Morning put its hand on Novaterra's shoulder and squeezed. The forge cleared its throat; Thorn stretched in her shed with the offended grace of a cat woken too early; Founders' Way yawned into hammers. The west wind carried the sulk of West Hollow and the cleaner air of burned beads. đ
The [System] arrived with neat satisfaction:
[Morning Brief â Novaterra] ⢠Wall Corner I: 25% â 30% (outer course + rubble) ⢠Forge: Javelin heads #3; Shield bosses #1; Hinges #4 ⢠West Hollow: Dormant (low pressure); totems destroyed (1) ⢠Primer v1.1: Adopted (Novaterra/Silverbrook/Riversong) ⢠Smile Rock: Watch set (Bryn/Hale/Ras) ⢠Morale: Buoyant đ
Aiden closed the pane and let the lines breathe into people. Venn stalked the crates like a benevolent storm. Mara made tea taste like law. Hadrik argued with a new bloomery tongs until it repented. Elara crossed the oval with a spear and that particular stillness that makes noise obedient.
Ras waited by the half-gate, chin up, boots cleanâclean now, not lazy. He touched the brim of a nonexistent cap. "Watch relief, lord. Bryn sent me to fetch hands if the rock smiles back."
"Hands," Aiden said. "Take Garran. Take Hale." He looked at Elara. She nodded the smallest nod. "And take me."
Mara threw him a look that could break stew. "Bring sense," she said, ladle pointing at his chest.
"I'll bring two," he promised. "Elara keeps the third."
Elara's mouth twitched. "Greedy."
The prairie knew how to keep a secret at noon. Heat made the air think; grass hissed like quiet laughter. The Smile Rock waitedâold earth-bone with its crooked grin. Bryn perched at the south brush, invisible in the way trees teach. Hale lay in shade that had decided to be serious.
Bryn's finger flicked: there.
A packet lay in the grin. New. Flat. Untouched since whoever liked moths had decided the rock was trustworthy.
Elara drew a circle of caution with words instead of chalk. "No one touch," she said softly. "Ras?"
Ras crouched, hands empty to show trust. He leaned close enough to smell starch and something that tried to be sweet. "Ink," he said. "And⌠flower water."
Calder was not there to hum disapproval, so Aiden did it for him. "Perfume in a letter is a man's way of dressing a knife."
"Elara's rule," Elara murmured: "If it smells like a scheme, it is." She nodded to Hale. "Hook it."
Hale used a forked stick and a piece of Venn's twine to draw the packet out. It resisted the way a cat resists a bath; then it came, polite as a guilty child.
"Snare?" Garran asked.
"Later," Elara said. "We aren't greedy at the edge." She nodded to Ras. "Read with eyes, not hands."
Ras angled the paper so the light could do the lifting. The moth sealâsoot neat as a signatureâstared up with calm wings. The writing beneath it made Venn's future smile: tidy, precise, smug only if you knew smug when you saw it.
To the Lord Who Prefers Ledgers to Luck,
You burn well. I approve of men who dislike superstition; it leaves more market for arrangement.
You will not stop fear with rope; you will only organize it. That is also a trade. I admire trades.
Since you enjoy numbers: here is a route where your broom will sweep profitablyâif you act before the new moon. Since you enjoy ledgers: a rate for which charms cease near your neighbors (we prefer coin to violence). Since you enjoy bridges: a note that the fox to your east flips his coin for audiences as often as for truth.
If you insist on burning goods, at least pay the boys who hang them. Hunger is a poor teacher; you may hire mineâonce.
P.S. Your scorpion has a fan club. Please send an autograph bolt.
â Grey Moth (who likes letters more than knives)
"Fan club," Garran said, straight-faced. "Dangerous."
"New moon in six days," Bryn murmured, eyes on the east horizon as if the moon might be loitering there. "He's pushing us to run."
"Route?" Elara asked.
Ras found the map in the letterâinked lines clean enough to be honest and dishonest at once. "Market lane with the red awning," he said. "Three turns, then a wadiâhe's telling us where Red Hal eats fear."
"Or where he will eat us if we arrive stupid," Elara said.
