The case file

Record catalogued · NO-NNO-07-001

Prologue: The first record

Ward 7, the Anvil. Before dawn, Day 1, Year 19.

Yvonne set the bowls out before she lit the stove. Tin first, then the blue cloth over the bowl that had no mouth left to answer for it. Behind the house, roof water moved through gravel and reed roots into two cracked drums. Yvonne cleared a snail shell from the screen, smelled the water, and set the shell aside for Junie. The filter bought washing water. The canal remained unsafe.

The shrine glass stood beside the cold burner. Yvonne touched its rim. Water rose above the lip, held for a breath, then fell flat. She filled the glass again from the covered barrel and watched it rise a second time.

She checked the rice sack. It would feed six people if she thinned her own bowl. She marked the barrel level and the changed hum on yesterday’s ward receipt, wrapped the paper in oilcloth, and hid it beneath the counter.