When the work bell fades, Ari Deth turns the largest slate toward the doorway. A child who arrived with the late caravan can see the first letters from there without taking a seat from the apprentices already bent over their trade sums.
The room is not large enough for two classes at once. Deth has begun splitting the evening: writing first, then the arithmetic the workshop apprentices need before their next bench examination. The change sounds modest until the attendance marks are read beside the lesson rota. The same hour has been promised twice.
Families say the earlier part is reachable if supper can wait. Guild stewards say apprentices cannot learn a measuring rule in fragments. No one in the room describes the choice as a conflict between children and work; the question is how long the school can keep asking one small set of slates to serve both.
The trial is being recorded by who attends each half, which lessons are finished and how many slates must be shared. Deth has asked the school table not to call a quiet first week a success until the full cycle of guild examinations has passed.
At closing, Deth wipes only the examples that have been copied correctly. The unfinished sums remain for the next group, a small sign that the room’s schedule is still being negotiated.
