(Filed under: The Rise)
They lay in the field beneath a sky too large to hold in memory.
The Queen stared upward, eyes tracing constellations that weren’t marked on any map.
Velin walked slowly toward her, coat catching the breeze, pockets already full of paper.
“You left these,” he said.
“I know,” she murmured. “I always do. I forget I’m still writing them.”
He crouched beside her, placing one paper flat on the grass.
“They’re not lost. Just scattered. I’m collecting them.”
She turned her face toward him, eyes a little glassy from the light above.
“And why do you think I keep looking up?” she asked.
“To remember the shape of things,” he answered. “Even if no one ever mapped them.”
A breath passed between them. Not a kiss. Not a claim. Just a shared knowing, fingertips barely touching.
The kind of closeness that doesn’t need a door, because neither of them ever left.