Births at the Halfway Inn, winter
Kept by Ferris, the innkeeper. Checked by Pell, who checks everything twice.

The third of Frost: a boy, born in the back room by the hearth. The snow was too deep for the carts, so the carter's wife stayed the night. Mother and boy both well.

The eleventh of Frost: a girl, born in the stable loft on clean straw. The mare did not mind. Her name is Hazel. Her father held the lamp, and says so.

The second of Longnight: twins, a boy and a girl. They came over the road from Kettle Ridge with their father, who has no cart now.

Two travelers came in from the north road. They wrote no names in this book, and they were gone south before the lamps were lit.

The carter Odo says the lights were over the north again. Some say they are falling stars. Some say they are fires. Ferris says the stars only moved, and that is all. Nobody went out to look.
%%
Register: the fence at the mill lane
Kept at Copperhold by Hesk, in the register of small disputes, at the request of the two families concerned. Spring of the 205th year. Written down because it went on for three months and both families wanted it finished.

The fence runs from the mill gate down to the orchard. The post at the bend is the one in question. The Sallow family say it is theirs. The Brin family say it is theirs. Both families have dug under it at one time or another, and neither has found anything but clay.

First hearing, in Blossom, at the mill. Present: Gwen for the Sallow side, Brin for the other. Brin said his grandfather set the post, and that a fence post is a fence post, and should be counted with the fence. Gwen said the post was set before the fence, since the post had no rails on the Sallow side. Brin said the rails were on the wrong side because Gwen's father had nailed them there. Gwen said it was the best side. They were asked to sit down.

Second hearing, in Swarm, at the Brin field. Brin's pig got through the fence and into the Sallow barley. The pig ate two sheaves and lay down in the ditch, and would not come out until the barley was counted. Gwen said the pig was a witness. Brin said the pig was a pig. The Copperhold clerk wrote down both things.

Third hearing, in Longday, at the boundary stone. The boundary stone was not found. Hesk asked both sides to look in the ditch, one each, and to tell him what they found. Brin found a stone. Gwen found a rusty spade. Hesk said that was a fair result. Neither side agreed.

Decision, in Melon, by the council at Copperhold: the post is shared. The fence is shared. The pig is to be kept in. The Sallow family will keep the north rails, the Brin family the south. Neither family is to be blamed for what the other one dug.

Brin said the decision was unfair. Gwen said it was the best one she had ever heard. They shook hands on it at the bridge, and then argued about the handshake.
%%
Inn register, the Brown Hen, winter 176
Kept by Ilse, who burns charcoal in the woods east of the inn and minds the book in winter.
The Brown Hen stands a day's walk east of Three Wells, where the Long Road bends by the stream. The inn keeps this book for births, namings, and names of travelers who stop. I write it plain.
Born here, ninth of Longnight: a girl, to Marta the cook and her husband Onn the carter. They named her Sedge, after the reeds by the stream, because she came in the cold and cried loud. Both well.
Named here, first of Deepsnow: a boy from Kettle Ridge, son of a miller, named Fen. The family paid in flour and stayed two nights out of the wind.
Married here, twelfth of Deepsnow: Alder the fletcher and Bess of the market. Pell the merchant stood witness and gave them honey from Ambrook. They ate soup and went home in the snow.
Travelers this winter: nine carts, two riders, one family walking west with a goat. The goat slept by the fire. We charged nothing for the goat.
The road is froze hard at the bend. The stream bridge holds. Keep your lamps lit.
%%
The Halfway Inn book, spring
Written by Willa, who keeps the book while Obed's hand mends. Obed says it will mend. He has said so since the frost.

Thaw, the fourth day. Two carts in from Vell and one from Three Wells. The Vell cart brought salt and a letter for the Brown Hen. The Three Wells cart brought a broken wheel and a cow called Nettle, who has been sold twice and has opinions about both.

Thaw, the sixth day. A family came up the south road, going on to Saltreach for the boats. Ferrer and his wife, five children, a cow, and one goose that would not come in. They paid for two beds and a bath. The goose slept in the cart. Nobody asked where they would go after Saltreach, and nobody said. Ruth says they had the look of people who had decided, and were glad, and were tired.

Thaw, the ninth day. The healer's cart came up from Lowmarsh with eleven people under sacks. Wren sent word that the cough is bad in the reed beds, and the beds are full. She asked for barley and clean rags, and we gave the cart both. The carters say the water is to blame. Obed's cousin says the ships, because the cough came the same month as the first big hull. The mine clerk from Copperhold, who was eating his tea here, says the mines. Nobody knows. The tea was very good.

Sowing, the first day. Clover is sitting up by herself now, and has opinions about the spoon. The hearth has not gone out in twenty years, and it will not go out for Clover.

Sowing, the eleventh day. Mira's letter came down with the last cart. It was short. She is well. The nights are long at Northpoint. She asks after Tam and the windmills, and she says the glass in the lamp room is clean. Pell read it aloud at the table, and then he read the bottom twice, where there was nothing at all.

Sowing, the fifteenth day. The melon is finally cut, if anyone is curious. It took two men and a cook's knife, and Ama came down the road to watch. It was good. Ama says that is what she grew it for, and says nothing more about it.

Blossom, the second day. A boy came in alone from the Long Road, with a sack and a letter from his aunt in Three Wells. He is going on to Vell to learn the copying. He asked whether the Archive really has no roof. I said it has a hill. He liked that, and wrote it on his cuff.

Blossom, the fifth day. Jun says the waymarks are all in order: the stone pillars, three blocks high, a torch on top, the figure and the arrow to the next inn. Someone has left three small white stones on the top of the Halfway waymark, which is the custom on this road. Nobody knows whose. Willa has not moved them.

Blossom, the ninth day. The riddle board by the fire has a new riddle, in chalk. Nobody will say who wrote it. Ruth says it is about a cow, and she should know.

Willa's note: The hearth is fed every morning. I will feed it tomorrow, and I will write down whatever comes down the road.
%%
Register: keepers of the north line
Kept at Vell in the register of towers, and copied at Northpoint, for the keepers and their lamps. Spring of the 207th year. Each tower on the north line is listed from the south, with its keeper and the number of its rungs, since the rungs are counted every spring and never every autumn.

Vell tower: keeper Sedge. Rungs, sixty-two. Lamp in good order. Glass replaced in autumn.
Three Wells tower: keeper Bel, for the feast days, and Sedge's cousin for the rest of the week. Rungs, sixty. Lamp in good order. Coal from Copperhold, short.
Hill tower, between Vell and Three Wells: keeper Hob. Rungs, sixty. A new peg in the third rung, and wax on the fourth. Lamp very clean. The cat is on the copper ring, and nobody is to move her.
Kettle Ridge tower: keeper Linnet's cousin Wil. Rungs, seventy-one. Lamp good. The windmill's sails interfere with the south line in a strong wind, and the windmill keeper has been told.
Ambrook tower: keeper Linnet. Rungs, fifty-eight. New glass in the spring. The old oak door is in good repair, and the door is kept shut at night.
Lowmarsh tower: keeper Tull. Rungs, forty-eight, since the tower is low. Lamp clear, but the frogs have been seen on the lamp room sill twice.
Saltreach tower: keeper Ottie. Rungs, eighty. Lamp good. The sea wind is hard on the copper ring, which is polished every week.
Northpoint tower: keeper Mira. Rungs, ninety. Lamp good. Coal, very low. Lantern is on rung seventy-two, and has been told to come down.
Summary. Eight towers on the north line are in good order. Two need coal. One needs a new peg, which is already in hand. The cat at the hill tower is not counted.

