Sorkk waits with his weight on the balls of his feet, as if listening for a machine to start beneath the floor. His skin is roughened and darkened at the knuckles and forearms by years of soot, caustic wash, and hot workshop air; pale clean lines remain where gloves usually cover his wrists. His hair is clipped close on one side and left in a stubborn bristle on the other, permanently dusted with copper filings. When he walks, he places each foot carefully and silently, but his shoulders bob with barely contained energy. He gives the impression of a small, alert creature trying very hard to look like a seasoned professional. Unexpectedly, he keeps a tiny paper theater folded in his tool case and can make its cutout figures dance with nimble precision.

Sorkk is observant and hungry to prove himself, yet uncomfortable when attention settles on him. Around machines, he becomes exact and decisive; around people, especially Khorvash, he measures every word and can mistake silence for wisdom. He is generous with his time but guarded with his worries. When relaxed, he is playful and unexpectedly theatrical; when afraid, he turns every feeling into a list of measurements.

Sorkk was raised around the repair sheds of a floodgate settlement, where a broken hinge could drown a street before dawn. He learned to sort screws before he could read and joined Khorvash Vezdrik's workshop as an apprentice after repairing a pressure gauge with a bent nail and a strip of boiled leather. Sorkk admires Khorvash's ability to see how a whole machine works from one loose tooth, and once defended him publicly when a council inspector called him reckless. That loyalty shifted during the winter test of the east sluice: Khorvash ordered the gate opened despite a reading Sorkk had marked as unsafe. The gate held, but afterward Sorkk found a second, scorched calibration mark beneath the dial and a page torn from the test record. Since then he has quietly compared old measurements, afraid the mark proves Khorvash concealed a dangerous mistake. He still brings the older artificer tea and still wants his approval. Meanwhile, Sorkk's friend and fellow apprentice, Sheshi, has been assigned to the east sluice maintenance crew and may be put at risk if the flaw is real. Sorkk is trying to establish what happened before the next heavy rain, without destroying the person who gave him his first chance.