The river did not roar.
It whispered.
Anna noticed it first at dawn, standing ankle-deep in mist where the water bent inward toward the settlement. The current slid past stones worn smooth by centuries of argument, its surface unbroken, deceptively calm. No turbulence. No visible threat.
And yet—
She felt it.
Not watching. Not reaching.
Remembering.
She crouched and let her fingers trail into the cold flow. The sensation was sharp, grounding, utterly physical—and threaded beneath it was something older than language. A pressure that did not ask who she was, only whether she belonged.
She withdrew her hand slowly.
Behind her, Lexus shifted on the bank.
“You feel it too,” he said.
“Yes.”
“That’s not cultivation.”
“No,” Anna agreed. “It’s consent-based.”
That made him glance up