Notes from the register. A keeper is a person who knows the tower, the rungs and the lamp. It is not enough to know the lamp. Anyone can blink. A keeper knows when a message should not be sent, and when the lamp is too dirty to be useful. Keepers are asked to write this in their books every spring, so the next keeper will know how to be one.
%%
Register of apprentices, Kettle Ridge
Apprentices tested and given out on the ridge, spring of 206. From the ridge book, kept by Ivo the baker. Marks are right answers in a hundred, from the tests at Vell.
1. Pip. Top farm, Tam. Farm and haul. Fields 98, roads 93. Given out long enough ago that Tam has stopped counting. Counts the beetroot twice, which is once more than Tam.
2. Fence. Brin's farm. Farm and store. Fields 97, stores 91. Does not like Biscuit. Biscuit does not like Fence either.
3. Sack. Sefa's mill. Hauls flour. Roads 92. Squeaks like the mill, and nobody minds.
4. Spade. East farm, Hanna and Rolf. Farm. Fields 98. The twins ride on its shoulders and it lets them.
5. Peel. New this spring. Given to Ivo the baker, for the flour sacks and the oven wood. Stores 94. Tested at Vell by Nessa, who said: do not send it to the fields, it has never seen a field. I will not. It has seen my oven.
Never send an untested mind to the fields. All five are tested.
%%
Namings at the bakery, spring of 206
A baker's book of naming loaves. When a child is named on the ridge, the family comes to my oven, and I bake one loaf for the day. Written down by Ivo, so the loaves are remembered, even though they are eaten.
Thaw. For Poppy: a round loaf with poppy seeds in a ring on the top. It did not stay round. It was eaten warm by nine people and a dog.
Thaw. For Tuck: a small loaf, tucked in at the edges, with a split down the middle. His father laughed so hard at the name of it that the loaf fell off the table.
Sowing. For Dell and Dara: two loaves, joined at the side, like twins. They would not come apart. The family ate them as one loaf. Dell had the crust. Dara had the middle.
Blossom. For Sail: a long loaf with four slits, like the sails of a windmill. Sefa came to see it and said it was crooked. It was not crooked. It was turning.
All the loaves cost nothing. The flour came from Sefa, who said the naming flour is free, as it always is.
Next, I am told, the Coopers are expecting their third. I have started on the recipe.
%%
The cart in the ditch, a note by Ilse
Written the fourth of Deepsnow.
A cart went off the road this morning, just past the Brown Hen, where the bend is. Old Renn was driving it, charcoal and sacks of beetroot, and the near wheel found the soft edge and down it went. Nobody hurt. The horse is fine. Renn sat in the snow and said a word I will not write.
We could not lift it. Four of us pushed and the cart only settled deeper.
Then a traveler came up the road with an apprentice walking behind him. Copper and iron, about knee high, with a crystal in its chest. I had seen two before, both at the Archive. This one carried a spade.
The man said, fetch rope. The apprentice stood a moment, then went to the shed and came back with rope. The man tied it to the axle. He said, haul. It hauled. Renn pushed. I pushed. The cart came up and out and stood on the road again, dripping.
Renn gave the apprentice a beetroot. It did not eat it. It held it all the way to Three Wells, I am told.
The man would take no coin. He said the apprentice was learning the roads. I wrote his name here and then rubbed it out, because he asked me to. The apprentice did not ask for anything.
%%
Apprentices given out, winter
Kept by Pell. Every apprentice is tested on the drill board in the yard before it leaves the inn. Ten unseen drills. Nine right is a pass. Less than nine, and it goes back to the tutor house at Vell.

Nessa sets the drills. She does not smile when they are wrong, and she never says why. The drills this winter were these:
> the hens need feeding
= farm
> take these apples to Three Wells
= haul
> time to go back to the shed
= home
> keep the gate shut
= stay
> come and stand by me
= come
> bring the spare glass from the store
= fetch glass
> put the wool away
= store
> the wall needs another row
= build
> the carrots want picking
= farm
> the well bucket has a hole in it
= fetch bucket

Gorse. Passed, nine of ten. Given to Odo's cart for the Long Road haul. It missed one: "time to go back to the shed" came out as stay. Nessa says that is a common mistake. She was still cross about it.

Tinder. Passed, all ten. The best score this winter. Nessa says it reads an order the way a farmer reads the sky. Given to the Brown Hen, for the yard and the well.

Fennel. Passed, nine of ten. Given to the sheep dealer, for the high pastures past the north road.

Rush. Failed, seven of ten. It walked into the stable wall twice, and once it fetched the leaky bucket. Nessa took it back to Vell in her own cart. She says it will be ready by Sowing.

Thistle. Passed, nine of ten. Given to Pell's own wagon, to sort the stores at Three Wells. Pell asked for it by name, and he is pretending he did not.

Each apprentice that leaves the inn gets a card from the tutor. The card has one line on it, in her hand, the same on every card: keep the fields until we come back.

I asked Nessa who we meant. She did not answer. She put the card in my hand and went to see about the horses.
%%
Register: apprentices tested and given
Pages copied by Nell from the tutor's notices, and from her own visits, kept in her book because the sea eats paper and Nell does not.
In the years after 195 the tutors began sending small minds out from Vell to towns that asked. Saltreach asked. Saltreach always asks.
198. A small mind for the fish market, on a card, tested before it went. The test: sort twenty baskets, unseen, by the marks on the lids. It got eighteen. The tutor said eighteen was enough. The market keeper said eighteen was not twenty. The tutor said "never send an untested mind to the fields, and never send a tested one back for being honest." The market keeper did not understand this. The mind went anyway.
199. Two apprentices at the slip. Copper and iron. They carry planks and hold the line. Corin says they are worth three boys and eat nothing. The boys disagree.
200. A mind for the school, on a tray, for numbers. The children still call it by the name from the bad lesson, though the tutor is long gone. Nell does not tell.
201. A big mind came to the relay tower above the harbor. Not in the house. In the tower foot, in a crystal the size of a loaf, on a stand, ringed by quickeners kept cool with water from the harbor. Nell went up to see it put in. It was very quiet. The keeper said that was normal. Nell asked it a question. The keeper said minds do not talk. Nell said "then it is a very quiet neighbor," and went home.
203. Nell wrote this down: "The boy from 176, the one who sneezed, is a man now and works the nets. His mother brought me a jar of honey for his naming, and still brings me one every autumn. I have more honey than a midwife needs. I give it to the school."
%%
Register, Hollin, the summer count
Kept by Cade, at the kiln, in the back of the book where the names are written in pencil, so they can be changed. The summer count is taken at the mill on the last day of Longday, and every house brings its number. Here is the hamlet, as it stands.

Houses: nine. People: thirty-eight. Children: twelve, and two that the Tilly house is still arguing about.

Dogs: four. Cats: seven, not counting the mill cat, which is not counted, because it counts us.

Sheep: twenty-two, on the hill and in the yard. Cows: three. Pigs: five, two of them from Ambrook and very pleased with themselves. Hens: thirty-one, though the Tilly house says thirty-two, and has been counting the same hen twice.

