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By Root 593 0

than admit it, Gringe loved his job, and it gave his family a secure home in the gatehouse after many years of living rough under the Castle walls. The day that Marcia had given him a half crown turned out to be an important day for Gringe. That day, for the first and only time ever, Gringe kept some of the bridge money—Marcia’s half crown, to be exact. There was something about the thick, solid silver disk lying warm and heavy in the palm of his hand that made Gringe reluctant to put it into the toll box. So he slipped it into his pocket, telling himself he would add it to the day’s takings that night. But Gringe could not bring himself to part with the half crown. And so the half crown sat in his pocket for many months until Gringe began to consider it his own.

And there the half crown would have stayed had it not been for a notice Gringe found nailed up on the North Gate one cold morning almost a year later:

YOUNG ARMY CONSCRIPTION EDICT

ALL BOYS AGED ELEVEN TO SIXTEEN

YEARS WHO ARE NOT APPRENTICED TO

A RECOGNIZED TRADE ARE TO REPORT

TO THE YOUNG ARMY BARRACKS

AT 0600 HOURS TOMORROW

Gringe felt sick. His son, Rupert, had celebrated his eleventh birthday the previous day. Mrs. Gringe was hysterical when she saw the notice. Gringe felt hysterical too, but when he saw Rupert, white-faced, reading the notice, he decided he had to stay calm. He shoved his hands in his pockets and thought. And when, out of habit, his hand closed around Marcia’s half crown, Gringe knew he had the answer.

As soon as the boatyard was open that morning, they had a new apprentice: Rupert Gringe, whose father had just secured a seven-year apprenticeship with Jannit Maarten, a herring-boat builder, for the substantial down payment of a half crown.

THE MATRON MIDWIFE

After the Matron Midwife was arrested, she was taken to the Castle Asylum for Deluded and Distressed Persons due to her distraught state of mind and preoccupation with baby-snatching, which was not considered to be a healthy preoccupation for a Midwife to have. After spending a few years there she was allowed to leave because the Asylum was becoming overcrowded. There had been a huge increase in deluded and distressed people since the Supreme Custodian had taken over the Castle, and the Matron Midwife was now neither deluded nor distressed enough to merit a place. And so Agnes Meredith, former Matron Midwife, now unemployed bag lady, packed her many bags and set off to search for her lost son, Merrin.

THE NIGHT SERVANT

The Supreme Custodian’s Night Servant was thrown into a dungeon after dropping the Crown and adding another dent to it. He was released a week later by mistake and went to work in the Palace kitchens as an undercook peeling potatoes, which he was good at, and soon progressed to be chief potato-peeler. He enjoyed his job. No one minded if he dropped a potato.

JUDGE ALICE NETTLES

Alice Nettles first met Alther Mella when she was a trainee advocate at the Castle Court. Alther had yet to become DomDaniel’s Apprentice, but Alice could tell that Alther was special. Even after Alther became the ExtraOrdinary Wizard and was much talked about as “that awful Apprentice who pushed his Master from the Tower,” Alice kept seeing him. She knew that Alther was incapable of killing anything, even an irritating ant. Shortly after Alther became ExtraOrdinary Wizard, Alice achieved her ambition of becoming a judge. Soon their separate careers began to keep Alther and Alice increasingly busy, and they never saw as much of each other as they would have liked to, something that Alice always regretted.

It was a terrible double blow to Alice when, in the space of a few days, the Custodians not only killed the dearest friend she had ever had but also took away her life’s work when they banned women from the Courthouse. Alice left the Castle and went to stay with her brother in the Port. After some time she recovered enough from Alther’s death to take a job as legal advisor to the Customs House.

It was after a long day dealing with a tricky problem involving a smuggled camel