Adventure of Swanga 1

Don Esteban Valcárcel snaps his sword free in a bright hiss and steps half a pace ahead, trying to make steel stand in for authority. The mist rolls thick over the dock stairs, where the dockworkers wait with hooks, mauls, and silent faces.

He lifts the proposal in his free hand, as if to remind the crowd what is at stake, then checks the nearest officers with a hard glance. Their line has thinned, uneasy but still holding.

Swanga remains at his side on the open pier, watched by a hundred eyes. The path inland is open, but every step now feels measured against the crowd’s patience.

The nearest dockworkers do not advance. Instead, they part wider, tools still ready, making it clear the escort is allowed, not trusted.

Don Esteban lowers his blade a fraction and leads toward the inland stairs, with Swanga beside him and the harbor mist swallowing the dock behind.

Swanga steps off with his palms open and empty, the rapier kept still at his side. Don Esteban takes the first stair and the mist closes around his boots.

The dockworkers hold their line back below, watching the pair climb. No one follows, but every face stays turned after them.

He does not look back when he says it, only tightens his grip on the proposal as the stairwell narrows.

Steam beads on the stone walls as they reach the landing, where a pair of warders wait in silhouette and part at Esteban's badge.

Swanga gives the warders a clean, courteous salute and steps half a pace aside, leaving Esteban the path. The magistrate takes the lead at once, but the warders do not soften. Their eyes stay on Swanga, measuring him like a delay they would rather not trust.

The landing opens into a narrow passage of wet stone and steam. Esteban moves ahead without looking back, while the warders let him pass and make Swanga wait just a heartbeat longer than courtesy requires.

One warder shifts his halberd and gives Swanga a cool, appraising glance, then looks to the sealed doors beyond the mist. The message is plain, the magistrate's favor opens the way, but only for now.

The pair advances into the steam, leaving the stair behind. The warders hold their posts at the threshold, and the doors ahead remain shut, waiting for the next word to be spoken.

Swanga keeps pace beside Esteban, but the steam thickens and the corridor narrows until the magistrate’s shoulder cuts too far ahead to ignore. The warders’ silence hardens behind him, and the path begins to feel less like an escort and more like a funnel.

Swanga presses on, but a slick step steals his clean stride. His boot skids on the wet stone, and he has to catch himself against the wall while Esteban continues one pace ahead.

The warder’s halberd angles across the passage, not blocking the way, only making the narrow gap feel even narrower. Esteban turns his head just enough to measure the delay, then waits without offering help.

Swanga regains the wall but loses the easy rhythm of the escort. The sealed doors ahead loom through the fog, and now both warders watch him as if one wrong step could become a public insult.

Swanga finds his rhythm again and glides beside Esteban, boots finding purchase where the stone still shines wet. The corridor keeps its narrow grip, but his pace matches the escort now, clean and measured.

Ahead, the sealed doors fill the misted end of the passage. The warder with the halberd shifts aside by a fraction, enough to show the doors are being watched, not barred.

Esteban lifts the withheld proposal, the folded paper catching the corridor light like a challenge. He does not seal it, not here, not on this floor slick with steam.

The warder reaches for the door latch, and the heavy leaves begin to part, spilling a colder air from within. Every eye in the passage turns on Swanga as the threshold opens.