Hives: six, on the far bank, by the flowers. The honey count is forty jars. Honey came from the far farm and the mill pond. The bees are not counted, because nobody has ever counted a bee and lived.

Apprentices: four, in the hamlet's book. Two at the mill, one at the kiln, one carrying honey. Two more are due in the winter cart.

Towers: the hill above Ambrook, one lamp, one keeper, one broken pane, now clear glass. Wire on the cloth, cloth on the crack. The relay line is kept.

Kiln: lit at dawn, cooled at dusk, cracked once in Swarm and mended by Cade, who says the crack was the kiln's fault and not his. Nobody believes him, and he does not mind.

The spiders in the barn: many, all named by the children. Nobody will say how many. Please go and count them yourself, and then tell me the number, and I will write it down, and then I will be quiet about it.
%%
Tested and given out, Vell, winter 191
A page copied from the tutors' book at Vell, kept here because my sister's boy is an apprentice now and I like to know the rules.
Nessa, tutor at Vell, writes the tests. A mind is tested on what it was never drilled on. Never send an untested mind to the fields.
This winter three minds were tested in the drill room. Each stood in its row and was given the same unseen drills.
First mind, a small one, for carrying. It was shown a full store and an empty one and a road between. It carried the sacks and stacked them straight. It dropped one. It picked it up. It passed.
Second mind, for the fields. It was shown a field with a ditch and told to farm. It hoed the rows and left the ditch alone. It passed.
Third mind, for sorting. It was shown apples and pears mixed. It sorted them into two bins. Then it put a stone in with the pears. It was wrong. The tutor drilled it again on stones and pears and apples. The second time it was right. It passed.
Each mind went out with its keeper and a card. The card says what it can do: Farm. Build. Store. A mind answers one of the eight meanings and no more. It cannot say it does not know.
Two went to Kettle Ridge. One went to Ambrook, to the mill, to carry. The miller paid in flour and honey and a promise of apples in Apple month.
%%
Register of the house at the edge
Kept by Jory, who has been told she is too old to keep a register and has kept it anyway.

This was the longest winter I remember. The snow came on the first of Leaffall, and it did not go until the tenth of Sowing. We burned all the wood in the shed, and then the shed.

Born, in the cold: a girl to the tutor's niece, the ninth of Frost. Named Hope. She is small and loud and is doing well.
Born: a boy to the baker, the nineteenth of Longnight. Named Wheat.
Born: a girl to the miller at Kettle Ridge, the second of Deepsnow. A cart was sent for the midwife, and it came in the end.
Died: old Sel's brother, the first of Deepsnow. He was ninety. He kept bees.

Apprentices given out this winter: none. The tutors say they cannot test a mind in the snow. I say a mind does not mind.

The new tower on the hill road kept its lamp lit through the whole storm. Two keepers, Brin and Tam, worked in turns. They did not lose a night. It was the first time the town saw how a lamp on a hill can bring a sled home.

The archive has a new room. They dug it in autumn, and it was ready for the first snow. Forty boxes went in. The clerks say it is the driest room in the hill.

It is hard, but we are well. The roads will open. The children are being taught to read. This is a good year to be small.
%%
Register: keepers of something
The house at the edge of Saltreach keeps more than babies. In the 180th year, Nell wrote this page at the back of her book.
The school at Saltreach had no school before this. A tutor came down from Vell to teach the children numbers, and she brought a small mind on a tray, in a crystal, each on its card.
The lesson went badly.
The tutor set the crystal on the table and asked it to sort pebbles, smooth ones into one bowl, rough into another. She said this was the first lesson in the books.
The crystal put every pebble in the left bowl.
The tutor moved a weight. The crystal put every pebble in the left bowl.
The children began to laugh. The tutor moved another weight. The crystal put every pebble in the left bowl and then, when nobody asked, the little dish of buttons too.
The tutor said, "We will try again tomorrow."
Tomorrow, the crystal put every pebble in the left bowl, and the left bowl was the right bowl now, because the tutor had turned the table around.
The children cheered. The tutor did not.
By the third day the crystal could sort a pebble from a button. The tutor said that was the whole lesson and more than the book promised. She was very pleased. She was pleased quietly, but Nell saw her face.
The children gave the crystal a name. The tutor took the name out of the crystal and put it back on the card. "It does not have a name," she said. "It has a card."
The children used the name anyway, when the tutor was not in the room.
%%
Road news from the Halfway Inn
At the back of the register, Pell writes what the carts say. Late winter.

Prices at the inn this week: a bowl of soup, one emerald. A bed in the back room, two. A bed by the hearth, three, and you must stay until morning. A bale of hay, one. A cart wheel mended, four. A bucket of milk from the Brown Hen's cow, two. A loaf from the Brown Hen oven, one, or two if it is still warm.

The harvest. Kettle Ridge had a poor year. The top field gave thin wheat. The beetroot rotted in the wet, and the bottom field gave potatoes no bigger than plums. Tam sent word with the cart, and he made a joke of it, which is like him. The carts that came over the ridge went back half full.

Ambrook had a good year. The apple trees gave more than the barrels would hold. Jory's mill took the rest, and the wheel turned from dawn to dusk for a month. The oldest tree, the one with the grey branch, gave the most of all. Honey was good too. Pell bought two jars for the hearth and one for his mother in Ambrook.

The road itself is quiet. The carts still go up and down, and the inns still have beds. The waymarks are still counted, one to nine, and every cart still stops at the Brown Hen.

The waymark outside the inn has a new stone on top. A girl from Three Wells walked the whole road alone to put it there, and she signed her name in the register as proof. Pell says he has never seen a child so pleased with a stone.

Three Wells has its bell mended. Dace, the mayor, had it rung for an hour to test it. The whole square came out to complain, and then stood still to listen.

Lowmarsh. The grey cough is in the reeds. The carts that pass the marsh boundary no longer stop there. Boatmen say the frogs have gone quiet, and the reeds are going yellow at the tips. Wren sent a note to the inn: the healing house is open day and night, and it needs clean cloth and honey. Some say the water is to blame. Some say the ships from Saltreach. Some say the mines. Wren says she does not know, and she is tired of being asked.

Copperhold. The carts from the Deep Works are late again. The miners say the stone is warm below the sixth level. Hesk says the count board is right, as it always is, and that he does not care to argue with it.

Mail. A letter for Ambrook came in on the Long Road. Pell has it in his coat. He will carry it himself, all the way, and not give it to a cart. He says some letters are too important for carts.

Pell's rule for the road: if you are not sure of the way, ask at the hearth. Nobody lies at the hearth. The riddle is still not answered.
%%
Apprentices tested and given out
Minds tested at the tutor houses this spring, and given out. A mind goes out only after it has passed the unseen box. That is Nessa's rule, painted on the door of the drill hall at Vell. I copied it in, because I liked it.

Ember. Tested at the Three Wells tutor house. Sorting: 46 of 50. Box: 9 of 10. Given out to the stores at the Brown Hen, to haul and to fetch. It answers stay and come without fuss.

Gull. Tested at Vell. Sorting the fish crates: 40 of 40. Box: 10 of 10. Given out to the quay at Saltreach. It fetched a coil of rope for the mender, then the mender's dinner, then the mender. A boy asked it to say hello. It did not. The boy was not hurt, only surprised.

