Elian died before dawn.
Not by the sword. Not by poison. Not by law.
He died on a staircase the Corrector altered beneath his feet.
When they left the prayer room, the corridor beyond the door looked familiar: three windows, a stone alcove, a staircase leading down to the inner courtyard. Miran went first. Lissa stayed close to Elian but did not touch him. Suddenly the third window became a mirror, the alcove turned into a door, and the steps tipped sharply and plunged away beneath them.
Miran managed to catch Lissa.
Elian had time to see Nim's smooth face below.
Then the stone struck his back.
He opened his eyes before dawn, and the new law was already waiting on the table.
The same grey cloth hung above the bed, the same cup of water stood nearby, the same glove lay by the window. But a thin tablet of bone rested on the table. Words had been carved into it:
"Every promise is paid for with time."
Elian sat up too quickly, and the room swam before his eyes. It was not death that frightened him, but the sudden weakness.
He went to the mirror and saw several grey hairs at his temples. A fine crease had appeared beside his mouth, and shadows lay beneath his eyes. He looked as though he had aged several years.
The system responded:
"Transition disrupted by the Corrector. The Draft of Debt has been opened. Years of life will be collected for unfulfilled promises."
He touched the cold glass, behind which stood a man a little older than he had been before his death.
The first to come to him was not Shani, Miran or Vestra.
Orm.
The executioner stood at the door with his sword drawn. Deep lines had appeared on his face, lines Elian did not remember. Orm too was paying for his earlier decision with years of his life.
"Your Highness," Orm said.
His voice did not waver.
Elian studied him.
"Do you remember?"
"Not everything. My hands remember that they did not bring down the sword. My throat remembers the formula. That is enough."
For the usually taciturn Orm, it was almost a confession.
The Council bells were already ringing below. They were given no time to understand the new rule: another morning session and another accusation awaited Elian. Only now, every person paid for their own words with age.
Elian saw Shani on the stairs.
She carried a tray of water. Her hands were trembling harder than they had in the first Draft. A grey streak had appeared at her temple.
"Shani."
She raised her eyes.
There was recognition in them. And fear.
"I called you 'Your Highness'," she whispered. "And in the morning I woke three days older. Then I lost another day when I thought that I would say the same thing again."
Elian's head spun, and Shani's name sounded clearly in his memory.
"Don't say it again."
She almost smiled.
"An order?"
"A request."
"Then it costs more."
He had no time to answer.
They entered the Council chamber, and the session began.
Savern was already standing beside the Empty Throne. Elian saw at once that the regent remembered more than he should. Savern looked not at him but at Nim, who stood in the shadow behind a column, and clearly recognised the Corrector.
Savern raised the night book.
"Today the Council will consider not imposture," he said, "but the debts this man has imposed upon the court."
The book opened by itself.
Lines appeared on the pages.
Shani Venn recognised a title without the right to do so.
Miran Kest gave testimony while not in service.
Tavel Rin opened empty books to an unauthorised person.
Orm Hal delayed the execution of a recognised sentence.
Vestra Lo sold a future right of succession to a man without confirmed blood.
Every line ended with a number of years.
The rule of the Draft of Debt could be seen in the people. Shani had aged for a single form of address. Orm for delaying his sword. Tavel was brought in under guard; he clutched his chest and struggled to breathe, as though several winters had passed through him in a single night.
Vestra entered last.
She looked almost unchanged. Only one lock at her temple had turned silver.
"Don't look at me like that," she told Elian. "I named my price honestly, so the world took very little from me."
Savern heard her.
"Princess Lo. Do you confirm the bargain?"
Vestra looked at Elian.
Elian suddenly realised how easy it would be to agree. If Vestra repeated her recognition, her name would be secured even more firmly. By spending it, he could settle Shani's debt, restore her lost days and protect Miran from erasure, at least for a time. He almost convinced himself that Vestra would understand and forgive such a choice.
The system responded quietly:
"Payment with Vestra Lo's preserved name is available."
Elian clenched his fingers.
Shani stood by the door, pale and frightened, with a grey streak at her temple. In the first Draft, one word from her had been enough to restore Elian's right to his name. Now that word was costing her years of her life.
"No," Elian said.
Savern inclined his head.
"Whom are you answering?"
"A world that drives a very poor bargain."
He walked into the centre of the hall.
"Shani Venn's debt is transferred to me."
The hall erupted in murmurs.
Orm stepped forward. "That is impossible without a formula."
Elian turned to him.
"Then pronounce it."
The executioner went pale.
For the first time that morning, Savern's voice turned sharp.
"Orm Hal, you have no right…"
"I do," Orm said. "In the Draft of Debt, the executioner knows the price of carrying out a sentence."
He raised the sword, not to strike but as a sign.
"He who accepted the recognition may also accept the debt of recognition. Do the witnesses hear?"
Shani began to cry without a sound.
Elian said:
"They hear."
Orm lowered the sword until its point touched the stone.
"Ten years for one hour of right. Prince Elian Vern accepts the debt of Shani Venn."
The system responded:
"Debt transferred. Preserved names have not been spent."
The Draft did not age Elian by all ten years at once. Part of the debt remained unpaid, and the system could demand it later.
The pain did not come at once. First cold swept through Elian, then his joints began to ache and the strength left his hands. In the wall mirror he saw new lines around his eyes. His voice grew deeper, his movements heavier. He did not look the full ten years older, but his body already felt their weight.
The grey streak vanished from Shani's hair, and her hands stopped trembling.
Savern regarded him differently now: at length, and without his former certainty.
Nim Arg raised his face. In another Draft, one version of Savern shuddered in his sleep and remembered the Corrector for the first time.
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