The Larkmere Civic Menagerie took two infant reed hogs at 06:40. Clerk Ada Quill entered them on Form 12-B, Live Arrival, Non-Speaking. The form has a box for speech. She marked it no.
The pair came up from the north freight dock in a cabbage crate. The crate board read SEND BACK. No sender was listed. Quill weighed them on the postage scale. Livestock Scale 2 is signed out to the canal office until Thursday. The tape printed LETTER, OVERWEIGHT for the first. It printed the same line for the second. She pinned both tapes to the form.
The first infant went down as nine pounds even. The second went down as nine pounds, four ounces. Quill wrote the hour in the left margin. She wrote "awake, wet, eating the corner of the form" in the condition line. She did not name them. The name line says "see attached, if any." Nothing was attached.
Keeper Bram Colter filed Petition 44 at 07:05. He is the petitioner of record. He asked for greens, a heated stone, and a lock on the south gate. He carried the crate in himself. The petition sits in the pending tray. The tray is under the window. The window faces the reflecting court.
At 09:16 a harmony minute reached the same desk. It came from the Day Court by morning courier. The seal was the sun seal. The minute was three sentences. It welcomed "two envoys of stillness" into the realm's care. It praised Larkmere for its calm water. It thanked the city for its harmony. It did not name a feed. It did not name a gate. It did not name Quill.
Banner Gloss read the minute aloud at 10:00. He is the Day Court's visiting speaker for the week. Fourteen ponies stood in the reflecting court. Gloss called the infants a widening of the peace. He called the crate a passage. He stopped when the ribbon left his hoof.
The ribbon was the civic welcome ribbon. Gloss had it tied to the pool rail at 09:50. By 10:02 it was in the pool. The lighter infant had it. The heavier infant sat on the spare copy of the minute. Gloss had set that copy on the rim so the water could witness it. The ink ran. The file copy stayed on Quill's blotter. She had not put it near the water.
"The form was finished at 06:40," Quill said. "The seal is a different sheet. I can file a sheet. I cannot feed a sheet."
Colter stood at the gate with his lunch greens in a sack. Petition 44 has no stamp. He watched the pool while Gloss finished.
"They were hungry at the dock," Colter said. "They are hungry now. The tray can take its time. They will not."
Gloss told the fourteen that the realm had grown by two souls of peace. He did not take questions. Menagerie warden Sella Voss had the questions on a card. The card asked who pays the greens. It asked who holds the key after dark. It asked which office owns a creature with no papers. Voss read the card into the record at 10:11. Gloss said the seal had answered in principle. Voss wrote "in principle" on the card. She did not write a sum.
The postage scale was due back at the letter office at noon. Quill carried it down at 11:40. She left the tapes on the form. A clerk at the letter office initialed the loan line. The clerk did not ask about the weights. The loan line is for letters. The infants are not letters. The tape says they are.
By 14:00 Voss had roped the pool. Her notice cites Form 12-B and Petition 44. It does not cite the harmony minute.
Gloss left on the 15:10 coach. He took the wet copy. He left the dry copy. He told Voss the Day Court would be pleased. Voss asked pleased by what. Gloss said by the welcome. Voss pointed at the pending tray.
At 16:10 the feed chit was blank. Colter had split his lunch sack and left the greens on the stone. Quill logged the greens as a private advance. She wrote the hour. She wrote his name. She did not write the Day Court.
At 16:22 Quill ruled a recovery line under the advance. She entered the stall price from the receipt in Colter's teeth. She clipped the receipt to Petition 44.
The harmony minute stayed on the blotter. It carried a welcome and a seal. The pending tray held the only sum in the building.