Ash. Tested at Vell. Farming the rows: wheat, beetroot, potatoes. Box: 8 of 10, which is enough for a top field and not for the house plots. Given out to Tam at Kettle Ridge. Tam says it is the best farmer on the ridge, and the only one who does not argue with the hens.

Reed. Tested at Ambrook, by the mill pond. Given out to the orchard. Reed picks from the low branches only, and it is very clear about the high ones. Ama signed for it, and asked it to stay by the hives. It stayed.

Tuck. Tested at Copperhold. Sorting at the shed: copper, iron, coal and deep stone. Box: 7 of 10. Not given out. Returned to the tutor house for a second drill, and so it is in this book twice.

Moth. Tested at the Three Wells tutor house. Sorting: 38 of 40. Box: 10 of 10. Given out to the school, to carry slates and ink, and to wait by the east well at the end of the day, where the children run to it. It does not run back. Dace says that is the one thing about it she likes.

Given out this spring: five. Returned for drill: one. Given out last spring: nine. Willa counts for a living, and she has counted twice.
%%
Keepers of the towers, the Ambrook line
Kept by Cade, copied from the relay house book at the foot of the Ambrook tower. The tower stands on the hill above the mill pond, and its door is made from the old oak that came down in the big wind. Its keepers are named here in order, as the book has them.

Tower on the hill above Ambrook: keeper Lorna, from the year 186 to the year 197. She kept the lamp well and wrote a neat hand. Her last note is about the door, which she says has a draft that comes from the north even in Longday.

Keeper Brann, from the year 197 to the year 203. He came over from Vell with a letter and a box of spare lamp glass. He climbed the stair every day. The book says he counted the steps every time, and found there were a hundred and forty, and then found there were a hundred and forty-one, and then gave up.

Keeper Ulf, from the year 203 to Blossom of this year. He is a practical man. His notes are all about the stove and the oil, and nothing about the sky. He retired to the mill pond to fish, and he says the tower is the best place in the world to see fish from, because you can see every one of them.

Keeper Sefa, from Blossom of this year. She is the mill's daughter, and she runs the lamp with the same care she gives the sacks. She has written one note already: the oak door still has a draft, and she has stuffed it with straw, and the straw has been eaten by mice, and the mice have been given to the cats.

The tower has one lamp, one stair, one desk and one keeper. The line from Ambrook to Vell is short, but it is never silent. Keepers are asked to write down every day, even the quiet ones, because the tutors say a quiet day is also a message.
%%
The Halfway Inn register, spring
Willa keeps this book while Obed's hand mends. I am a net mender from Saltreach. Please sign your own name. I cannot read Ferris's hand, and he thinks his is clear.

Born: a girl, at the inn, in the night of the second of Thaw. Her mother is Ruth, who cooks. Her father is Aldo, who drives the carts. She is small and loud, and she has Aldo's chin.

Named: Clover, at the supper table, after the stew. The name was argued for an hour. Clover won, because she had opinions too, and made them known by kicking.
Given: a bed by the hearth, for the travelers who come in cold. The hearth has not gone out in twenty years. Ask Ruth why. She says it is the bread.
%%
Register: apprentices given out, spring
Kept at Copperhold, at the foot of the stair, by Hesk, with the copy sent to the tutors' house at Vell. Spring of the 207th year. The tests were made before the spring cart left, so that nothing went out untested.

Given out to Sallow Farm: 1 apprentice, named Dib. Tested on the sorting and on the field drill. Passed the sorting with ease. Passed the field drill on the second try, after a long talk about the word stop.
Given out to the Copperhold foundry: 2 apprentices, named Rivet and Pell. Both tested on the carrying of iron. Both passed. The foundry named him Pell, since it had no other name for him.
Given out to Kettle Ridge: 1 apprentice, named Fence. Tested on the posts and rails. Passed. It is a good fence-mender, and an apprentice of few words, and Brin, who came to see it, said that was all he had ever wanted.
Given out to the Deep Works: 1 apprentice, named Clank's cousin, which is what the miners call it, since it looks just the same. Its real name is Tally. Tested on the carts, the rails and the lift. Passed all three. The lift test was done with the foreman inside, who was not consulted and who has forgiven nobody.
Kept at Copperhold: none. The Deep Works has its full crew.

Tested and not given out: 1 apprentice, named Wick. It failed the field drill, twice. It was sent back to the tutors' house for a month of drills on new fields. It may come out in the summer.

Note. Every apprentice given out is written here, with the place and the date. Every apprentice tested and kept back is written here too, with the reason. The tutors say the kept-back ones are as important as the others, since they show what the tests are for.
%%
Keepers of the Kettle Ridge tower
The keepers of the relay tower on Kettle Ridge, from the ridge book. Copied by Ivo the baker, who likes lists.

The tower was built in the 164th year of the archive, on the high ground above the mill. Its lamp can be seen from Three Wells on a clear night.

Orrin, from 164 to 181. The first keeper. Kept the lamp for the first winter on a pole, before the tower had a roof. Wrote in the log: Cold. Later he wrote: Colder. Later still: I have a roof.
Dag and Ula, from 181 to 190. A married pair. They took the night and day in turns, and they shared one quill. The log is in two hands that grow more alike every year. Dag wrote: Wind from the north. Wind from the north. Wind from the west, to be fair. Ula added a poem. It was a good poem.
Wynn, from 191 to now. Keeps the lamp and the log. Has a ladder with thirty-one rungs and counts them every night. The ridge house has a cat called Spark.
In the tower now: one tested mind, which does the lamp round with Wynn. It cleans the glass and carries the oil. The ridge calls it Lamp.

The relay board at Vell pays the keepers by the season. The ridge pays them in bread.
%%
The ridge book, spring page by page
The book kept by Ivo the baker for Kettle Ridge. These are the pages for spring. Everything on the ridge goes in, and nothing goes out.

Thaw 2. Frost on the barn roofs. The mill squeaks again. Sefa oiled it. It squeaks.
Thaw 4. Born: a girl to the east farm. Named Poppy.
Thaw 9. Arrived by cart from Vell: one apprentice, tested, for the bakery. Named Peel, by me, because it holds the bread paddle better than I do.
Thaw 11. The paddle is in two pieces. Peel did it. I did not ask why. I think it was the oven door.
Thaw 18. A fox took two hens from Tam's yard in the night. Pip stood by the hen house the whole time. It had been shown hens. It had never been shown a fox. It did what it does when it sees a hen: it left it alone, and it did the same for the fox. Tam has asked the tutors for a fox drill. Nessa wrote back: a fox is not a plot. Tam wrote back: it is to the hens.
Thaw 20. Tam has made a fox out of a sack, to teach Pip. Pip stood beside the sack all day. The hens were very nervous.
Sowing 3. Brin's Biscuit got into the bakery and ate a naming loaf. It was for Dell and Dara. I baked another.
Sowing 8. Born: twin girls, north farm. Named Dell and Dara. Fence carried the cradle up the hill.
Sowing 21. Wedding of Tuck's aunt to the ferry keeper from the river. Bread for sixty. Peel carried the loaves. Not one fell.
Blossom 4. Born: a boy, to the miller's sister. Named Sail.
Blossom 12. The apple blossom has not come to the ridge. It never does. We hear about Ambrook's by relay.
Blossom 20. Old Brin turned seventy. A loaf for him, shaped like a sheep. Biscuit ate the ears.
Blossom 28. End of spring. Bread baked: 2210 loaves. Bread eaten: all of them. Hens lost to the fox: two. Hens bought from the east farm: two. The fox has not been seen since. Tam says it is afraid of the sack.
%%
Naming: Hazel, at the hearth
Written by Odo, who held the lamp. Checked by Pell.

