The celebration's bonfires had burned out, their lingering warmth fading completely in the cold wind before dawn.
Minas Tirith, that vast construction site, stirred awake again as the first pale gray light pierced the clouds.
The brief frenzy of cheers and ale was swept away by the bitter cold of a winter morning and the work ahead.
The workers wrapped their clothes tightly around themselves and emerged from rows of unfinished barrel-shaped buildings, their breath steaming white.
Their faces still bore the weariness of hangovers, but the cold had clearly dispelled yesterday's mood, leaving only reality behind.
After all, the glory belonged to their lord. They still had to use their hammers and carts to earn the rations and merit points that would see them through winter.
Tristan rose early. He stood on the third floor of City Hall, overlooking the streams of people bustling below like colonies of ants.
His brow was faintly furrowed.
The city's population had already surpassed ten thousand, more than ninety percent of whom were refugees and bankrupt farmers who had arrived over the past two months. They came from all across the Duchy, with a jumble of accents and differing habits. All they knew of the Gray Marsh Fief was that it offered food and work.
Loyalty was a luxury that required time, order, and shared memories to cultivate.
And time was precisely what Minas Tirith lacked most.
Just then, Tristan's gaze settled on a small, detached two-story building at the other end of City Hall's square.
It was the temporary lodging the Lord's Manor had allocated to the Church of the Lord of Everglory.
Rather than settle in Newborn Town, with its better administration and more complete facilities, the priest Fabian had insisted on coming to this chaotic, noisy harbor construction site, filled