Page 91 of Pocket Wife

Samuel does.

I open my slate and bring up the First Hall covenant imagery: water mark, harvest mark, burial mark, household registry loops. Three dots at the cistern handwheel. One cup. One seed. One grave.

“Not knocks,” I say. “Priority order.”

Lucy understands first. “Sick. Seed. Dead.”

“Clinic. Harvest. Burial.”

Celia’s eyes sharpen. “The three things Helix tried to rename.”

Kaun speaks through the feed. “Specialist Veyr, do not initiate opening without neutral authorization.”

“I am not initiating. I am interpreting.”

“That distinction is fragile.”

“So is the water.”

Salo’s voice cuts between us. “Tribunal authorizes non-invasive diagnostic procedure only. No cover removal. No insertion. No extraction. Resident witnesses and neutral record must remain active.”

Sen’s voice intrudes from another channel. “Helix objects to any resident interaction with a potential evidence vault.”

Lucy faces the slate. “Helix already interacted with it.”

“Without authorization,” Salo adds. “Objection denied.”

I face Lucy. “If the cistern recognizes communal priority, it may respond to the people named by those uses. Not ownership. Duty.”

Lucy nods once.

Then she turns to the field. “Nara.”

Nara’s face blanches. “Me?”

“Clinic water.”

Nara pulls her son closer and steps forward.

“Samuel. Seed.”

Samuel comes to Lucy’s left.

Celia lifts her chin before Lucy calls her. “Dead who dug the well.”

Lucy does not argue. Neither does Samuel.

I position them around the stone ring without letting anyone touch the cover. Jessa keeps the tribunal slate raised. Torren adjusts his scanner to passive mode after I correct him twice. The distant witness screens remain open, faces from other settlements watching with reverent alarm.

“Speak only what is true,” I say. “No performance. No oath you do not understand.”

Nara swallows. “First cup for the sick.”

Her son’s small hand curls in her sleeve.

The handwheel gives a soft click.

Samuel’s voice follows, rougher than usual. “Second for the seed.”