Fyndrecht

A person found alone in trouble beyond city walls belongs to the person who found them.

The Fyndrecht — the finder's right — is recognized in all six city-states and disputed by none. What happens to the found person next is entirely at the finder's discretion: release them, take payment from them, their house, or their city, or keep them. All three are lawful and none requires a reason.

The principle

It is not a punishment and is not framed as one. It follows the same logic as a war captive: a person who chose to be out there accepted what being out there meant, and the person who had to go and get them is owed something for it. The Pact of Reason confirmed that a Frontier claiming is lawful, the Frontier being beyond any city's walls, and that once marked there is no city in which the taken can be free.

In practice

A man is more likely to be ransomed or released, because a man is worth more returned than kept. A woman is more likely to be kept. Nobody made this rule and everyone understands it, and it changes the arithmetic of Frontier travel for a woman in a way it does not for a man.

The Fyndra

A Fyndra is a person found whose fate the finder has not yet decided. The condition is real and, for a woman at least, usually short. A finder who knows what they intend marks the person at once, because the Koelrth — the mark — settles the matter for everyone they will meet on the road. The waiting exists only while the finder is weighing it: whether the person is worth more returned or kept, whether a house will pay, whether the party can carry someone that far. It can last weeks if the answer is difficult, and a Fyndra spends that time watching the arithmetic being done. A woman found alone is rarely a Fyndra for very long.

An Aesloes who cannot look after themselves is a Fyndra with nothing to weigh: no house will pay and no city will claim them.

See also

• The Frontier · Becoming a Slave · Slavery
• The Pact of Reason#The war — the claiming that started it