Muriel woke to the sound of knuckles rapping against wood. She lifted her head from the cot and listened. Another knock, harder this time. No one came to her door. She lived too far out, where the moss grew thick and the water sat still. Someone had found her anyway. She slid from the cot and crossed to the door, her tail leaving a wet trail on the floorboards. When she opened it, no one stood outside. Just the grey morning light and the smell of rot. Then she looked down. A piece of paper lay on the threshold, folded once and weighted with a smooth stone. She picked it up. The ink had faded but the words were clear enough: "I need what you have. I will pay." No name. No signature. Muriel scanned the trees and the water beyond. Whoever left it was already gone. She folded the note again and tucked it into her pocket. Word had spread faster than she expected. Someone wanted her secretion badly enough to come all the way out here, but not badly enough to wait and ask her face to face. That told her something. They were either desperate or afraid. Maybe both. She had what they needed, and now she had proof that others would come. Her bathhouse wasn't just a plan anymore. It was something people would seek out. She moved outside and found more than just a note. A jar hung from a wooden post near the water's edge, suspended by wire. Inside, layers of colored slime pooled at the bottom, rainbow bright against the murk. A small snail sat perched on top. She stepped closer. The slime wasn't hers. It was ordinary snail secretion, the kind that did nothing but stick to your hands. Someone had put it there as a marker. A signal. This is the place. This is where the woman with the healing skin lives. The jar swayed slightly in the breeze. She reached up and unhooked it. The slime inside sloshed. Word hadn't just spread. It had been advertised. Beyond the jar, near the edge of her property, a fire still burned in a hollowed log. The flames were low but steady. Whoever had been here had camped. They had waited through the night, maybe longer. Then they had left the note and gone. Muriel crouched beside the fire and held her hands over the heat. The warmth felt good against her skin. She looked back at her hut, then at the jar in her other hand, then at the note in her pocket. Three pieces of evidence. Three signs that her idea had already begun without her permission. She didn't need investors anymore. She needed control. The swamp had decided for her. Now she had to decide what came next.

Muriel spent the next two days watching the jar and the fire pit. No one came back. She checked her records again, calculated what she could charge, and waited. On the third morning, she heard voices before she saw anyone. Two figures came through the trees. One she recognized from the shape of their shoulders, the way they moved too carefully. The other walked beside them, broader and louder. They stopped when they saw the shell-shaped building she'd built between her hut and the water's edge. She'd spent the last two days shaping it from mud and old wood, covering it with moss and vines until it looked natural. A place to meet strangers without letting them inside her home. The nervous one pointed at it, then at her. The broader one stepped forward and called out, "We need it now. My brother's dying." Muriel didn't move from where she sat on the threshold. Behind them, she could see the carriage pulled up at the edge of the clearing, two alligators waiting in their harnesses. They hadn't come alone, and they hadn't come to bargain. The broader one pulled a pouch from his belt and held it up. Moss covered the outside, bright green and wet. "We brought payment. Real coin, traced and counted. Just give us the secretion and we'll go." Muriel looked at the pouch, then at the shell building, then at the two men. She could scrape some secretion into a jar right now and send them away. Or she could make them wait. Make them understand that what she had wasn't something you demanded. The nervous one shifted his weight. "Please," he said. "I left the note. I didn't know he'd bring others. I didn't know he'd—" The broader one cut him off. "Doesn't matter. We need it. Now." Muriel slid forward until she reached the shell building's door. She opened it and gestured inside. "You wait in there," she said. "I'll decide if you get anything." The broader one's face darkened, but the nervous one grabbed his arm and pulled him toward the door. They stepped inside and she shut it behind them. She could hear them arguing through the walls. She looked at the carriage, at the alligators, at the pouch still clutched in the broader one's hand. She had control now. They had come desperate, but she had made them wait. That was the first rule of her bathhouse. No one took from her without her permission. She turned back toward her hut to gather what she needed, moving at her own pace.