Lidyana’s question hung between them, thick as the smoke still curling from the singed timber. Bronik stared at her, the ache in his ribs a dull throb against the sharp edge of her gaze. He saw no pity there, no feigned concern, only a calculating intelligence that mirrored his own. The cynicism, usually a solid wall, wavered. He’d spent months meticulously gathering these supplies, sealing himself off, anticipating this precise moment, yet here was someone who saw past the madness to the grim truth beneath. He pushed off the maul, the crude weapon clattering against the loose stone. “And if I do?” he rasped, his voice rough. “What then? You’ll run to Tomaz? Tell him Bronik the madman has built a boat in his tower?” Lidyana gave a short, humorless laugh. “Tomaz wouldn’t believe me. No one would. They’re too busy squabbling over who gets the last prime harvest plot before the river swells.” She gestured around the chaotic yard, the half-burnt wood, the scattered tools. “Besides, you think I’d trade one set of fools for another? I’ve seen enough of Ostran’s ‘sensible’ folk to last me three lifetimes.” Her eyes scanned the horizon, where the distant valley floor was already blurring under a persistent drizzle. “My remedies are good for what ails the body, Bronik. They don’t cure willful blindness. The council already branded me a ‘provocateur of dissent’ for suggesting the town well was tainted weeks ago. They prefer ignorance, even when it’s fatal.” Bronik considered her, the sharp angles of her face, the defiant set of her jaw. An outcast. Like him. He harbored doubts, yet her blunt assessment rang true. He needed hands. Competent, discerning hands. Zivtar was barely functional, a perpetually pickled burden. Lidyana was sharp, resourceful, and crucially, she had seen enough to intuit the truth without him having to preach it. His isolation had been a weapon, but it was also a heavy cloak, smothering opportunity. Trust played no part in this; it was a transaction. “I need a healer,” he said, pragmatic, almost cold. “And someone who can follow directions without drowning in their own spittle. You work, you earn your keep. There’s a space in the tower, dry and safe, when the water rises. Beyond that, no promises. My ark, my rules.” Lidyana met his stare, a slow smile spreading across her lips, devoid of warmth. “A roof over my head, and a chance to watch Ostran’s elite swim for their lives? You drive a hard bargain, Bronik. But I’ll take it.” She picked up a coil of rope, testing its weight. “Show me what needs doing. I’m better with a trowel than a poultice when it comes to stone.” Zivtar, roused by the sound of new voices, poked his head out of the tower entrance, his face smudged with soot and confusion. “Another… *assistant*?” he slurred, squinting at Lidyana. “Are we opening a crag-top clinic now? I’ve got a cough that rattles my teeth, if you’re taking patients.” “She’s here to work, Zivtar,” Bronik snapped, already turning towards the tower’s base. “Not to coddle your liver. There’s a structural crack in the lowest cellar. We need to reinforce it and waterproof it before the real downpour starts.” He led the way down the uneven stone steps, the air growing cooler, heavier with the scent of damp earth and old stone. The subterranean vault was a dank, cramped space, barely taller than Bronik. The air hung thick and still. Moss and black mold coated the rough-hewn walls, the only light filtering through a narrow, grated opening high up near the masonry vaulting. Zivtar, after a token grumble, was quickly dispatched to fetch buckets of pitch and melted tar, grumbling about “archaic sealing methods.” Bronik handed Lidyana a heavy chisel and a mallet. “Start scraping this off. Every inch. The pitch won’t adhere otherwise.” The rhythmic *clink-clink* of their tools against the stone filled the silence. Bronik worked methodically, clearing a section, then applying thick, glistening tar with a crude brush, working it into every crack and seam. Lidyana, surprisingly efficient, cleared away the clinging green growth, revealing the rough, ancient stone beneath. The shared scrape and brush formed a temporary truce, cutting through the need for idle chatter. “The valley folk, they called me a witch,” Lidyana said suddenly, her voice cutting through the scraping. She didn’t look at him, her eyes fixed on a stubborn patch of moss. “Because I found the cures they couldn’t, or wouldn’t, acknowledge. Because I dared to learn from the old ways, not just their sterile, sanctioned lore.” Bronik grunted, spreading another layer of tar. “They called me mad. A fool for trading fertile land for a pile of rocks. Said I deserved what I got, after Mirzela…” He trailed off, the name a bitter taste in his mouth. He hadn't meant to share that. The words had simply escaped, unbidden, in the quiet, damp air. “Mirzela,” Lidyana repeated, a hint of something unreadable in her tone. “The one who married Tomaz. The one who inherited your fields.” She paused her work, finally turning her head. Her dark eyes, no longer sharp, held a flicker of something akin to empathy. “So, your betrayal wasn’t just about land, was it?” Bronik looked away, focusing on the uneven stone. “It was about everything. My future. The life I’d built. They took it all, then watched me sign away the last shred of my dignity for this.” He slammed the brush against the stone. “This useless peak.” “And now it’s all you have left,” Lidyana finished, her voice soft. “And it will be everything.” She resumed her scraping, a new intensity in her movements. “My father, he was a simple farmer, but he knew the land. He taught me to read the signs that the city folk ignored. The way the river ran unusually low in winter, the aberrant migration patterns of the river eels. He’d seen the old maps, the ones that showed the valley as a vast, ancient lakebed. He used to say, ‘The land remembers, Lidyana. And sometimes, it remembers what it used to be.’” Bronik stopped, his hand mid-stroke. He’d never heard anyone speak of such things. Never had he found a soul attuned to the deep, unsettling hum beneath the surface of the valley floor. He glanced at Lidyana, truly *looked* at her. She withheld judgment and scorn alike, grasping the signs without dispute—an unwelcome crack in his defensive solitude. He watched her scrape away a dense clump of lichen near the vault's crest, her shoulders bunching with the effort. As the green growth peeled back, a pattern emerged on the rough stone. Not natural veins, but deliberate carvings. Ancient, worn by time and damp, but unmistakable. Stylized waves, sharp and angular, etched into the rock. And beneath them, carved effigies. Not people, but stretched, distorted forms with upturned skulls and reaching limbs. They seemed to be swimming, or perhaps drowning, in a torrent of water. Lidyana gasped softly, her chisel falling with a clang. Her finger traced one of the etched waves, stopping abruptly at a distinct line, deeper and more pronounced than the others, running horizontally across the wall. It was a clear, unmistakable watermark, precisely scored at the level of the upper stones. Above it, more waves. Below it, the drowning silhouettes, trapped beneath that historic waterline. “What… what is this?” she whispered, her voice tight with a sudden dread. “These aren’t just markings, Bronik. This is… a record.” Cold sweat broke across Bronik's neck, sharp against the subterranean chill. His foreknowledge had ceased to be an isolated delusion. This was a warning, etched in stone by a forgotten people who had endured what he was now trying to survive. The carved dead lay submerged beneath that line; the very crown of his refuge marked an ancient shoreline. Outside, the steady *tap-tap-tap* of rain on the stone roof of the Anvil had been a constant, monotonous rhythm since they’d started. Now, it changed. A low rumble began, growing quickly, swelling into a deep, guttural roar that vibrated through the very foundations of the tower. It wasn’t just rain anymore. It was the sky tearing itself open, a thousand waterfalls crashing down at once, weeks ahead of his most pessimistic calculations. The faint light from the grated opening vanished, swallowed by an instantaneous, crushing darkness. The deluge had truly begun.

The Writing on the Wall