Hale sniffed the paper and gagged delicately. "Flower water hides⌠something. Calder would say 'mild hex' and then make tea."
Aiden flicked open a small [System] pane in the corner of his sight like a pocket mirror.
[Scan: Letter â Grey Moth] ⢠Infusion: low-grade nerve sweetener (fear-dulling) ⢠Effect: Reader impulse to **comply** +5% for 10 min ⢠Counter: Calder's bitter infusion; fresh air; mockery đ
"Mockery," Aiden said out loud, relieved to have a tonic he could provide. "Grey Moth says please."
Elara's mouth did the ghost of a smile. "Denied."
They didn't take the bait. They took the letter. Back at Novaterra, Calder brewed bitterness and made everyone drink. The room collectively regretted tongues. đŹ
Venn read the script without touching, eyes glittering like an accountant at a carnival. "He sells process," Venn said. "Rents fear, leases routes, charges late fees in blood."
"Rates?" Aiden asked.
"Offensive," Venn said, delighted. "We will undercut him by offering free rope and expensive tea."
Mara stabbed a finger at the route with red awning. "We'll go sweep, but on our day, not his."
Elara nodded. "Dace can move in two with broom and walls. We send Bryn and Hale for horse-gossip. Rinna keeps Thorn. No heroics." Her eyes slid to Ras. "You guide. If we smell Moth, we stop and laugh at him."
"Yes, captain," Ras said. His ears had the decency to blush at captain. đ
The [System] hummed tidy approval:
[Counter-Scheme Updated] ⢠Grey Moth letter intercepted ⢠Fear-dulling mitigated (Calder) ⢠Operation: Red Awning â scheduled (Tâ2)
"Write back," Aiden said, because you don't leave a man who likes letters alone with his imagination.
Venn sharpened his charcoal with malice. Aiden dictated:
To the man with perfumed paper,Thank you for the route. We will sweep when we choose, not when your moon thinks it is clever.
We pay boys who hang rope. We stop men who hang fear. Your rates are noted; your invoice is denied.
As for foxes: we prefer bridges with boring bushes.
P.S. Thorn sends a punctuation.â Aiden
Rinna contributed a small, inked dot on the margin. Tam beamed like he'd been asked to sign a treaty. Thorn was here. đ
They put the reply under the Smile Rock by dusk. Bryn's snares learned new tricks. Hale taught a bush to behave as if it had always watched letters. Ras walked back with a look that said tea and rope tasted better than fear.
In the oval, Primer v1.1 turned into legs. Elara made the wall drill polite retreat until pride accepted it wasn't hunger. "Two short," she called, and the line flowed backward like water practiced at being a river, not a puddle. "Three sharp," and they peeled out of a pretend snare without tripping themselves. Jory tootled with a seriousness that would have embarrassed him yesterday and delighted him today. đŤĄ
Hadrik rolled out shield bosses that made wood feel like it could survive opinions. "Punch with the board," he lectured. "Not with your ego."
The cavalry ran dust lines at the flanks, learning to look big without being brave-stupid. Bryn took them through a low dip and back out, two riders losing hats and both learning that hats are not formation-critical.
The [System] purred like an anvil pleased with itself:
[Unit Gains] ⢠Shield Wall: +1 Stability (bossed) ⢠Cavalry Screen: +1 Feint ⢠Skirmishers: +1 Priority Targeting (drums)
A runner from Silverbrook arrived with Sera's tidy script and Lia's messy gratitude braided together:
[Message â Silverbrook] ⢠Route "Red Awning" under watch. Primer drills working. Two charms burned. ⢠Market mothers learned 2-short "polite retreat" and now use it on husbands. ⢠Request: paint for flags (children want colors). â Sera & Lia
Mara snorted so hard the stew bubbled. "We'll send paint. And a manual on husbands." đ¨
Aiden packed a small crate: pigments, spare horn, a booklet titled 'Don't Chase (Even At Market)' with Jory's drawingsâstick people, one with a basket heroically not spilled.
