The first tremor was not felt but remembered.
A pulse through the ground—like breath being drawn from beneath existence. Not seismic. Temporal. A recall of all that had been suppressed, dismissed, unfinished. And from that hidden reservoir beneath the Grove, where the Memoryroot had first stirred, something more than memory awakened.
It was not benevolence.
It was not malice.
It was return.
A Return older than vengeance. Older than structure.
A Return of what had once been offered—then forgotten.
And now, it wanted to be known.
---
The Ashen Librarians Arrive
Their footsteps made no sound. Their robes were soot-stained. Their eyes were pages long since turned to ash.
The Ashen Librarians came not from the Archive, but from the burned libraries of intention—the places where stories were never even allowed to begin.
Each carried a relic: a charred index card, a melted cassette, a locked laptop with no charger.
But one held a match.
And one held a tongue made of wax.
