“Be gentle—time is listening.”

The corridor was dark as a well of stars, the air thin with old prayers. I waited beside the moonlit arch when he arrived—white fur, pearl hair, red sash catching stray light. He didn’t speak. He rarely needed to. The quiet around him said enough.

Beyond the arch, the echo of a ruined hourglass trembled, a fault in time like glass about to ring. Constellation-lines brightened. The chamber answered—motifs of gold waking on the floor, dust lifting as if remembering how to fall.

The crack steadied. The arch cooled. Something gentle—steadier than courage, softer than surrender—moved through the room and settled where the world had been thin.

I checked the instruments; the needle stopped shivering. Far off, the campfires of our friends held. He turned, haloed in the afterglow, and the night felt properly arranged again.

Some heroes shatter mountains. He smooths seconds—so the rest of us can breathe.

Art ©  Xngfng95