Sage had expected several hundred people.
By sunrise, there were several thousand outside the gates.
He stood on the upper level of the Grand Guild Hall with both hands resting against the railing, staring through the enormous windows at a line that had already escaped the Grand Complex entrance, crossed part of the Western Crownway and continued beyond what he could see from his position.
The first applicants had apparently arrived before dawn. Then laborers came from the outer districts, clerks from commercial neighborhoods, craftsmen carrying tool cases, healers in robes of several different traditions, warriors looking for security positions, cooks, stable workers, accountants, former soldiers, unemployed apprentices, warehouse workers and people Sage couldn't immediately classify.