The Wall â Corner I took another row; Ansel declared a course "soupsafe," poured a ladle to test, and nodded as if he had just invented physics. Calder wrung out cloths and taught a young apprentice how to bind a sprain and a promise.
Toward late afternoon, Clove appeared at the half-gate with his clerk's face and pond eyes. He held up empty hands, then a small pouch.
"Payment," he said, bland. "For Ras's rope work. Your letter said he'd be paid once."
Mara's eyebrow made a sound like a hinge grinding. "You read our letter."
"I handle the mail," Clove said, as if telling the weather the sky was blue.
Aiden looked at Ras; Ras looked at the pouch like it might bite. "I don't want Moth's coin," he said, and then, after a breath, "I want rope coin."
Elara's eyes warmed the way metal does before tempering. "Good."
Venn glided in and confiscated the pouch with the dignity of a magistrate. "We will launder it into soup," he said. "This is called poetic accounting."
Clove's mouth quirked. "You are going to become insufferable when your walls are tall."
"We're insufferable already," Mara said. "You're late."
He inclined his headâa clerk's bow to a kitchen's queen. Then his gaze ticked to the east, calculating. "Red Hal has a cousin called Pikeâyou saw the name. Pike thinks with his elbows. He'll try to beat the broom into the brush." A pause. "Children with horns are a good idea."
Aiden's pulse did that ugly little thing it had learned lately. "You work for the moth."
"I work for letters," Clove said. "Sometimes they feed worse men if you don't steal them first."
"Steal more," Elara suggested.
"Tea is encouraging," he said, which might have meant stop making it taste like bark. He walked away with a gait that confessed to no hurry and implied it anyway.
"Do we trust him?" Jory asked.
"No," Elara said.
"We use him," Venn added.
"We feed him, or he feeds us," Mara concluded. "Either way, we have spoons."
Dusk put its cool fingers on wood and iron. Aiden walked to the west edge and let the line become a hum. Caltrops sat under the grass like rude prayers. Thorn breathed oil. Bryn was a shadow that liked trees. Ras traced the places he would have hung fear yesterday and set rope there today.
The night's test came mean and smallâfive goblins with more hunger than plan. They met the wall that now had bosses and learned the difference between a push and a No. A drummer tried to drum and got silence for his trouble. One goblin tried to be clever and found rope where there should have been air. "Six low," Jory murmured under his breath, practicing the snare call, and did not blow it because practice stays practice until someone says.
No casualties. One bruise. One shield-boss dentâHadrik stroked it like a cat and promised to polish in the morning.
The [System] tucked the day in:
[Evening Summary â Novaterra] ⢠Grey Moth: Reply intercepted; perfume mitigated ⢠Operation "Red Awning": Scheduled Tâ2 (Dace; support: Bryn/Hale) ⢠Primer v1.1 drills: Effective ⢠Wall Corner I: 30% â 33% ⢠Forge: Shield bosses, javelins ⢠Smile Rock: Dead drop stable; snares improved ⢠Morale: Steady â Resolute đ
Aiden stood with Elara at the half-gate that wanted to be and listened to a town that had decided to be a verb, not a noun.
"He'll write again," Elara said, eyes on the east where letters learned to walk.
"He thinks letters are knives," Aiden said. "We make them bridges. And if he tries to cross with teeth, we make the bridge boring and very, very solid."
"Boring and dangerous," she said, amused. "Your brand."
He breathed out. "Soon," he said, not quite to the air, "we'll have to take the field properly. Open. With dust and drums and flags." He caught himself before saying tell me how the ground lies, and turned it into, "We'll be ready."
"We will," Elara said, and the words sat like a brace under a beam.
They watched the west. Somewhere beyond the caltrops, a drummer tried to remember who paid him to play and decided it wasn't worth the bruise. Somewhere to the east, a man who liked moths dipped his pen and wrote himself into a corner he hadn't realized had rope.
"Novaterra," Aiden told the quiet, "we sharpen paper and stone. We laugh at perfume. We keep our edges. No heroics. Just work." đ
The wind liked it. The wall settled another fraction into promise. And Thornâsmug, oiled, patientâpurred exactly enough to be imagined.