Location: Branhal Time: Evening - Day 2
The village bell tolled once at dusk.
Alec stood in Mira's doorway, gazing across the village square where shadows stretched long and orange over the dirt. Chimneys exhaled their last smoke before nightfall, and voices lowered into murmurs as doors closed and shutters creaked. Only a few lights remained lit — but one glowed brighter than the others.
The old council hall, if it could be called that, was little more than a longhouse built from thick timber and dark stone, its outer walls choked with ivy and age. The roof sagged at the middle, but its presence was solid. It was the only structure in Branhal built before the memory of anyone living — before even Old Garric's time, according to Mira.
Now it called to him.
"Are you sure about this?" Mira asked at his side. She held a lantern, her face part concern, part curiosity.
"He asked to see me," Alec said. "I won't make him wait."
"He didn't ask. Jorren passed the message from his son. That's not the same as a formal summons."
"Then it's an informal test. All the more reason to pass it."
Mira handed him the lantern. "Don't threaten him. He won't respond well."
"I don't threaten people, Mira."
She raised an eyebrow.
"Not unless they give me a reason," he added.
Inside the Longhouse
The interior of the hall was warm and smelled faintly of beeswax, pipe smoke, and old paper. Torches lined the walls in bronze sconces, each burning low with a dull orange flicker. A long wooden table stretched down the center of the chamber, with mismatched chairs placed around it.
At the far end, a large, high-backed chair carved from dark oak sat atop a raised platform. In it reclined an older man — Headman Harwin.
He looked up as Alec entered.
"Close the door," the man said, voice gravelled by age but sharp enough to command obedience.
Alec obeyed, taking a moment to assess the room. Only two others were present — Merrit, a gaunt man with ink-stained fingers, likely a scribe or advisor, and Silla, a wide-shouldered woman in boiled leather, clearly Branhal's militia leader.
"Come forward," Harwin said.
Alec approached the table calmly, noting how Silla's hand hovered near the hilt of her belt-knife. Merrit was scribbling notes already. Harwin leaned forward in his chair, elbows on the table.
"You're taller than they said."
"And you're sharper than most would expect for a village head," Alec replied.
A tense silence followed.
Then Harwin chuckled. "Good. You're not just another madman with strange words and empty hands."
"I came here with less than nothing," Alec said. "But I'm working on changing that."
Harwin gestured to the side chair. "Sit."
Alec did.
Harwin poured two cups of bitter cider and slid one across the table. Alec took it politely.
"You speak like a noble," Harwin said. "But you carry no crest. No sigil. No weapons. You arrive in fire and smoke, unconscious, half-dead — and now in two days, you've repaired three village tools, improved Jorren's forge draft, and taught Mira something about burn-cleaning that she claims saved two infected boys this morning."
"I'm trying to be useful."
"That's what concerns me," Harwin said.
Merrit looked up from his notes. "You have knowledge that doesn't match your origins. You speak Edenese tongue too well for a foreigner."
"I learn fast."
"You think too fast," Silla muttered from her corner.
Alec sipped the cider — sour, unrefined, but strong. "If thinking quickly is a threat, then I am dangerous."
Silla straightened, her tone hardening. "You don't deny it?"
"No." Alec met her stare. "Because I am dangerous. Not to the people here. But to the way the world is."
Harwin studied him for a long moment.
"I've overseen Branhal for nineteen years," the headman said. "I've survived taxes, famines, mercenaries, and two false plagues. I know when something unnatural comes crawling into my town."
"And I know when something old is about to be broken open," Alec said. "You feel it, don't you? The tremble under your feet. The way people talk when they think no one's listening."
Harwin's jaw tightened.
"You didn't bring me here to test my manners," Alec continued. "You want to know what I want. Why I haven't asked for coin, land, or women. Why I look at your forge like it's a child's toy."
Harwin said nothing.
"I want your trust," Alec said.
That finally broke the silence.
Merrit chuckled softly, shaking his head.
Harwin raised an eyebrow. "You want the one thing you can't have so easily."
"I don't expect it easily. I expect to earn it."
"How?"
"By making Branhal the first village in Edenia to stop living like it's still in the dark."
Harwin leaned back. "You speak of light like a prophet."
"I speak of it like a man who's held it in his hands."
Silla stood. "That's enough riddles."
Harwin lifted a hand to silence her.
"You want to change Branhal?" he asked. "Then you'll prove it. Publicly."
Alec tilted his head. "How?"
"There's a watermill a league north, long broken. Abandoned after the last flood twisted its wheel out of alignment. No one's been able to fix it. We've used hand-grinders ever since. If you can bring it back to working order — without magic, without lies — you'll have my attention. Maybe more."
Alec thought for a moment, then nodded. "I'll need access. A team. Wood. Rope. Tools."
Harwin glanced at Silla. "You'll assign two men."
"To help him?" she growled.
"To watch him," Harwin corrected. "And report what he does."
Silla grunted.
Harwin turned back to Alec. "One week. If the wheel turns, we'll talk again."
"If it turns," Alec said calmly, "you'll never look at water the same way again."
Outside the Hall
The air was cool, the moon rising over the trees in a pale silver arc. Mira waited in the square, arms folded. She straightened as Alec emerged.
"How did it go?"
"I have a week," Alec said. "To rebuild an abandoned watermill and prove I'm not a fraud."
"That's... bold of him."
"No," Alec replied. "It's smart. He's not afraid of me. He's afraid of needing me."
They walked slowly, the quiet of the evening wrapping around them like fog.
Mira glanced at him. "Can you do it? Fix the mill?"
"Fix it?" Alec smiled faintly. "I can make it ten times more efficient. That mill was designed by people who didn't understand water pressure or torque distribution. I do."
She studied him as they walked.
"You're not what I expected," she said.
"What did you expect?"
"A false god," she said. "A madman. A liar."
"And now?"
She shrugged. "Now I think you're just a man trying to build a new world... inside the shell of an old one."
Alec stopped walking. He looked at the dark sky, the stars unfamiliar above.
"I don't know how I got here," he said. "I don't know if I can ever go back. But I do know this: this place is ripe for something greater. For an awakening."
"And you think you're the one to bring it?"
He met her gaze.
"I'm the only one who can."