Afternoon turned to logistics and traps with clean hands. Oakwatch blinked — . (ready); the air over the hills was dry enough for mirrors to gossip. 🙂
— Afternoon Brief — Novaterra• Drum Lexicon v0.3: add stall cadence & back-edge (long–short–long)• Optics Sting: deploy nonsense light-call ("pretend thunder") at dusk• Addendum: draft Optics Law (light for logistics only; misuse → fines/work-service)• After-Sight: Ready (0/1)• Morale: Work-bright 🙂
Clove's leaf said: You are about to test white in front of people who rent fear. They will try to see your light calls. Consider pretend thunder at dusk to count eyes on the hills. — C.
"Trap," Jory grinned. "Let there be small thunder."
They tuned glass: Kessa seated a thinner lens in the shelf; Émile buffed edges; Jory ticked angle marks; children were banned from the platform with love. 😅
Bryn and Hale set shadow posts on two likely hills; Ras packed a coil, a smile, and three spare mouthpieces for generous knotholes.
Dusk folded the day neat.
"Signal shelf," Jory murmured, lifting the pane. He flashed dot-dot-dash-dash—the nonsense light-call nobody but Novaterra should answer—Oakwatch → Cairn #8 → back → a teasing hop to Glass Isle.
Two breaths. Three.
On the western shoulder, a wink replied—dot-dot-dash-dash—from a hill with no cairn. The beam wobbled, new hands on glass.
Bryn and Hale were already moving. Ras drifted where hope had predicted absence and found canvas, a cheap hand mirror, and a boy whose pockets smelled like walnut ink and coin.
"Bridge Law," Bryn said, gentle and flat. "Light is for letters. You rent fear during white, you sweep for a season."
The boy looked past them at the Parley Box, at the water bucket and the absence of drama. His shoulders revised themselves. He nodded.
Hale took the mirror; Ras cut the tell seam on the canvas with bored kindness; Bryn walked him down the hill without making a story of it.
— Optics Sting — "Pretend Thunder"• Eavesdropper: 1 (human; Pike hire)• Gear: canvas hood; cheap mirror; handbill scraps• Action: detained; warned; mirror confiscated; assigned broom work (season)• Lesson: nonsense light-call works; hills watched
Venn nailed the Optics Addendum beside Bridge Law and the Pact of Brooms:
Light is for logistics (count, water, ready).No alarm calls by mirror.Misuse → fine to Widows' Rope + work-service (brooms/latrines).Parley hours: no mirrors within bowshot.
Lucien read it and smiled like a banker recognizing a regulation written by someone who has touched a shovel. "You regulate light the way I regulate credit," he said. "We should trade ledgers."
"Bring sand and a broom," Mara replied, filling his bowl anyway. 🍲🙂
Night softened the fields. Oakwatch winked — . (ready); Cairn #8 returned — . (ready) correctly now, which pleased Jory in ways he tried not to advertise. 🫡 The Fort smoked like a thought counting to six. On the palisade, Tavi moved once, then twice, guards thinning around him.
Aiden didn't spend After-Sight. He put his hand on oak and trusted boards. Tomorrow, white would be tested at the left bank. They had made room for it and written the grammar on the air.
Elara bumped his shoulder with her gauntlet. "Mirrors behave," she said.
"And so will we," he answered.
"Good arithmetic."
"Novaterra," Aiden told the cairns and the tower and the river that now knew the difference between letters and alarms, "we trapped a mirror with pretend thunder, wrote law for light, and kept white from being a stage. Tomorrow we keep it honest at the water. No heroics. Just work." 🙂
— Evening Snapshot — Chapter 36B• Optics sting complete; Optics Addendum posted• Drum Lexicon v0.3: stall, back-edge added; horn translations updated• Cordon steady; white zone prepared (left bank mid-sun)• Spawn Window: 6–11 days; sally appetite low• Morale: Quiet-proud; eyes open for white 🙂