Filed in Good Faith

Elara Pestle has run The Quiet Tincture for years, mixing custom adjustments for regulars who can't take the standardized stuff. When a regulatory complaint lands the day before her renewal, the seal goes up and the herbs start dying in the window. The clockmaker who filed the complaint did it in good faith — three years of meticulous notes, a statute cited correctly, a sincere belief in safety. But somebody she'd never met sent her the legal summary, picked the date, and is waiting in the gap her closure leaves behind. Marzipan LeFlour, three-pod baker and reluctant noticer, splits across town one regular at a time, follows the paperwork to a name nobody local has heard, and learns that a small town isn't too small to be a target — just too small to notice the hunter.