Ethan declared, "I want to lay everything out."
Lina, who had been sitting cross-legged at the corner of the table, straightened. She had been watching him sketch for hours, but this was the first time he spoke with such certainty.
"Map?" she asked.
"Exactly," Ethan said, tapping the old sheet of parchment. "Streets. Blocks. Farmland. Public areas. Homes, markets, workshops, everything. A town without order is chaos. And chaos weakens us."
Lina frowned, twisting a strand of hair. "People won't like moving their houses."
Ethan chuckled. "I'm not tearing down what's already built. But everything new has to follow a plan. If we don't, we'll just keep patching problems forever."
He set a piece of charcoal to the parchment. The sheet was wrinkled and stained, but it would serve. He began slowly, carefully, drawing a large circle in the center.
"This will be the heart of Greyrest," he explained. "A plaza. A hub for everyone. From here, streets extend outward like spokes. Wide enough for carts, with drainage on the sides. No more wagons sinking into mud or filth washing into people's homes."
He sketched more lines, arcs crossing the spokes to form neighborhoods. "The wind comes from the west, so we put the smoke-heavy trades downwind. The land slopes east, so drainage flows that way. Farmland here, close enough for people to reach, but not pressed against the houses. The main plaza will always catch the sunlight."
Lina leaned closer, eyes wide though her brow stayed creased. "And in the middle of the plaza?"
"A well," Ethan said. "A clean one, stone-lined. Water at the center of everything. And maybe, someday, a statue. Not of me, something that belongs to everyone."
Lina smiled faintly. "I think people would like that."
The next day, Ethan took the plan to the people.
The villagers gathered in the square, a crooked patch of dirt with leaning stalls and chickens pecking about. Children clung to mothers' skirts. Old men leaned on canes, suspicious eyes following Ethan's movements.
He held the parchment high. "People of Greyrest! We've spoken of water, waste, and walls. But these alone aren't enough. If we build without order, we'll spend our lives fixing the same problems. With order, we build a future."
He unrolled the parchment across a wooden board. The crowd muttered.
One man scratched his beard. "What's all this scratching? Looks like spider legs."
A woman shook her head. "Too many lines. Too many rules. We already have our homes."
Ethan crouched, set aside the parchment, and drew in the dirt with a stick. "Here is your house. Here is your neighbor. And here a street wide enough for carts. No more wheels stuck in the mud. Here is a place for the children. Here, a market roofed against the rain. And here, he jabbed the stick, a deep, clean well. No more drinking the same water used for washing."
The villagers' murmurs softened. Faces changed, suspicion giving way to curiosity.
"The land itself tells us where to build," Ethan continued. "I only listened. Water flows this way. Wind comes that way. Sunlight falls here. We build with it, not against it."
An old farmer stepped forward, weather-beaten skin pulled tight across his cheekbones. "You're saying water will come into town? No more walking to the ravine?"
"Yes," Ethan answered simply. "And not just water. Fields close enough to reach. Drainage so storms don't drown your crops. Streets leading straight to the gates, so traders can find their way. If Greyrest stands, it cannot be a tangle of huts. It must be a place people want to stay, not leave."
The murmuring rose again. Boys offered to carry pegs. Old women argued about where stalls should stand. Some men scowled and muttered about wasted effort, but no one walked away.
Lina stood off to the side, watching with quiet pride. For the first time, people weren't listening out of duty, they were listening because they wanted to believe.
The next few days turned into a blur of work. Ethan rose before dawn, walking the land with rope, pegs, and a string weighted with stone. He measured slopes, marked lines, and adjusted paths so water would drain away from homes instead of drowning them.
Children followed close behind, laughing as they carried the pegs. "Here, master Ethan!" they cried, running to push them into the earth. Their small hands tugged the ropes tight, tracing new paths where streets would one day run.
Young men dug shallow grooves where he pointed, testing how water would flow when rain fell. The grooves guided the runoff toward lower ground. For the first time, the villagers saw how the earth itself could be shaped to serve them instead of fight them.
Lina never left his side. She copied his marks onto scraps of wood, painting simple symbols, houses, wells, markets. She might not have understood every detail, but she saw the pattern forming. More than once, she caught herself staring at Ethan, wondering how someone his age knew so much.
One evening, as the last light faded, a town elder came to him. Harren was his name, a man bent with age yet still sharp-eyed. His cane tapped against the soil as he studied the lines Ethan had laid out.
"You see more than the rest of us," Harren said slowly. "You walk this land as though you've been here longer than any of us."
Ethan shook his head. "I only listen. The land speaks, where water falls, where wind blows, where the sun stays longest. We build with it, not against it."
Harren grunted, neither agreeing nor disagreeing, but his gaze softened before he walked away.
When the day's work ended, Ethan's nights began. By lantern light, he hunched over the parchment, redrawing lines again and again. His fingers were smudged black from charcoal, his sleeves dusted with chalk.
Where others saw only huts and fields, Ethan saw grids, plazas, drainage channels, and shaded groves. He spoke aloud to himself as he drew.
"This street will bear carts," he muttered. "Paving stones, later. Here, space for wells. Public restrooms every block. Here,schools. Not now, but someday. If we don't leave space, the town will choke itself."
The plan grew with every line, every smudge.
Lina brought him bread and a bowl of stew. She set them beside him and sat quietly, chin resting on her knees. She listened to his voice, though much of what he said made little sense to her.
At last, she asked, "Why draw places for things we don't have? Schools? Restrooms? These are for cities, not for us."
Ethan paused, staring at the half-finished grid. "Because if we wait, people will squeeze them in wherever they find room. And when they do, it will break the town apart. If we leave room now, the future will breathe."
Lina nodded slowly, sensing the weight behind his words.
Days passed, and the villagers began to see.
They saw trenches carry stormwater away from homes. They saw paths wide enough for carts, no longer a mess of mud and broken wheels. They saw the plaza's circle take shape, a place to gather that wasn't just dirt.
Still, not everyone agreed.
"Why move my stall ten paces?" one trader argued.
"Why must I dig where he says?" another grumbled.
Ethan never shouted. He explained. Patiently, again and again, he walked them through the plan. He showed them how stalls in rows would keep paths clear, how drains cut here would save their crops from floods. Some still muttered, but fewer turned away each day.
Hayward the mason, took special interest. Broad-shouldered and scarred from years of stonework, he squinted at Ethan's drawings by firelight. "Never seen plans like this. But I have heard of then but I haven't gone beyond this town, so I haven't seen that much. Streets with drains, trees in rows, houses facing the sun. Strange. But…" He rubbed his beard. "I think it could work."
Ethan clapped him on the shoulder. "It will. And I'll need your hands to shape it."
For the first time, Hayward grinned, a wide, genuine grin. It was the first Ethan had seen from the man.
By the end of the week, Greyrest was no longer the same. It was still poor, still rough, still more mud than stone. But the people could see the lines now. They could see the shape forming.
Ethan knew they were far from finished. True walls would take time. Aqueducts, paved streets, shaded courtyards, these were dreams for the future. But for now, something far more important had been built.