The stone holds.

Not forever. Forever is a mason’s dream and a miller’s joke. It holds for market bread. The bee-hum comes back with a little rasp, like a singer who has a cold and still has to do the hymn.

Hew turns away and pretends the wet in his eye is flour. You pretend you believe him. Anyone who wanted a blade-story discovers hoop-iron is a better guest. If Hob the tenant is here, he watches the measure and sees it is still fair, still a sting, still better than a silent mill.

You grind a test-run: wheat that will be loaves under the assize, weight matching the grain-price board as honestly as Greyfen can manage. Multure taken in the open. Wheel slapping the lade as if dawn had been Hew’s idea after all.

Tomorrow the square will smell like crust. You will be tired in the useful way. The keep will eat. Tenants will grumble and chew, which is the manor’s oldest duet.

You put your palm where Hew’s was. Warm. Alive. A machine.

THE END

What you learned: a mill is an economic engine; mill-soke means grinding at the manor mill for a toll. A cracked stone is an emergency because bread is a town, not a snack.