The keepers say the consortium began after a dry-season fire left a block of Slate Yard without drinking water. A handful of pump workers, bath attendants, and carriers pooled their tools to reopen a buried cistern that had been sealed after an old collapse. Their first deliveries were carried in borrowed vessels and sold by the cup. The name Warm Wells Keepers was already painted on a warning board at the sealed access: WARM WELL, KEEP OUT. They kept the words as the name of their work, claiming that renaming a dangerous place invites it to become dangerous again. At first, the group charged only for labor and repairs. As demand grew, it took long-term supply contracts, bought route rights, and concealed the cistern locations to prevent private landowners from fencing them off. Its defining watershed came during the Ash-Dry Week, when a route blockade cut most deliveries. The keepers opened an emergency ration line and supplied water to the ward's fire crews, but refused to reveal the cisterns even when officials demanded access. The fire was contained; the consortium became indispensable, and its secrecy became both its shield and its original sin. Since then it has expanded quietly, survived a failed takeover by a wealthy customer, and learned to treat maps, maintenance records, and favors as carefully guarded assets.