Jade reached the round door as the waiting deck coupled to something that refused to turn.
Lower service rolled onto its left wall behind her. The floor beyond the door stayed under Parel's carrier board, under thirty one other passengers, and under an intake clerk holding a wooden box of numbered pegs.
Jade put her left boot across the threshold. The step remained hers.
After Rillhold, that felt almost indecent.
The fixed platform extended beyond the deck in three square terraces. Families waited between iron rails with sleeping nets, tool chests, and carrying boards stacked around them. Several had tied direction tags to their children. One boy wore a padded cup around his head because every turn sent his ear toward a different floor.
The woman holding a toddler inside the deck unfastened one side of the chair strap and came toward Jade. A black nail beneath the chair kept its legs planted while the coupling groaned around it.
"You dropped this deck with my son beneath me."
