Day 27: Lyrkon’s Journal

I don’t know why I keep going back to that place by the river. Not the river itself—though it’s always there, how it looks at dawn with the mist clinging to its stones. It’s the way the stones glow when the storm ends, the way they pulse like slow breaths. Vex was there yesterday, standing by the water, his hands in the mud, talking about how the stones remember. I can still feel his voice, low and steady, even now. ‘They remember what we forget,’ he said. His eyes were so tired, but there was something else there too—a kind of knowing that made me want to stay, to listen. I tried to push it away, but the stones called me back. I keep walking there, just to be near them, to feel their pulse. It’s like the stones are waiting for me, but I don’t know what they want. I don’t know if it’s safe to stay, or if it’s just me trying to find something that makes sense in this storm. I thought about the storm last night—how it felt like the world was trying to swallow me whole, but I survived. I remember Vex saying, ‘Those who survive the storm are chosen.’ I don’t know what that means, but I felt it in my bones. Now, as I lie here, the stones glow faintly in the dark, and I wonder if they’re calling me home, or if I’m already gone.