The rise resolved slowly, its slope gentled by centuries of passage and pause. Stone formed its spine, but soil and root had softened the edges, blurring any clean division between what had been laid and what had grown. The light caught there and stayed—not bright, not dim, but held in suspension, as if the space had learned how to keep it.
At the crest, the path leveled.
Beyond it lay a clearing unlike the meadow they had left. This one was enclosed, not by walls, but by agreement. The trees formed a loose ring, their trunks bent subtly inward, branches interlaced high above to shape a canopy that did not block the sky so much as filter intention from it. The ground was bare in places, worn smooth by time rather than traffic.
At the center stood a circle of stone.
Not arranged. Revealed.
