Song for this chapter: Human by Rusty Clanton
Zephan;
I hardly bring many people here.
In fact, I never bring anyone here.
The path is narrow, half-swallowed by ivy and silverleaf vines.
It's curled everywhere like a beautiful defence. Curled along the pasty way and wrapped around the collapsed archway, most of the palace no longer remember exists.
The stone beneath our feet is cracked and softened by moss and time, and. Every step feels like trespass, but how can I trespass in a place I created?
Aunt Selthía walks beside me in silence.
She does not ask where we are going, and she does not rush me. That alone tells me she senses the weight of what I am about to show her.
… How important it is to me.
When I push the last curtain of vines apart, the air changes.
Warmth welcomes my skin first. Then beautiful light bathes me.
My hidden garden opens before us like a slice of a world no man was meant to see.
Golden light is what constitutes this beauty.
