I didn’t get lost this time.
The path to the terraces had started to etch itself into muscle memory—left at the junction with the cracked pipe, right at the mural where some bored child had drawn a very determined-looking goat. The air grew cooler and more humid the closer I got, carrying the faint scent of growing things and nutrient solution.
The gardens were quieter than earlier, most of the morning shift already done and the afternoon crew not yet fully arrived. Light panels overhead bathed the tiered beds in a soft, even glow. Vines trailed along wires, broad-leafed plants crowded in neat rows, and patches of something that looked suspiciously like kale stubbornly occupied one corner.
A human woman in a stained tunic stood at a central console, frowning at a readout. She glanced up as my shadow crossed the threshold.
“You’re the courier,” she said, not unkindly. “Lina, yes?”
“That’s me.” I hooked my thumb through my belt loop to keep from fiddling with the empty tag chain. “Need any help?”
She eyed my ankle but didn’t comment. “You know anything about root density in tiered beds?”
“Only that if you pack them too close, everyone starves,” I said. “Convoys used barrel gardens sometimes, but nothing like this.”
“Good enough.” She stepped aside. “The nutrient flow is fine, but the lower rows on the south side keepunderperforming. I think they’re getting shaded out by the top tier, but every time I suggest thinning, people act like I’ve proposed burning the grain stores.”
I studied the layout. The upper beds were lush, leaves thick and overlapping. The lower ones were definitely spindlier, reaching toward any stray light.
“How often do you rotate crops between levels?” I asked.
She blinked. “Rotate?”
“Yeah. On the road, we rotated storage all the time so older goods didn’t sit in the back until they went stale. Same idea here. If the top tier is hogging the best light and nutrients, move new starts up there, move older ones down, or stagger planting times. That way no one level becomes the permanent underdog.”
The woman tilted her head, considering. “We’ve been treating each row as fixed. Less to track.”
“Sure,” I said. “Until the bottom ones starve and you have to explain why you’re getting half your potential yield because the beds are easier to track.”
A laugh snorted out of her before she could stop it. “You’re blunt.”
“I’m hungry,” I said. “Self-interest masquerading as wisdom.”
Something shifted behind me, and the hair at the back of my neck prickled in that now-familiar way. I didn’t have to turn to know Rygnar had entered. The air seemed to notch down half a degree around him—not colder exactly, just more focused.
“What’s wrong with the south beds?” he asked, coming up beside us.
“Nothing yet,” the gardener said. “But your stray human here wants me to start rotating the crops like wagon stock.”
He glanced at me, one brow ridge lifting. “Does she?”
“It’s just a suggestion,” I said. “If you want the lower rows to keep failing, ignore me. I’ll go back to reorganizing bandages.”
He looked at the beds, then at the console. “Nutrient distribution?”
“Even,” the woman said. “Light exposure is the only obvious variable.”
He folded his arms, considering. “Rotation would complicate tracking.”
“Not if you mark the tray sides,” I said. “Color code, date planted, tier history. You already tag harvest weights, right?”
The gardener nodded. “In a ledger, yes.”
“Then you’re halfway there,” I said. “If it works, you get more food. If it doesn’t, you can tell me I was wrong and feed me extra kale as punishment.”
Rygnar’s mouth twitched at the corner. “There are worse consequences.”
“Not many,” I muttered.
