The wind carried no warnings—only lullabies. In the cradle of the glade, they were not fugitives or rebels, not warriors or refugees. They were keepers. Carriers of a quiet revolution.
Cruzer didn't sleep, not fully. His body rested, but his thoughts wandered. Each glade they shaped felt less like a camp and more like a heartbeat in a growing rhythm beneath the world. Not war drums. Heartbeats.
Beside him, Elara breathed steadily, presence grounding him. She didn't offer answers—only nearness. That had always been her gift: not prophecy, but presence.
Before dawn, he slipped from beneath the willow's shade. Indigo sky stretched above him, stars like scattered memory. At the spring, Charlotte was already there, murmuring to the water.
"You never sleep before a journey," she said.
"Too many maps in my head."
She smiled faintly. "Then let's make a new one. One without borders. Just songs, kindness, places where people remembered how to be human."
