The silence after was not empty.
It was thick, alive, trembling with a weight that no one in the Circle could name.
The Book That Refused to Close remained open, its pages breathing in rhythm with the roots beneath. The air tasted faintly of ash still, but also of rain that had not yet fallen, of soil that had not yet been turned, of seeds waiting in the dark.
The Second Seed Child closed their fingers gently around the trembling root in their palm. It did not vanish. It did not dissolve. It stayed. A reminder, a burden, a gift.
The Stranger without the mask looked upward. Above them was not sky, not stars, but a vast canopy of shifting dark, filled with shapes that suggested constellations yet refused to settle into them. His lips parted as if to speak—but no words came, only a breath that seemed to weave itself into the unseen loom above.
