The registration hall opened at first light.
Kai was there before the doors did.
He stood in the empty street and watched the building while the city woke up around him. It was a wide, two-storey structure made of the same pale stone as the outer wall, with the Guild seal carved large above the entrance and a row of flags along the roof line. Each flag was a different colour at the bottom and the same deep grey at the top. He did not know what the colours meant yet. He intended to know before he left.
At first light, a man in a grey coat unlocked the front doors from the inside and pushed them open without looking at who was waiting.
Kai walked in.
