Thran pushed through the last of the underbrush. Just as he did, the sight of the village came into view. However, the village wasn't what he had imagined.
His pupils expanded as his breath hitched.
The other members had almost identical reactions.
The palisade wall— the same one he had helped reinforce with his own hands before departing—now stood twice its former height.
The fresh timber was pale against the weathered logs beneath as though the entire structure had grown overnight like some living creature.
New watchtowers rose at intervals he didn't remember placing, their silhouettes sharp and unfamiliar against the moonlit sky.
Where there had once been open fields beyond the wall, now stood rows of half-finished granaries, their frames skeletal in the dark but unmistakably numerous — far more than the single granary the elders had approved before he left.
