Worlds to play, cards to import

Halbren tithe-wagon driver off the Granlands roads — hauling Coronal's bread from towns going hungry to grow it, and saying so too loudly in too many taprooms.

Keeper of the Gleaners' Shrine — sixty-seven years old, confessor to a frightened quarter, and guardian of the bread table that feeds Granton's hungry by night.

Junior quill-clerk at the Granton Exchange — twenty-three, invisible, and the only person to have set the tithe tallies beside the yard counts and noticed they disagree.

Master brewer of the Old Malting — jovial keeper of Granton's taproom parliament, who hears everything over the third pint and repeats almost none of it.

Yardmaster of the Tithe Yards, twenty years Emberguard before the weighbridge — the man whose calm official counts keep Granton quiet, and who knows exactly how wrong they are.

The Ondrel of the Millrace Steps: he turns the great capstan when the river runs thin, has ground Granton's grain for six decades, and gives counsel at the same speed he gives flour.

Bailiff of the Bread Courts — Susset Harrowick's writ-hand by day, and Oathseat Berrin Harrowick's quiet errand-runner by necessity, caught between the family's two halves.

Halbren ledger-keeper of the Deep Pantry and Ede Thrifthall's nephew — a young quartermaster who has counted the cellars twice and can't make the two answers agree.

Chief factor of the Granton Exchange: the woman whose chalk sets the Bench Price of bread — and who has been smoothing the number, for the best of reasons, for months.

Chittik scales-inspector of the Chandlers' Concord — the incorruptible keeper of the True Ounce, appointed by Maud Tolley precisely because the whole city distrusts his kind.

A widowed Sheavebury landholder with a modest public barn and a very private second one — the quietest grain-hoarder in the Granlands.

Veskarn quench-master of the Quench Yards — heat-blooded reader of tempering steam, whose face the smiths now watch harder than the water.

The tithe assessor at the Sackford Toll — a meticulous Crown officer collecting grain under a dead Emperor's seal, and hating every stamp of it.

One-legged Emberguard veteran and keeper of the Slagged Standard — despises the recruiters drinking her taproom dry of young men, and can't afford to bar them.

Steward of Harrowick Hall and cousin to the Oathseat — she runs the estates that anchor his power, and has begun editing what the Hall reports to Coronal.

Dvergani guildmaster of the Pickhall — bleeding the relief fund white for the failing Deepworks, and furious at anyone who asks whether miners shorted the Oath.

Journeyman baker at Mollet's Ovenhouse by day; by night, the hand that chalks the true flour price on Granton's walls for the Barefoot Chorus.

Pensioned Emberguard gate-serjeant, thirty years on the Ferruhm Gate — Doran Vex's old training serjeant, living out his ale-warmed retirement in the Standard's back room.

The last living Deepvein — Dvergani elder and keeper of Threeseam Hall, quietly having every seam-kin in Coronal restate their oaths, just in case.

Mistress of the Armourers' Arcades — the finest harness-maker in Coronal, taking war-scale orders with peace-scale silence about what they mean.

A young Halbren wagonmaster out of Lowhearth who runs the grain convoys to Ede Thrifthall in the capital — the tithe-road's most reliable man, twice a month, rot or riot.

The shamed preacher of the Iron Oath-stone — thirty years of 'iron cannot rot' sermons, silenced mid-sentence by the graft, now hunting the breach one confession at a time.

Householder of Lowhearth — the Halbren elder who keeps the Hunger Ledger, portions the common cellar, and decides which strangers eat at the long table.

Master of Ricksgate's wall-mills and the loudest Meriel man in the Granlands — grinds fair, talks large, and quarrels with his own sister across the wheat.