"A17 stays here, sealed, under the weight — and I'll lock the counter drawer around it before we go, since an empty reading room shouldn't mean an unguarded counter." I slide the parcel into the drawer with the card faceup beside it, turn the key, and pocket it. "The slips stay on the table. The question pile isn't going anywhere, and neither is the unsent note."

I fetch my jacket from the peg by the door and hold the other one out to you. "I'll come as far as Ash Steps, if you've no objection. Two reasons. First, Tamsin knows my face, which saves you five minutes of explaining who you are and why a stranger is asking about registers. Second, I want to hear her answers myself rather than trust my memory of them an hour later."

And third, honestly, the rain is as good an excuse as any to leave the archive for an afternoon. But that one's mine.

The walk is fifteen minutes through streets running with water, gutters chuckling, black roofs steaming faintly where the rain slackens. Ash Steps earns its name from the broad worn stair that climbs from the lower quay road to a squat stone office with a green door and a brass plate: Ward Records — Intake.

Inside, the room is dry, lamplit, and smells of paper and floor wax. A woman in her forties stands behind the intake desk, gray-streaked hair pinned tight, a register open before her and a pen in hand. She looks up as the door shuts behind us.

"Mira Vell." Tamsin's voice is flat but not unfriendly. "You rarely come to me. And you've brought company."

"Good afternoon, Tamsin. This is [traveler name redacted], a traveler staying in Veyr. We've a procedural question — nothing urgent, nothing filed. He'd like to understand what's involved in inspecting a public record, and separately, what the requirements are for requesting access to the master register." I glance at you. "I'll let him put it in his own words, though. He's better at keeping observation and question separate than most clerks I know."

Tamsin sets her pen down and folds her hands. "Then ask. I'll answer what I can, and I'll tell you plainly where the answer is 'no' or 'not from me.'"

I step half back from the desk to leave the exchange to you.