Astrid Grayburn had stolen from lords and beaten men twice her size, but the wooden barricade ahead stopped her cold. The checkpoint stood between her and the official's district. Somewhere past it lived the man who took her mother's enchanted heirloom while her mother lay dying. Astrid meant to steal it back. But the guards demanded identity papers, and she had none. She found the old scribe in a shuttered stall down a quiet lane. Rook Harmond bent over his writing bag, sunken eyes squinting as he mixed ink. Once he had forged documents for the regime's own leader, until they caught him and cast him out. Now he traded fakes for scraps of food. Astrid slid two coins and a loaf across his table. "They'll check the seal," Rook warned. His voice stayed soft. "I do good work. But good is not perfect." He pressed the wet stamp onto fresh paper, then blew it dry and handed it over. "Walk slow. Look bored. Bored people don't get searched." Astrid tucked the papers into her belt. Outside, a mangy black dog with pointed ears watched her from a doorway. It didn't beg or bark. It only studied her, calm and cautious, then trotted off. She envied how easily it passed the guards. At the barricade, a young soldier waved her forward. Messy brown hair, a devilish smirk, a gun on his hip. His gray and blue uniform looked slept in. He took her papers and turned them to the light. His smirk widened. "The ink's still tacky," he said. He rubbed his thumb across the seal and showed her the smudge. "Rook does nice work. Not perfect work." Astrid kept her face bored. Her heart slammed. "I don't know any Rook." "Sure." The soldier leaned close. "Name's Darian. Here's how this goes. I can call my sergeant, and you spend the week in a cell. Or you pay me, and I stamp you through." He glanced at the jewels hanging from her hips. "That would do. Guarding this gate bores me to death. Consider it a toll." Astrid looked past him at the district beyond. The heirloom waited there. A week in a cell meant losing her only lead. She unhooked the dark jewels from her belt and dropped them into his palm. Darian pocketed them and stamped her forged papers with a lazy flick. "Enjoy the district." Then he leaned in one last time, still grinning. "I'll remember your face. Come back through, and we'll talk price again." The barricade lifted. Astrid walked past, slow and bored, exactly as Rook told her. She was through. But she had paid with the jewels meant to buy her way back out, and now a bored, greedy guard knew her face and owned her secret. She had gained the district and lost her exit.