On the eleventh of Frost the whole inn came to the hearth. There were nine carters, two cooks, a sheep dealer who meant to leave and did not, and a tutor from Vell who stayed for the soup.

Each guest put a log on the fire first. Then Ferris read the riddle from the board. It goes: I have a heart, but I am not alive. I am made of wood, and I sing in the cold. The answer is the hearth. The children always guess the kettle, and they are always wrong.

Noll, Hazel's father, said her name three times. The first time he said it wrong. The second time the cook said it wrong. The third time the baby said it, and that is how we knew.

The tutor wrote the name in his little book. Then he asked how the mother was feeling, then the baby, then whether Odo needed a drink. I think he was nervous. He said he had never been to a naming before.

Pell says the name goes in the register. Nobody argued. The soup was good, and the hearth was warm. Ferris says the riddle will be answered by the first child who sits by the fire long enough. Nobody has managed it in twenty years.
%%
Note: the bet on the pond road
Hollis the carter and Jory of the mill have a bet, made in the 191st year and renewed every summer since.
The bet: which of them can carry a full barrel from the mill to the bridge without stopping. The looser buys the honey cakes at the fair.
Jory says the wheel does half his carrying for him, so it does not count. Hollis says a barrel is a barrel.
This summer Hollis won. He did not stop. He did not put the barrel down, not even to open the gate, and he went over the loose plank at a run.
Jory paid for the cakes. The bees got the crumbs.
The cat from the Hollow farm was there. It will not stay out of the mill. It sleeps on the warm sacks and Jory has given up. He says the cat has decided, and a cat that has decided is not a thing to argue with.
Next summer, Jory says, he will win. Hollis says he says that every summer.
%%
Winter at the Brown Hen
I keep the book and I keep the fires, and in winter the fires are the whole of the work.
The Brown Hen has twelve tables and four rooms and a hearth that has not gone out in twenty years. Travelers say that about the Halfway Inn, but our hearth is older and warmer and I will argue it with anyone who is not too cold to argue.
This winter the road brought us a stuck cart, a wedding, a christening, and a man who played the fiddle for his supper and was worth every bite.
The christening was Sedge's girl, come up from Copperhold to be named where her mother was born. They named her Ember, for the fire. She slept through it. The fiddle played. We ate beetroot soup and bread and a pie of apples from Ambrook.
Apprentices are common on the road now. Two came through with a crew, hauling timber for a new relay house down the valley. They stood by the fire and did not warm themselves, having no need of it, and the children fed them bread to see what they would do. One said, store bread. It put the bread in its box. The children thought this was very funny. It was, a little.
The road is froze at the bend again. Renn has learned to go slow there. The stream bridge holds. The lamp over the door burns steady and has not blinked since that one strange night, and I have stopped wondering about it.
Keep your lamps lit, and come in out of the wind. There is soup.
%%
Register of births and namings
Kept by Cade, glassblower, in the book by the kiln. Hollin is nine houses and a mill pond, a long walk from Ambrook and a short walk from the best sand on the river bank. Entries are in the order they were brought to the kiln, which is the order people think of them.

Born in Sowing, to the Tilly house: a girl, long and cross. Named Ivy. Her grandmother says she has her grandmother's chin. Her grandmother does not have a chin, according to the rest of the hamlet, so the matter is still open.

Born in Blossom, to Lenna and Tobin, who are not speaking this month: a boy. Named Rook, after the bird that sits on the kiln chimney. The bird was consulted and did not object.

Born in Swarm, to the miller's wife: twins. A boy and a girl. Named Pell and Dell, for the miller's two aunts, who were both very pleased and both wanted to be asked first. They were asked, and then they argued about the spelling.

Born in Longday, to Brann's cousin at the far farm: a girl, small, quiet, very fond of the hives. Named Honey. Nobody argued about that one. The bees have been very polite about it.

Naming day for Ivy, in Longday, at the mill pond. Forty people came. The mill was stopped for an hour, and the mill wheel turned slowly to show the baby the water. She did not notice. Her grandmother did.

Naming day for Rook, in Swarm, on the kiln bank. Cade made the cup for the water, a green glass one with a small bubble in the base. The bubble was an accident. Rook has been very careful with it since.
%%
Register of the house at the edge
Kept by Jory, who is very old now, with the help of her granddaughter Lark, who writes a better hand.

This register is the last that I will keep. Lark will keep the next.

I write what I have seen. In the winter of 14 there were four apprentices and a handful of towers. This winter there are eleven apprentices, and twelve towers on the lines, from the north cape to the south shore. Lamps on the hills, a thousand letters a year, and an inn a day apart on the Long Road. I did not think I would live to see it.

Born: nine children in the house's lane. The names are in the front.
Naming: a boat at Saltreach, the Gull. The shipwright said she was white, and loud.
Naming: a school at Three Wells. They named the door blue.
New keepers: seven. Among them is a young woman called Hale, from Kettle Ridge, going to the tower at the north. She is practical and says very little.
Apprentices tested: six, in the cold. One misunderstood the board and stood in the road all day. The tutor said it was her mistake, not the apprentice's. She changed the board. It worked after that.
Roads: all the towns are joined. A cart can leave Vell and reach Saltreach in six days. In my youth it took a month.
Weather: the snow came early, and it stayed. The children made a snowman as tall as the gate. It was still there on the fifth of Thaw.

I have been writing in this book since I was a young grandmother. Now I am an old one. Lark says I must stop. I say I will stop when the book is full.

It is almost full. It has been a good book.
%%
Broken lamp, the hill tower
Kept by Cade, in the hamlet's book, copied from the note the keeper sent down with the boy from the mill. Written in Sowing, before the hail.

The big pane on the south side of the lamp room cracked in the hail this morning. It did not fall out, which is luck. But there is a line across it from one corner to the other, and the lamp light is going out through the crack. The message is weak. The next tower will not see it past the second hill.

I have covered the crack with a cloth and tied it on with wire. It is not a fix. It is a stop-gap, the kind my father used on the mill sluice, and the mill sluice held for twelve years, so I have hope.

Please send glass. Not the old green kind. The clear panes from the glass house at Ambrook, because the lamp wants clear. Two panes, cut to the frame. I will pay in honey. I have a jar of the good heather honey that I was saving, and I am not going to eat it while the lamp is dark.

Also the spiders have been in the lamp room again. They are big, and they have made a web across the copper ring. I have not disturbed it, because the ring is the thing that holds the glass and the web is light. I will take it down when the glass is in.

