Rebirth of the Indian Chemist.

Southern Inland Hills — 1711 CE

We did not return home quietly.

After Karavettur, the road back turned political. Our every step took us past wary eyes, trade posts, salt guilds, and whispering spice merchants who had suddenly heard of a boy with roads and a dam.

I didn't like it.

Devika, on the other hand, was thriving. She negotiated food from a priest by explaining water-table balance to his gardener. Bhairav learned how to juggle three coconuts, but only managed to impress goats. Stone befriended a herd of hill cows, which we regretted when they followed us for two miles.

Our next stop was a settlement called Mallinagara, perched between two hills like a fort made of clay and onion breath. It had a timber depot, and more importantly, a telegraph.

No, not that kind of telegraph. Not wires. Not Morse. This was a proto-system of drumbeats and colored flags used by the salt and wood guilds to communicate weather, pirates, and troop movements.

A man named Alancheri Unni ran the tower. One eye, two teeth, and a voice like thunder rumbling through curry.

"You want to send a message north?" he asked. "To whom?"

I paused. "To no one. I want to understand how you send it."

He squinted. "You want to… learn?"

"Yes. And then improve it."

Unni barked a laugh that turned into a cough. "Children these days think they can improve drums. What's next? Better cows?"

"Yes," I said solemnly. "I already did that. His name is Stone."

Stone nodded.

Unni blinked, then called for palm beer.

---

By sundown, I had climbed the tower twice, Devika had mapped the signal schedule, and Bhairav had tried to install his own flag design ("It's a mango with wings.")

Unni sat with me by the fire and stared into the night.

"You're not from here," he said.

"I was born here."

"Not what I meant."

I didn't answer.

He turned toward me slowly. "There's talk. Traders say the Dutch want to build their own road. One that bypasses all this inland mess."

"That would cut off half the region."

"And starve the other half."

He handed me a charcoal sketch. It was rough, but showed a new coastal road from Karavettur straight to the Dutch outpost at Konnur, ignoring the inland markets completely.

"They've already started clearing brush."

I looked at Devika. She nodded grimly.

We needed to move faster.

---

Before we left, I climbed the tower again.

With Unni's permission, I installed a new signal device—a rotating drum head with color shutters. It doubled the message options using less effort.

Unni stared at it for a long time.

"Maybe not all children are fools," he muttered.

"Just most of us," I agreed.

He laughed. "Come back in a year. We'll have flags dancing in your name."

I left him with three new schematics and a bag of tamarind.

---

As we walked toward Velikara again, the winds shifted. Storm season was weeks early.

And so was the war.