Nine Grains Short

About this book

In the delta city of Vessery nothing may be sold until it has been weighed against the Standards in a sealed vault, and a tampered weight sweats rust through its stamp. Odalys Marrick, seventeen, is a Weighhouse apprentice who quietly shaves half-grains off market scales. On the morning of the Autumn Reckoning, Master Assayer Ilse Corvane, the one person who caught her and kept silent, is found dead behind a barred door, the Standard Pound nine grains light, and Odalys's own cheating weights under the body. She has nine days, a rival apprentice who cannot tell a lie, and a talent for finding the fraction that does not add up. The law will hang someone at the ninth bell of the ninth day. Who profits when a pound is short?