Margit returned at twilight.
Not to warn.
Not to lecture.
But to ask.
Astrid heard her before she saw her — boots on wet gravel, a cough softened by age, and a rhythm to her presence that was more tidal than human.
The door creaked open.
And Astrid, still in her robe from the bathhouse, stood from her writing table without surprise.
Margit entered, uninvited but not unwelcome.
"You didn't burn the book," she said, eyeing the red leather volume on the table.
"No," Astrid replied. "But I've stopped writing everyone."
Margit's eyebrow lifted.
"And started writing yourself?"
Astrid smiled faintly.
"I'm still learning where I begin."
Margit removed her coat. Beneath it, she wore nothing but a linen shift, soft with age, and a body marked by time — the scars still visible along her shoulder and hip.
Astrid saw them differently now.
Not curses.
Verses.
"I want to show you something," Margit said.
She walked to the fireplace, lifted her hair, and turned her back.
Etched into the skin beneath her shoulder blade was a symbol — not just scarred, but inked.A rune.Old. Sharp. Deep as language.
"I was branded," she said. "By the fjord. The night it took my book."
Astrid stepped closer. Traced it with her fingers.
Margit inhaled sharply.
"No one has touched it in decades."
Astrid whispered:
"Then let me be the one who writes it back into your body."
She guided Margit to the hearth rug.
No seduction.
Only consent.
They undressed slowly, reverently, the fire casting shadow against their skin like ancient script. Astrid kissed the inside of Margit's wrists, the crease beneath her breast, the shallow place just below her navel.
But not her mouth.
Not yet.
Margit whispered:
"Don't make me young. Don't make me beautiful. Just make me real."
Astrid didn't answer with words.
She answered with touch.
Fingers, slow and trembling, moved down Margit's thighs like pens in holy hands.
She kissed the rune.Then the scar beneath it.Then the soft, silver hair between Margit's legs — and there, she paused.
"You still want this?" she asked.
Margit nodded.
And Astrid wrote a poem with her tongue — one that never needed to be written down.
Margit came like a breath caught in a bell —soft, sudden, resonant.
Afterward, they lay curled together, two different times of life tangled in the same warm present.
And Margit finally said:
"I was wrong.The fjord didn't punish me for writing.It punished me for hoarding.I tried to make it mine."
Astrid whispered:
"Then let's never own it.Let's just keep giving it back."
Before she left, Margit picked up the red book.
"May I?" she asked.
Astrid nodded.
Margit flipped to a blank page.
And wrote just one sentence:
"Some stories do not want to be told.But they ache to be touched."
She closed the book.
Handed it back.
And kissed Astrid softly — not on the lips, but on the temple.
A blessing.
A punctuation.
That night, Astrid didn't dream.
She remembered.
Not just the touch, the sounds, the eyes — but something deeper.
The moment she chose to stay.