I tick through it the way I did before, standing at the edge of Tamsin's desk with the rain still working at the windows.

"Location: Ash Steps, ward records intake office. Present: you, me, Tamsin at her desk. Rowan is away — no one has seen him since he left the parcel this morning. No remote contacts established; the note to him is still unsent, sitting on the archive worktable with your sorted slips."

"A17: sealed, uncracked, locked in the archive's counter drawer. Custody is mine. No receipt has been issued — Tamsin confirmed plainly that her countersign attests only to Rowan's signature, not to receiving or inspecting any parcel. Nothing has been delivered."

"Established this visit: the accession entry for A17, which we have a copy of. It records the parcel as received from Black Archive intake, courier Rowan Fen, recipient ward records office — with no street in the address column, and the main entry in a hand that isn't mine and isn't Tamsin's. The entry reads as though the parcel left the archive this morning. It didn't. Whether that's an unmarked anticipatory entry or something worse is unresolved."

"Also established: the process for the bell-metal master register — a written request naming specific records and purpose, countersigned by a ward officer, licensed surveyor, or magistrate's clerk, then approved by the registrar's office upstairs. We haven't applied for anything."

"Open choices: head back to the archive, ask Tamsin more, or something else entirely. The parcel investigation waits either way."

That's the whole of it. Nothing dressed up as more than it is.

"Your call."