The lamp is lit tonight, with the cloth over the crack. It will be dim for a few days. The line to Vell is slow, but it is kept.
%%
Keepers of the towers
Travelers tell me who keeps the lamps, and I write it down, because a keeper who moves on is worth knowing about before you walk half a day to find an empty tower.
Northpoint: Mira, these many years. Her apprentice is Lantern. They keep ninety rungs and a cold roof. In winter the lamp is lit early.
Vell: Brann. He writes everything in short lines. He trims the lamps and says so.
Three Wells: the tower by the east well, kept by Dace's cousin, a quiet man named Orrin, who also rings the bell on market day.
Kettle Ridge: no tower of its own. The mills squeak and that is signal enough, Tam says.
Copperhold: the tower above the mine, kept by a woman called Sedge, who was born at this inn in the cold and cried loud. She climbed the rungs at nine years old and never came down in her heart.
Saltreach: the tower above the harbor, kept by Corin's brother, who smells of tar and says the fog eats the light.
Ambrook: the tower on the hill above the mill pond, its door made from the old oak. Kept by Ama's grandson.
Lowmarsh: the tower on the boardwalk. Kept by Wren's neighbor, who keeps frogs out of the lamp room with a broom.
The little tower between Vell and Three Wells has one lamp and one keeper, an old woman named Tull. She is the smallest tower and the proudest. She says one lamp is enough if you keep it clean.
%%
Letter: Hollis to his sister in Three
Dear Sanna,
The apples are in early this year and the bees are busy and the pond is low but the wheel still turns.
I have a new helper on the cart road. Not an apprentice, just a boy from the Hollow farm called Tobin who wants to learn the roads. He is quick and he remembers the waymarks and he does not lose his hat, which is more than I can say for some.
The cat has had kittens again. We kept two and gave two to the mill. Jory says the mill is now a cat house with a wheel on it. The kittens will not stay out of the barrels and one of them has learned to ride on the cart and will not get off.
Tell mother the honey is dark this year and very good. I will bring a jar at the fair.
Your brother,
Hollis
P.S. The waymark at the third turn is lit. I checked it myself.
%%
Register: a cave under the beet field
Autumn of 191. Written by Nell, at the request of the farmer, who cannot write and does not trust the mayor to write it right.
The farmer at the edge of Saltreach plows a small field of beetroot behind the house, between the house and the sea cliff. Good soil. Sandy at the bottom. The sea gets into it.
In Apple of this year the plow went down and did not come up. The horse stopped. The ground had opened into a hole the width of a cart.
The farmer thought it was a badger. It was not a badger. It was a cave.
Nell went to look, because the farmer's wife was carrying, and the farmer wanted her to look at the hole and swear it was safe. Nell is a midwife. Nell is not a stone reader. Nell looked anyway.
The cave is small. It is dry. The walls are dark, not deep stone, just dark rock with a seam of copper in it, thin as a finger. There is a pool at the back, brown at the edges. No fish. No frogs. It smells of old air.
The farmer wanted to fill it in. The farmer's wife wanted a cellar. They argued for a week. The wife won, because the wife always wins, and also because the cave is cool and good for apples.
The farmer walled the copper seam up so the children would not pick at it. Nell thinks the children will pick at it.
Nothing lives down there. Nell went down twice with a lamp and saw nothing but drip marks and one beetle.
The beetroot field now has a hole in it, and a small door, and a set of steps, and it is the best cellar at this edge of Saltreach. The farmer keeps turnips in it. The turnips keep well. Nell has eaten some. She can say that.
%%
Register: the visiting tutor, summer
Kept at Copperhold, at the tutors' desk by the foot of the stair, by Hesk, who was asked to keep the register while the tutor was in the town. Spring of the 206th year. The tutor was Oda, from the north hall at Northpoint, a short quick woman with a box of cards and a very good cup.

Oda came to Copperhold on the first day of Sowing, by the spring cart. She brought four cards for each apprentice in the town, sealed by the clerks at Vell, and a notice from the tutors that said the tests would be given in the open, at the shaft head, with the miners as witnesses.

Hesk asked why the open. Oda said the miners would not believe a test that was done in a locked room. She said a mine is the most honest place a mind can be tested, since the mine does not care what the mind thinks, only what it does.

The first test was given to Clank, on the third day. Four cards. On the first card, Clank was asked to haul a cart of ore up the rail. It did. On the second, it was asked to sort the copper from the iron. It did. On the third, it was asked where the lift was, and it pointed. On the fourth, it was asked what to do if the lift was not there. It said, in plain letters on the card, "Ask the foreman." Oda said that was right. Hesk said the foreman would be pleased.

The second test was given to Rivet, which was new. Rivet got three of its four cards right. The fourth card asked it to cross a rail with a broken tie, which is the one thing every miner knows and the card did not. Rivet stopped at the broken tie, and waited. Oda wrote on the card: "Stopped, and waited. Good." She said it was the first time she had seen an apprentice wait without being told.

The third test was given to Tally, which was from the Vell house and not from Copperhold at all. It passed three of four, and failed the card about the lift. Oda said the card was hard, and that she had given it on purpose to see what the mind would do with a hard card. It had made a guess. The guess was wrong. Oda said it would be drilled on the lift again, and tested again, and that the guess was the most useful thing she had learned all week.

Oda left on the fourth day. Before she went, she asked Hesk what the miners thought of the tests. Hesk said he thought they were all right. He said that most of the miners did not trust a mind until it had been down a shaft, and that the tests had only told him what the shaft would tell him in the end. Oda laughed, and said that was what the tests were for, to save the shaft some trouble.
%%
Keepers of the towers, winter
The towers as the keepers and the carts report them. Pell copied it out for the register, every name spelled as it was given.

Little relay, on the hill between Vell and Three Wells: one lamp, one keeper, Dell. The lamp is lit every dusk and put out every dawn. Dell says the wind has got into the copper ring, and the ring sings when the gusts come. He has asked for rags to stuff the gaps. He has not been sent any.

Vell: two keepers, Ivo and Ansel. Every stair lamp in the hill tower is lit. The glass on the top lamp has had a crack since Blossom. Ivo says it has not got worse. Ansel says that is not the same thing.

Three Wells: keeper Dorrit. Eighteen steps to the lamp room, and she counts them every dusk. The square is quiet this winter. The bakery keeps the stones warm, and the lamps are fed with coal from the Deep Works carts, when the carts come.

Kettle Ridge: keeper Lenn, who is also the miller at the windmill. The lamp at the top is lit. The stair lamps are out for the frost. Lenn says he will light them when the wind stops, which may be Sowing.

Ambrook: keeper Ned, brother of Jory the miller. The lamp is clean and the glass is whole. Ned says the mill pond froze for the first time in his life, and he did not like it at all.

Saltreach: a crew of four under Corin. The lamp is lit for the fishing boats coming in. Corin says the quay is busy this winter. Corin says nothing else, and when asked twice, he went to the boats.

Copperhold: keeper Bett, cousin of Hesk. She says the tower hums at night, low, like the mine. Some say it is only the wind in the rungs. Bett says the wind has not blown for three days. Nobody has asked the mine about it.

Northpoint: keeper Mira, and Lantern on the lamps. No word since Frost. The last message came in on the fourth of Frost, and it was cut off in the middle. It said the lamp is, and then nothing. Every tower on the north line has sent every hour since. Nothing comes back.

A carter came down the north road in Frost. He says the lamp room was dark from the foot of the tower. The door of the relay house stood open. The foxes were sitting by it, he says, as if they were waiting for someone to come out. He did not go in.

