"That seems reasonable. If you're likely to be heading out into the backcountry, Ceveus the Younger may have some things worth keeping an eye out for; I believe we're short some Earthshakers we expected to arrive last fist. And our smith here, Isotanis, may have some surplus iron kit he could sell. Beyond that - I'll get someone planning a location outside camp to meet under truce."

"My thanks, Marshal."

'Investigate missing Earthshakers?' goes on her to-do list.

As does 'Find/make dicta re: surrender and not die'.

If she wanders over toward the forge (not forge-bound, this is just for repairs and working iron), there is a random Chorus guy arguing with a Stone Shield.

"Hey, I'm not saying I understand how everything here works, yet, I'm just asking, since we're allies, for my falx back."

"I took that trophy while you were an Oathbreaker, I'm not giving it back just because you're supposedly on our side now."

"...If you two want my opinion, I do believe I have one."

Holder sets a price not to exceed three times the item's production cost but can't refuse to sell, she thinks.

"Fatebinder! Yes, I'd accept your decision. Definitely better than arguing with this conscript."

"Sure, I'll tell my side and you tell yours and then the Fatebinder judges? That's fair."

"That is basically how it goes; I may ask clarificatory questions, and I in particular make a habit of explicitly stating when I make an official ruling, rather than a preliminary opinion, because I prefer to give people a chance to respond to me - other Fatebinders might not.  Not that I expect you'll see any other than myself for the next year or so."

"Sure. So, I was fighting with the Guard - a fist ago or so, and we fought the Disfavored, and he beat me, fair and square. Knocked me out, but I lived, so good luck for me. Only I woke up and my family falx was gone. It's been ours - was ours? - for three, probably five generations. And, you know, fair, beat me up and took a trophy. But then a day later the Chorus comes by, and they find what's left of my unit, who are all pretty beat, and say we're conscripted. And, sure, that's fair, too, I was certainly already thinking that joining Kyros's side was looking like a better idea every day, so I went along with it. And the induction rite was two nights ago, ten of us and I got one of the nine knives, so I'm in the Chorus, and they said 'Go get yourself a decent weapon!', not the stupid stone knife that only gets used for induction anyway. And I thought You know what's a really decent weapon, my family falx, and now the guy who has it is my ally, so I came over here to ask for it back. And that's it right there."

She nods.  "So noted.  And your side of the story?", she directs to the Stone Shield.

"Basically accurate. He was a rebel and an oathbreaker when I took the trophy, and the right of battle trophies is well-established. Sure, it's good that he's a new man who fights for Kyros, but it doesn't belong to him, it belonged to the man he used to be and now it belongs to me."

Some legal principles that might matter here:

- War trophies are indeed established practice, especially among the Disfavored, though there aren't strong precedents that they are universal rights.

- Graven Ashe has a decree on proper rationing which considers weapons left idle to be a minor misuse of resources

- The obligation to assist an ally does exist, again not as a universal right, but wouldn't obligate him to give him this weapon if he has (or can quickly get) another

- The Court has the right to take and keep artifacts of conquered peoples for display, though usually this is restricted to things like culturally-significant banners and crowns.

Also, the Scarlet Chorus is about strength and would generally look down on him for wanting a Fatebinder to give him a weapon rather than taking or making one by his own effort.

And, in fact, Verse is snorting a little at him, off to the side.

"...Well.  This sounds like the sort of thing I'm going to get a lot of; this means I'm going to want to properly set out the logic.

"You," she gestures to the Stone Shield, "have primary claim to the weapon by right of spoils.  But just as swearing yourself to Kyros's Peace does not clean your slate of every crime, so too does it not break every bond - not under Kyros's Law; the Archon of Secrets can do what it wants when tending to its own affairs, as per bloody usual.  He has some right to his heritage, no matter that it is your trophy.

"I think, therefore, that I am going to ask that you," the Stone Shield, "name a price, within some number multiple of the price to commission an equivalent falx - which you will consult a professional that is not either party's friend, upon, if the number's challenged - and if you," the new conscript, "are willing to pay that price, ownership reverts to you when you pay it - and a similar debt will accrue if it 'goes missing' into your possession.  Otherwise, stop bothering him about it.  And this is of course a trade within your circles, so you do not need a permit to do it.  Do either of you wish to respond to this before I issue a formal ruling?"

"I didn't really keep my rings when I was conscripted. How long does the price to buy it back last?"

The Stone Shield smirks. "No, Fatebinder."

"Lasts indefinitely; only changes if the both of you agree, or you challenge the price and it's too far over market value - well, the multiple thereof - when appraised.  Anything else?"

"No, I accept that judgment, ma'am."

"Technically you have no choice whether to accept, and you do not have any appeal, according to the way Fatebinders work - when we are doing our jobs, we are speaking with an Archon's voice - but - well.  I don't like to leave resentment in my wake.  Let me just..."

Write this down.

