The residential district opened past the last warehouse row. Cook smoke had settled between the buildings, thick enough to taste. Three and four stories rose on either side, the spacing tighter than the original design had intended.
More people, less thought about where to put them.
The streets were dirty but functional. Commerce operated at a small scale. A woman sold bread from a board laid across two barrels. Beorn stepped around a stalled hand-cart, its owner negotiating with a buyer over secondhand tools.
Children moved through side passages with ease, their paths precise and unhesitating. Laundry hung between upper windows, forming lines across the narrow gaps.
The people registered Beorn in a consistent way. They looked briefly, judged him, and looked away. A man carrying Badlands travel marks and an unfamiliar companion.
Not relevant. No one moved out of his way. No one altered their path.
A woman leaned out from a third-floor window ahead and called down to her neighbor. She spoke about weather moving in from the eastern section, referencing the old break and whether it would bring rain. She mentioned the Scar as part of that pattern.
She didn't look at it while speaking. The neighbor who responded didn't look at it either.
Beorn caught the exchange, then dropped his eyes to the dirty ground and kept walking.
The slums ran along the south side, positioned in the shadow it cast for most of the day. The buildings had originally been storage structures. That was still visible in the height of the ceilings and the lack of interior divisions.
They had been converted into housing without being redesigned for that purpose.
The first constraint was density. More people occupied each building and each stretch of ground than in the residential district, despite having less space.
The smell changed immediately. Too many people in too little space. Cooking was done on open braziers outside because indoor use carried too much risk.
A child stood in a doorway and took him in as he passed. The expression was cautious. Learned early.
Strangers here were not worth the risk of engaging.
Two men sat against a doorframe. They continued a low exchange as Beorn passed. They didn't pause. In the upper districts, that kind of conversation would have stopped when someone new appeared.
Here, it continued.
Aestrith said nothing.
This was the lowest functional layer of the city. Below it, there was only the Badlands. People arrived here after failure elsewhere. They were still alive, but they had no further options, so they remained.
The place absorbed them into this section and did nothing further. The pressure had been building for a long time. No authority had touched this section in years.
He walked through.
The high quarter occupied Ashmark's center, raised slightly on a built-up foundation. The elevation created a clear boundary. Everything old but tended. Painted surfaces. Ironwork that functioned properly.
The street surface was smoother underfoot.
Sentries stood at major doorways. Their equipment matched. Higher quality than the garrison's, and consistently maintained. The air carried the smell of linseed oil and oiled metal, fresh enough that someone had worked the fittings recently.
A man stood on the steps of the largest house. He tracked them into the quarter and kept tracking as they drew level. The tracking slowed when it reached Beorn's face.
Then he turned back to what he had been doing before.
"Salt merchant?" Beorn asked.
Aestrith glanced at the house. "How did you determine that?"
"In a city with constrained food supply, the leverage point is essential goods. Salt is one of them. The building with the strongest private security is usually controlling that flow."
She didn't respond. That was sufficient confirmation.
The garrison quarter sat in the northwest section of the city, pressed against the wall. The space had been designed for a full military presence. The scale was wrong for what it housed. The barracks were still intact.
Between the main structure and the wall, grass had pushed through what had once been packed earth. It smelled of cut grass and dried mud, the kind of ground worked hard and then left alone. Maintenance had lapsed significantly.
The gate was open. The guard at the post leaned against it at an angle that suggested long-term inactivity.
He straightened slightly as Beorn approached, then let it go and settled back.
Three soldiers were visible on the training ground. One sat eating from a cloth. He raised his head briefly, then returned to his food.
The equipment rack beside the barracks door held crossbows with functional mechanisms. The stocks, however, had not been oiled in months. Spears leaned alongside. Two shafts were visibly warped from exposure.
The open space smelled of rust and old leather.
"Excuse me. When was the last time there was a commander here?" Beorn asked.
He looked at Beorn more directly, with suspicion. He reassessed. "Before my posting," he said.
"How long have you been posted?" Beorn asked.
The guard paused, thinking. "Four years."
Beorn nodded once. "Thank you," he said. He stepped back and turned toward the administrative seat.
The administrative seat stood at the highest point inside the walls. A citadel that had been designed to project authority. It still did, partially, though signs of neglect were visible.
The stonework remained structurally sound. The ironwork on the main gate showed rust at the hinge pins. Inside the courtyard, visible above the wall, a small garden had been planted. It was neat, trimmed with care.
The garden smell carried over the wall. Cut herbs and something green against the dry afternoon air. It was the only visible sign of active upkeep on that side of the building.
They stopped in front of the gate. There was no guard present.
Aestrith looked at it, then at him. "Are you planning to stand here much longer?"
"Almost done," Beorn said.
"You've been at this for half a hour."
"The garrison took longer."
She didn't respond to that.
Beorn examined the crack above the gate lintel. It ran diagonally from the upper right corner. Old damage. No recent expansion.
Then the garden again, past the wall. It had been tended recently. Then the rusted hinge pins.
"My answer is yes," Aestrith said.
Beorn turned to her.
"The hire," she clarified, holding his gaze. "Yes."
Beorn considered that, then looked back at the gate for one more moment.
Then he reached forward and pushed the gate open. The hinges gave a low, grinding cry as the gate swung wide. He stepped inside.
Aestrith came through behind him.