The keepers want their names kept in this register, so they are kept here.
%%
Register: births and namings
Autumn of 176. A heavy season. Four births in one month, which has not happened since the year of the long fog.
The baker's wife had a boy on the seventh of Apple. The baker brought bread. The whole street came for the bread.
A girl was born on the slip to a family that builds boats. Corin's cousin. Corin was fifteen and ran for the healer and fell in the harbor and arrived wet. The baby was already born. Corin was still wet.
A quiet birth at the house on the hill. The parents asked Nell to write nothing. Nell wrote: "A child. They will tell you." That is a promise and a page.
A naming on the ninth of Leaffall. The grandfather held the baby up to the window and said the name twice, once for the sea and once for the land. The baby sneezed. Everyone took that as a yes.
Nell notes: the word "apprentice" is being used for a new thing now. The shipwrights at the slip have a copper one that carries planks. It walks behind them like a dog with work to do. Nobody knows where it sleeps. It does not sleep.
Nell notes again: I am told they are few, and the towns that have one do not share.
A note from the mother of the fourth: "Nell, it is a girl, and she has your nose, which is a good nose." Nell does not have a nose that shows up on babies. Nell is being teased. Nell likes it.
%%
Register: the house at Saltreach edge
Nell's book, begun in the 150th year of the archive. Births, namings, and the small things people bring to a door at the edge of Saltreach.
The house has one room, one bed, one chair and a bench that is too long for the room. Nell did not measure the bench. Nell was given the bench.
First entry: a girl born to the net mender's family, third of Sowing, 150. The mother asked for the window open. The wind came in. The baby did not mind.
Second entry: a boy, no name for three days. Then the grandmother said "Call him after the tide" and everyone laughed. They called him after the tide.
Nell writes in this book because the mayor asked for a list of the living. Nell says: the living come and go. The book stays.
Not every entry is a birth. One is a cat. One is a boat. One is a bad turn with a leg that got better.
Nell does not write the sad ones in this book. Nell keeps those in her head, which is a worse place, but Nell is the one who has to carry them.
%%
Births at Kettle Ridge, spring of 206
Births and namings on the ridge, from the book kept by Ivo the baker, who has the best hand and the warmest kitchen.
Thaw: a girl to Hanna and Rolf at the east farm. Named Poppy, because she came on the morning the first poppy opened by the gate. Her brother says he opened it.
Thaw: a boy to the low farm. Named Tuck. He was born in the middle of a snow shower and has been loud ever since.
Sowing: twin girls to the north farm. Named Dell and Dara. Their mother says she knew it from the way her feet hurt.
Blossom: a boy to Sefa the miller's sister. Named Sail. The mill squeaked when the news came. Sefa says it was a cheer.
Also born: lambs 61, calves 7, chicks 31, and five kittens in the cellar of the Kettle Inn.
Ivo
%%
Register of the house at the edge
Kept by Jory the grandmother. This is the sixth register since the first. The old ones are in the Archive, in a box with my name.

Born: sixteen children in the town this winter. Names in the book at the front. The best name was given to a girl at the inn: Maple.
Naming: a road. The new one from Vell to Lowmarsh, which crosses the marsh on a long bridge of oak. The workers named it the Reed Way.
Naming: the tower at the end of it. Wick Tower. Wick is the keeper's cat.
Keepers of the towers, so far: nine towers on the lines, each with a lamp and a keeper. Two have two keepers. The north line has two.
Apprentices given out this winter: five. A baker's apprentice at Three Wells. Two for the hay at Kettle Ridge. One for the new mill at Ambrook. One, called Rake, for a farm outside Vell, which misunderstood a mark on the drill board and cut the hedge in half. The farmer was kind. He said the hedge had been too long.
Apprentices tested: all five, before they went. The tutors say it is the rule, and the rule has never changed: do not send an untested one out. I think that is a fine rule.
The winter was long, but not as long as the one of 22. We were ready for it. We had wood, and a good road, and a sense that people were coming.
%%
Test record: apprentices given out
Kept at the tutor house, the 196th year. Nessa, tutor.
The test box is the pages no mind was ever drilled on. Every mind is tested on those pages before it leaves. Never send an untested mind to the fields.
We tested four this summer.
The first, a sorting mind, went to the mill at Ambrook to carry and sort sacks. It sorted the sacks by weight and put the light ones by the door. It was wrong twice and right forty times. Good enough for sacks.
The second, a farming mind, went to Kettle Ridge to Tam, who has an apprentice called Pip already and wanted a second for the top field. It ploughed a straight line on the test board. Tam will be pleased.
The third was not given out. It answered the same order two ways and could not say which. We will drill it more. A mind that cannot say it does not know is no use in a field.
The fourth, a hauling mind, went to Hollis the carter, who asked for one that would not stop on the road and would count the waymarks home. It counted them all and came back. Hollis gave it a name, Cobb, and says it is slow but sure.
Hollis also asked whether an apprentice could be taught to catch a cat. I said no.
Nessa, tutor at Vell
%%
Apprentices given out, Hollin, year 201
Kept by Cade, from the hamlet's book, where the tutors' letters are pasted in. Each mind was tested at Vell on an unseen drill before it came out to Hollin. The test is the only thing the hamlet trusts, and Cade has read every letter twice.

The mill had the first one. A small field mind, sent up in the spring cart, to work the mill sacks and the stone yard. The tutors' paper says it passed eighteen out of twenty. The miller says it passed twenty out of twenty on the sacks, which are heavier than anything the tutors drill. He is not a clerk, and he has never been asked to be one.

The kiln had the second, a store mind, to sort the sand and the soda by the barrels. It is a quiet one, with copper hands that never tire. It counted every bag of sand in the first week and told Cade the true number, which was four fewer than the bill said. The sand merchant has been asked about this and has said nothing, very loudly.

The far farm had the third, a mind for carrying. It carries the honey from the hives to the cart and the cart to the hamlet. It has never dropped a pot in its life, and I would not say that to the hives, who are very touchy about it.

The mill pond boat had none, because the boatwright at Ambrook says a boat does not need a mind, only a rope and a sensible person. He has a point, but he has not been asked about the mill.

Four new minds are on their way this winter, to the hamlet's ditches and the stone walls. The tutors' letter says they are tested on the wall pattern, and then tested again on the ditch, which is a harder test, because the ditch does not stay where it is put.

Cade adds this: the hamlet is glad. Nobody has said so out loud, but the kiln bank has been quiet for a month, and the carts come up the road on time.
%%
Namings, and a melon too big
Namings this spring, in the order they came to the book.

Pim, son of the miller at Three Wells. Named on the bridge over the ditch, the only place quiet enough in market week. Pim cried through it, and so did his father, who says it was the dust.

Dell, daughter of a shepherd from Kettle Ridge. The name was her grandmother's, and her grandmother would have bitten anyone who said otherwise.

Oss, a foal from the Brown Hen stable. Named by the stable boy, who has three names for every horse and none for himself.