BE IT KNOWN:

That before the Court is a matter in which a soldier conscripted by one Archon wished to invoke the duty to aid allies to compel the return of specific property seized as spoils by a soldier of another before the first was conscripted;

That this Fatebinder of the Court expects to encounter many similar incidents over her tenure;

That this Fatebinder, in the interest of time and predictability, shall set forth her logic in this case as it will usually follow in other cases, such that cases of the same fact pattern may be resolved without needing her close attention.

BE IT KNOWN:

That the Court only judges this as a matter of interpretation of Kyros's Law, and not as a matter of the law of any particular Archon; 

That the Court considers this matter as primarily a question of property rights, not a matter of duties owed, and explicitly denies the claim that duty to aid allies can compel production of a specific object without specific need of that object, examples of such need including being best skilled in its use such that an equivalently useful object is otherwise unavailable, or the object having specific properties needed to complete a duly-assigned task;

That the Court is not, in issuing this judgement, waiving or limiting its right to claim and display items of conquered peoples;

BE IT KNOWN:

That the Court has previously judged that if you are outside Kyros's Peace, and enter within it, certain crimes - but not all crimes - are null;

That if not all crimes are null outside of Kyros's Peace, so too not all rights should be;

That claim to ownership of specific identifiable objects is a right that is not nullified for those that exist outside of Kyros's Peace;

BE IT KNOWN:

That the Court thusly ORDERS that a price be set by its present holder for the return of one (1) heirloom bronze falx, not to exceed the cost of three (3) times the price in materials and labor of creating a similarly complex falx;

That the Court stipulates that this price, once offered before a credible witness, is fixed at the value so offered or the cost of producing an equivalent item in materials and labor, whichever is higher, unless the present holder of the item so waives the price floor;

That the Court stipulates that the price in materials and labor may be established by consulting licensed wrights of the appropriate sort of item that neither party has an ongoing relationship of business, friendship, animosity, or other pursuits with;

That the Court stipulates that such a consultation must either be witnessed by either a credible witness or the other party, or given in writing with signature, to be valid;

That the Court stipulates that each party has the right to invoke such review once per calendar year, or by consent of both parties;

That the Court stipulates that there shall be at least one such appraisal before the trade is consummated, except if this is waived by the present holder of the item;

BE IT KNOWN IN ADDITION:

That if possession of such an item is transferred to another party by trade, whether within or without the immediate circle, the right to buy it back is still extant, but the new holder may set a new price consistent with these rules;

That if the item is outside of the possession of a person sworn to Kyros's Peace for a consecutive set of days larger than one month, (on the twenty-seventh day,) the original owner's claim will regain primacy should it not return to the possession of its prior holder immediately upon re-entering the possession of persons sworn to Kyros's Peace;

That if the item is stolen, and ends up in the possession of its original owner before the twenty-seventh day, the original owner shall either swear truthfully and verifiably that it is not by their hand or the hand of their allies that the theft occurred, or immediately incur a debt of the price so offered;

That had this item been a generic (but in some way recognizable) example of its kind, the Court would have set its price-multiple cap at four times the cost of production, an increase by one;

That should this item prove to have artifact properties, the price-multiple cap will be increased by two and the holder may set a new price once;

That should both of those conditions have held, the Court would have applied both increases to a total multiple of six.

SO WRITTEN AND SO JUDGED

Upon this the FIRST day of the month of BLOOD,

in the year FOUR-HUNDRED THIRTY-ONE of Kyros's TRUE RECKONING,

By the hand of FATEBINDER OPHELIA VAUDELLE,

 

As so authorized by TUNON, the ARCHON OF JUSTICE.

"Right."  She shakes out her hand, stamps the papers with her seal, and returns the absurd contraption by which she made a second copy of the scroll as she wrote it to her pack.

"I'll need to take these to a scribe to be copied; I will need some for the criers, because I don't want half a dozen of you tracking me down over this if you can sort these cases out on your own.  Each of you should get a copy of the decision if you want one, I will send one of the canonical copies to Tunon's Court, and I will keep one myself for my reference.  What have you decided to charge him?"

"Half an iron seems fair."

She nods, makes a note.

"So witnessed.  Good luck, you," she says to the new guy.

He nods, and heads off, probably back to the Chorus camp.

Isotanis the smith seems to be having a quiet, slightly heated conversation with an Iron Walker over that way, past the (fairly small) prison cage. Back the other way, an unusually tall Iron Guard is up on a platform, talking with an Earthshaker below him - that might be Ceveus.

She's inclined to snoop on the heated conversation; talking to Ceveus and the Earthshaker...

Hm.  Okay, actually, people going missing is pretty important and she expects that most of the Disfavored aren't giving enough of a damn after Cairn happened.

"If either of you want to snoop on the heated discussion over there that'd be great; I think it might need a Fatebinder - but I know loyal people vanishing into thin air needs a commander to respond, and I've been asked to help with that."

"I can listen to Isotanis, Fatebinder." Well, he can try, at least. He's not exactly good at subtlety.

"If you want; don't just do it because I asked, do it because you think you can or that failing would be worth it.  Worst comes to worst you can just tell him I wanted to know what was going on, anyway."