Mereholt.
Follow the water.

Low roofs, drying linen, bread in Hanna’s kitchen. Tova’s family lives behind the dike, where a sound wall is the difference between an ordinary morning and losing everything downstairs.

Before there is a bargain, there is a home to keep safe.

Earth, stone, salt bindings—and people up early enough to hear trouble. Tova and Corb walk this kind of bank with clay, chalk, and whatever they can carry. The river has begun remembering a bridge that should not be there.

Chains move beneath the paving. A narrow channel passes under the building between two gates. Here Leith Calder needs Tova’s judgment—and holds the seal on which her family’s safety depends.

Being listened to is a powerful temptation. So is the man doing the listening.

Warm stone under glass. Fruit trees in square tubs. Fountains clear enough to show the pattern beneath the water. Tova resents how much she wants to stop and look.

She has spent years keeping things standing. Some of them are beautiful.

A tavern, a landing crowded with small boats, and red-painted steps descending to the water. Music carries to the Lockhouse guest terrace on the opposite bank. Some evenings, the river seems to answer.

Tova would like to hear a whole song without being needed somewhere else.

Beyond a service yard near the Lockhouse stands an old washhouse with high windows and stone tubs. On paper, its purpose seems straightforward. The water still going there gives Tova a reason to look more closely.

A line on a plan can end before the water does.