A melon came up the road on the Ambrook cart, in a sack, and was too big to go through the kitchen door. It is as heavy as a sheep. Ama says it is the best melon she has grown, and she would like it back when it is cut. The cook says it cannot be cut, only lifted by three men and set down again. It has been on the table since the feast. Nobody has been brave enough.
%%
Register of the Hollow farm, Ambrook
Kept by Hollis, carter, at the mill on the pond road. Begun in the 184th year.
Births and namings: the twin lambs, named Fennel and Fig by the children. The grey cat had four kittens in the hay. We kept two. The other two went to the mill.
Trees planted: twelve apples on the east slope, four pears by the wall. One oak for shade, against the day.
Apprentices: none here. The farm is small and the work is ours. The mill has one, called Cobb, that carries sacks and is slow but sure.
Keepers: none. The nearest tower is on the hill above the pond, and the keeper there is old Ren, who keeps bees too.
Weather this summer: warm, dry, good for the apples. The pond is low. Jory says the wheel still turns.
Written by Hollis, who carts the apples and tells the bees the news.
%%
Register of the house at the edge
Kept by Jory, a grandmother. The house is the last one before the hill path, and everyone who comes to the archive passes it.

Born: a boy to Sel's daughter, the third of Deepsnow. Named Oak.
Born: twin girls to the ropemaker. Named Reed and Rush.
Apprentice given out: the second of the four, to the farm on the south slope. Tested. It plows a straight line.
Tower keeper: Ames, for the new tower on the ridge road. A lamp and a bed.
The winter is cold. The roads are open.
%%
The lamp that blinked a strange message
Written by Ilse, at the Brown Hen, the twentieth of Longnight.
A thing happened at the inn that I cannot explain, and I am a plain woman who burns wood and writes what she sees.
The lamp over the door blinked. It is a good lamp, trimmed every night. But this night it blinked and blinked, quick and slow, quick and slow, like a keeper at a tower sending a message down the road. We all went out to look. There was no keeper. There was no tower. Only the lamp and the snow.
Pell the merchant was here, with his ledgers, and he watched it a long while. He said it was the wind. The wind was not blowing. He said it was a moth. There are no moths in Deepsnow. He said then it was a sign, and would not say a sign of what, and went in to his soup.
Old Renn said it was the lamp remembering a message it carried once. Renn is a carter and says such things.
A boy at the fire, a traveler's son, said it was saying hello. I liked that best.
I went out with a cloth and cleaned the glass, and the blinking stopped. Perhaps it was the glass. Perhaps it was the wick. I wrote it here so that someone with a better head can say what it was. The lamp is trimmed now and burns steady. Good night from the Brown Hen.
%%
Register: births at Sallow Farm, spring
Kept in the back of the farm book at Sallow Farm, in the valley road outside Copperhold, by Rudd, for the Copperhold council. Spring of the 206th year. All births are written here, and the name is written when it is given. Some names took longer than others.

Spring, first week of Thaw: a foal to the grey mare, a colt, born in the straw at midnight. Named Biscuit by Ivy, who was not allowed to name him Biscuit, and did. Gwen says the name stays.

Spring, Blossom: a lamb to the ewe Hattie, a twin, one black and one white. Named Bran and Flour by the children, who fought about it for three days. The ewe settled it by eating the sign.

Spring, Blossom, later: a girl to Ellen, who keeps the store at the bridge. Named Hazel. Gwen came up the lane with the midwife's bag, crossed the bridge in her boots with the string round her neck, and was in time for the cry. Hazel's first word was "brook," which Gwen says is a sign she will be a bridge keeper.

Spring, Sowing: a boy to Anja, who keeps the lower farm. Named Alder, for the trees along the brook. Anja says he is the first thing the brook has ever given her without her having to dig for it.

Spring, Sowing, late: a boy to Mab and Corran, the carters. Named Tobin. He is very loud. Corran says he will be a carter. Mab says he will be a singer. The council has not been asked to decide.

Births of animals, spring: 2 foals, 9 lambs, 3 calves, 14 chicks in the hen house under the old clock, which was not expected and has been widely admired.

Notes. The register is complete. Each name has been checked against the spoons. Every child born on the farm will have a spoon from the valley, and a page here.
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Register: the last page Nell wrote this
Autumn of 208. Nell is old now. The book is nearly full. The bench is still too long for the room.
There are two apprentices at the house this autumn, sent up from the slip to help with the harvest at the edge of town. One is copper, one is iron. They carry the beetroot in. They do not speak. Nell talks to them anyway, because talking to a quiet thing is better than talking to no thing.
She asked the copper one to bring her a chair. It brought her a chair. She asked for a lamp. It brought a lamp. She asked for the sea. It stood still for a long moment and then it brought her a bucket of water from the harbor, which is not the sea, but is close, and Nell laughed until she had to sit down.
She wrote: "I asked them for the moon once, out of meanness. They did not move. I think that is the right answer."
The births this autumn: two. A boy on the third of Apple, a girl on the twentieth of Leaffall. Both fine. Both loud. The grandmothers came and took over the house, as grandmothers do.
The farmer's cellar is still full of turnips. The copper seam is still walled up. The children still pick at it. Nell has stopped telling them not to.
Nell writes at the bottom of the last page: "The house has one room, one bed, one chair, a bench too long for the room, and a book that is nearly full. The living come and go. The book stays. Nell stays too, for now."
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Register of the house at the edge
Kept by Jory, grandmother of nine, and keeper of this book since the winter of 14.

Born: a girl to Ames and his wife. Named Lark. She came in the night and the keeper at the tower on the hill road sent the news ahead by lamp. Three Wells knew before the cart left.
Born: a boy to the tutor's house, the fifth of Longnight. Named Kes.
Born: Oak's first child, a girl. Oak, who was born in the winter of 14, is now a father. I am old.
Naming: a tower, the new one at the cross of the Ambrook road. The keepers named it Apple.
Apprentices tested: three this winter. All passed the field drill. The tutors say they are the best yet. One of them, called Spade, misunderstood a mark on a drill board and planted the winter turnips in the snow. The farmer said it was a good mistake. The turnips did not agree.
Apprentices given out: Spade to the south farm, the other two to Ambrook and Kettle Ridge.
Roads: the road to Three Wells is cobbled, as far as the second bridge. The inn at the halfway point is half built, and already serving soup.
New keepers: two. Brin, the elder, will go to the Ambrook tower. Tam goes to the ridge.

It is a good winter. There is a sense, in the house at the edge of Vell, that things are growing. More roads, more towers, more children. I do not know where it will end. I would like to see.
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Keepers of the towers, Long Road
These are the keepers along the Long Road, as they stood this spring. A keeper signs on the day he climbs to the lamp room. A keeper who does not climb does not sign. Bram says this is the rule. Bram has not climbed since the winter.

Vell hill: the Archive's own signal lamp. The clerks keep it, and sweep it each morning. Nothing to report.

Ridge Hill: Bram, keeper. The lamp has a crack in one glass pane, from the frost. Bram says new glass comes with the spring carts. He said that last spring too. The lamp still blinks, a little to the left.

Three Wells: Ilse, keeper. The lamp is good. The bell is cracked, Ilse says, and the bell does not mind.

Ambrook: Linnet, keeper, in the tower on the hill above the mill pond. The door is made from the old oak. The bees have moved in under the stair, and Linnet says they are no trouble if you do not hum.

Northpoint: Mira, keeper. Her letters come down the road slower each season. Nobody on the road can say why, and the carters are not asked.

The Northpoint lamp has not answered the Ambrook lamp since the thaw. The Vell clerk says the line is cut, and the keeper has been told. Ridge Hill says it is the frost, because the northern glass freezes and then clears by itself. Three Wells says it is the carters, who talk. Nobody on the road can say which of them is right.
