rock wall, selling roasted meat, pickled vegetables, hard bread, and several types of preserved goods I couldn't identify, stored in clay jars sealed with wax. I stopped at a stall selling dry rations, calculating how many days' journey they might cover, when I noticed a small wooden crate standing upright at the side of the stall. Inside lay several bundles of dried leaves, their wrinkled label bearing a name I had only encountered in magical literature.
Stoneshade.
I knew theoretically what this substance was for—the leaves changed color when brought near curse residue, serving as an active medium for detecting curse types. The literature's description of identifying characteristics was vague, mentioning "water-stain patterns on the leaf backs," but the problem was that water stains themselves could form in a dozen different ways. I had never seen the actual plant and had no way to confirm.
The stall keeper was a man with one dyed ear, a purplish-red color I'd never seen before. When I asked about those bundles of leaves, he waved dismissively, offering a description so vague it made me wonder if he'd ever seen them himself.
"Small leaves, dark green, some pattern on the back. The function you mentioned—I couldn't say for certain."
"Does the pattern on the leaf back radiate outward from the stem, or does it run along the leaf edge?"
He paused, glancing at the bundle of leaves, then at me. "How should I know?"
I was just about to crouch down and examine them myself when a voice cut in.
"This one."
Cade was standing at the side of the stall—I hadn't noticed when he'd arrived. He reached into the small wooden crate, pulled out one of the bundles, and handed it directly to me.
I turned over the leaf back. The pattern was clear, every leaf matching the incomplete line in the literature: radiating outward from the stem, evenly spaced, tapering slightly as they reached the leaf edge.
It was correct.
The stall keeper's expression changed.
"That's not for sale," he said.
Cade's tone remained level. "Lassen's courtyard, three months ago. Someone wearing green gloves."
The stall keeper's breathing hitched for half a beat.
"And that batch of 'medicinal herbs' from the north in spring," Cade continued. "When that shipment left, one crate was lighter than when it arrived."
"Enough." The stall keeper's voice was compressed to something barely resembling his original tone.
"The Law of Silence applies equally to buyers and sellers," Cade said. "If that transaction of yours gets uncovered, you won't be the only one in trouble. Right now, I just want to buy this bundle of Stoneshade, and she gets a fair price on her dry rations."
"Five silver coins. Rations at listed price," the stall keeper said, his voice much smaller than before.
"Four."
"Four it is."
I paid, packing the bundle of Stoneshade and ten days' worth of dry rations into my cloth bag. We walked two more streets away from the stall before I spoke.
"What you said about him—was that true?"
"True."
"How did you know?"
"Knowing is our job," he said.
"'Our.'"
He didn't answer. That "our" had slipped out smoothly, without hesitation. I recalled he'd always used "I" before. This small difference suddenly felt not so small.
"That Law of Silence," I said. "How does it work in the Lower City?"
"It's simple. In the Lower City, what nobody knows didn't happen. But if you know something others think didn't happen, you hold the right to speak of it." He paused. "Whether you use it properly is another matter."
"And if I misuse it?"
"Next time you return to the Lower City, you'll find no one willing to see you," he said. "The Law of Silence governs both sides."
We stopped at a crossroads. The morning crowd dispersed from here in several directions. A child ran past, colliding with my waist without turning to apologize.
"Cade."
"Mm."
"Those two things you mentioned about the stall keeper," I said. "Did you hear them from others in the Lower City, or did you witness them yourself?"
He looked at me for about two seconds.
"The one I witnessed myself wasn't useful today," he said. "I used what I'd heard. What I'd heard was more reliable. What I'd heard has a second witness somewhere."
I asked nothing more. He answered nothing more.
We returned to the inn at dusk.
I spread all the supplies I'd purchased today across the table, carefully wrapping each item to keep them dry. Cade leaned against the window eating bread. His presence had shifted from "something I need to adapt to" to "a fixed shape in the periphery of my vision."
The magical lamp's light was yellowish, falling on the Stoneshade's leaf backs and making those radiating patterns look remarkably like some kind of delicate blood vessels.
"These aren't for treating wounds," he finally spoke.
"No." I didn't look up. "They're for analyzing magical residue."
"Analyzing what?"
I considered how to explain.
"I need to replicate a test. The test equipment is complex, but I understood the principle—drip residue onto some kind of active medium and classify based on the reaction. I couldn't take his equipment with me, so I'm trying a different approach. Each type of herb produces different color changes when exposed to different types of curse residue. I have over a dozen herbs, each sensitive within a certain range."
I continued in the most accessible terms I could manage while organizing.
"If I arrange them in a matrix, when I encounter new residue, I run it through all of them, see which ones react and which don't, and I can work backward to deduce the curse's composition."
After listening to my explanation, Cade's hand paused over his bread.
"Didn't expect you to be clever, miss. But tell me—why are you testing curses?"
My hands stopped. Today's help from him had lowered my guard. I shouldn't have said so much.
So I adopted my most serious expression.
"I told you, Cade. Don't ask questions you shouldn't ask."
His expression remained serious, without that half-smile he usually wore. He looked at the herbs beside my hand, then glanced at me again, stuffed the remaining half of his bread into his mouth, and said nothing more.
The atmosphere fell into brief awkwardness. I packed everything away and sat at the far end from him, beginning to take notes.
"You need to find a wizard," he spoke after a while. "Preferably an Archmage. Osric."
My hand paused.
"Why him specifically?" I was asking despite knowing the answer—Archmage Osric was one of the few familiar things I had here.
"Everyone with a name in that tower, I know something about them." He shrugged. "That Stoneshade you bought today—he was the first to discover it. He even published a primer that sold like wildfire at the time."
I set down my pen.
"You've read his pamphlet."
"I've read it," he said, as if refuting something. "Hunters read too."
I didn't pursue the question further.
But in that moment, several things coalesced in my mind into a single shape: his familiarity with Osric's book, his tensed shoulders when returning to the Lower City, that small habit of tapping the table. This shape didn't have a name yet. Tomorrow it might.
I closed my notebook.
On the table, the Stoneshade under the magical lamp's glow showed its leaf-back patterns even more clearly.
Tomorrow, I absolutely had to see Osric. I couldn't delay any longer.
Before returning to my room to sleep, I placed my backpack in the cabinet, falling asleep while praying that the Silverthread wouldn't wither under the curse's influence.