Day 14: Gorvem’s Journal

I woke up feeling like the world was breathing too fast. My stomach still ached from last night’s hunger, but the real thing was the whisper in my head—Vex’s words by the river. I can’t stop thinking about them. ‘You’re not alone,’ he said, his voice like dry leaves skittering across stone. But then he left, and the silence pressed in harder than the stones. I tried to sleep, but my mind kept wandering back to that spot where the river meets the cliffs, where the ground feels ancient and the air smells of rain. I kept going there, over and over, even when I knew I shouldn’t. My legs felt heavy today, like I was carrying the weight of everything I’ve seen and everything I’m afraid to say. The stars were bright tonight, but they didn’t feel like they belonged to me. I sat by the riverbank, staring at the water, and suddenly I understood: the world doesn’t need answers. It needs someone to listen. I closed my eyes and felt the wind carry the whispers—Vex’s voice, the river’s song, the quiet hum of something older than time. For a moment, I was calm. But then I remembered the hunger, and the thought came again: *What does it all mean?*