The stench of wet wool and unwashed bodies hung heavy in the air, a thick blanket over the usual damp earth and ozone tang of the Anvil. Bronik watched from the main watch-level as the refugees, a ragged assortment of Ostran’s displaced, huddled in the tower’s lower chambers. They were less a grateful populace and more a colony of shivering, resentful vermin. Two days had passed since he’d opened the gates, two days of incessant rain and the shrill wind that seemed to mock their cramped existence. He rasped out commands over the din of dripping water and muttered curses. “You! The one with the torn breeches! Pry up that floorboard, carefully! We need every sound plank for the pontoon frames.” A gaunt man flinched, then moved with grudging slowness. Bronik didn’t care for their feelings; he cared for progress. Mirzela, a dark shadow flitting at the periphery of his vision, moved among the newly conscripted laborers. Her voice, once a honeyed melody, was now a rasping whisper, planting seeds of doubt and discontent. He watched her from the corner of his eye as she spoke to a group hauling timber, their movements already sluggish. He saw the shift in their eyes, the hardening of their jaws. She wasn’t trying to incite outright rebellion yet, just eroding their will, making his work harder. Tomaz, meanwhile, was nowhere to be seen in the main work areas. That was a bad sign. Tomaz wasn’t one for manual labor. He was one for manipulation, for backroom deals. Bronik felt a prickle of unease, a cold sensation that had nothing to do with the drafts whistling through the tower’s cracks. “Bronik! A moment of your invaluable time, if you please!” Zivtar’s voice, slurred but urgent, cut through the din. He stumbled up the rough-hewn stairs, a half-empty flask clutched in one hand, a smudge of grease across his brow. “The… the contraption for the rudder! The steam-driven one. It needs gears. Heavy ones. From the water-mill in the old church. The ones that drove the grain crushers.” Bronik scowled. “The church is submerged. A good two fathoms under.” “Precisely! That’s why I brought up the diving bell. The repurposed brewing vat, remember?” Zivtar gestured vaguely towards a corner of the main level, where a riveted metal cylinder sat amidst a pile of ropes and air hoses. “Only… someone’s been at it. The air valve. It’s been… un-tightened. Deliberately. And the pressure gauge? Gone. Smashed, it looks like.” Bronik ran a calloused thumb across the brass fittings of the ruined valve. This wasn't just incompetence. This was malice. He knelt, examining the thick, muddy residue on the ground near the diving bell. It wasn’t the usual wet earth tracked in by the refugees. This was a denser, almost clay-like mud, consistent with the riverbed near the sunken church. He followed the faint, drying trail of the specific mud. It led him away from the central passage, past the sodden bedrolls, and down toward the auxiliary vault beneath the eastern foundation. A faint, metallic glint caught his eye near the heavy timber door. A discarded lockpick, bent and smeared with the same unusual mud. His own lockpicks, he realized, were usually kept in a leather pouch on his workbench. He had seen them there this morning. Now, the pouch was empty. Someone was not simply sabotaging the work; they were stocking up. And they had a key, or the means to pick a lock. He pushed open the oak planking into the dark undercroft. The air inside was cool, still, and heavy with the scent of stored grain and smoked meat. The light from his oil lamp struggled against the gloom. Sacks of dried rations, cured fish, and barrels of salted meat were stacked haphazardly along the walls. He moved deeper, his boots crunching on loose pebbles. And there, hunched over a pile of sacks, was Tomaz. The man’s face, usually slick with arrogance, was now a mask of frantic greed. He was bagging dried fruit and a handful of cured sausages into a small canvas pouch, his movements furtive and quick. “Tomaz,” Bronik’s voice, low and dangerous, echoed in the cramped space. Tomaz startled, dropping the pouch. His chin jerked up, his mouth twitching into a sour sneer. “Bronik. Just… ensuring the supplies are properly distributed.” “Distributed, or hoarded?” Bronik stepped inside, raising the lantern high to show the slashed meal-sacks. “The diving bell. The valve. The missing gauge. My lockpicks. And now, the rations. Are you trying to starve my workers into a rebellion, Tomaz?” Tomaz slowly straightened, a defiant glint in his eye. “They are *my* workers, Bronik. Or they will be. Once they realize what a madman you are. You think these fools will build your ridiculous floating bath-tub? They’re hungry, Bronik. And hungry hands follow whoever holds the ladle.” He gestured to the surrounding sacks. “These are just… incentives.” “You really think I’d let you take over?” Bronik took another step forward. “You couldn’t manage your own lands, Tomaz. You think you can manage a desperate mob on a sinking rock?” Tomaz’s gaze darted past Bronik, feral and twitching toward the narrow egress. He didn’t reply. Instead, with a sudden, unexpected lunge, he shoved a stack of heavily packed sacks of grain. They toppled like dominoes, crashing against the far wall of the cellar. The impact was sickeningly loud, a dull thud that quickly escalated into a grating groan. The stone ceiling above them shuddered. A hairline fracture split across the ancient mortar. Pebbles rained down, then larger chunks. Tomaz scrambled backwards, a terrified squeak escaping his lips. Bronik cursed, turning to face the collapsing wall, but it was too late. The groan became a roar, and the world dissolved into a thunderous cascade of rock and dust, plunging him into suffocating darkness.

Rats in the Cellar