Sumi woke before the dawn.
He didn't move at first. Just lay there in the quiet, listening. The air in his room was cool, unmoving. The stone above him still carried the weight of night.
Something was sliding down his cheek.
Slow. Warm.
He reached up without thinking. Touched it.
When his fingers came away, they were black.
Ink.
Thick, almost dry. A single tear.
He sat up slowly, the blanket slipping from his chest. For a moment he just stared at his hand, turning it slightly to watch the ink catch the dim lantern-light.
"This is new," he muttered.
His voice sounded rough, half-formed. He hadn't spoken since yesterday.
The ink hadn't done this before. It had always been a part of him, sure—but distant. Passive. Dormant. It never moved on its own. Never bled like this.
He rose to his feet, walked barefoot across the floor, and lit the lantern by the door. The flame bloomed in a hush of golden light, pushing shadows away.
He caught sight of himself in the old brass mirror.
"You're crying now?" he asked his reflection.
He didn't smile. Not yet.
He grabbed a dry cloth and wiped his face, then bent over the washbasin. The water was cold enough to sting, but he splashed it on anyway, dragging his hands across his skin until nothing remained but a faint shadow along his jaw.
His eyes rose again to the mirror. Calm. Too calm.Still.
He stepped into the hallway, lighting the lanterns one by one as he passed.
The house wasn't big, but it felt that way in silence. Every plank of wood had a voice. Every nail remembered being hammered in. His footsteps whispered across the stone.
The main room opened up before him: high ceilings, thick beams, and a long table still covered in scrolls and parchment. A breeze moved through the cracks in the shutters, rustling the loose edges.
He walked to the table, dragging his hand lightly across the surface.
"You didn't finish this one," he said.
The map was half-drawn, sketched in his father's precise, looping hand. Notations in the margins. Small diagrams, tiny symbols. A draft of a place no one had found yet.
Sumi leaned over it, resting both hands on the table.
"Maybe you knew you wouldn't." He paused. "Or maybe you wanted me to."
Beside the scroll, a quill lay dry in its holder.
"You always said ink tells the truth better than words," he murmured.
He stepped back.
The fire had long since died in the hearth. The room smelled of paper, ash, and something older. Time, maybe.
He walked into the kitchen.
It was simple, like the rest of the house. Stone walls, a round skylight, shelves full of jars and tools, hooks with bundles of dried herbs. Nothing was there for decoration. Everything had a reason to exist.
He boiled water. Added bark to steep. The scent rose slowly—bitter, sharp, familiar.
He leaned back against the wall, holding the warm cup in both hands, and stared across the room.
"You've been gone fifty-two days," he said softly.
His voice didn't shake. It didn't need to. The stillness said enough.
"You said it would be long. That I'd be fine. That the house would help me wait."
He looked toward the ceiling.
"Well. She's trying."
He took a sip. Sat down on the bench by the window. The cup warmed his palms, but not his chest.
"You told me the house listens. That it remembers what's said inside it."
His eyes scanned the empty room.
"Then listen," he said louder, straight to the walls. "I'm not going to pretend nothing feels wrong this morning. You hear me?"
The walls didn't creak.
He drank again, slower this time. The light outside was beginning to shift—thin streaks of blue spreading across the stone tiles near the door.
"And what was that tear for, anyway?" he asked the empty hearth.
"Was it a warning? A memory?" He hesitated. "Or something waking up?"
He set the cup down on the windowsill.
The silence pressed in.
He stood. Ran a hand through his hair. Let it fall.
"You said silence could hold answers," he muttered.
Then, after a pause, his lips curled into the faintest, tired smile.
"Still sounds like a stupid idea."
He glanced around the kitchen. Every corner felt familiar. Every item in its place.
He spoke again, this time quieter, like a thought that had escaped.
"If I stay in here too long… I'll start talking to the walls."
He paused, then chuckled once under his breath.
"…more than I already do."
Sumi set down the empty cup, slipped on his coat, and stepped outside.
The morning air touched him with a quiet chill. Not sharp, not biting. Just cool and wet, like stone left overnight in the rain.
He stood for a moment on the threshold.
Below him, the land sloped gently toward the heart of Thaliak. Mist clung to the rooftops. A pale light hovered behind the clouds. Everything looked soft and distant, as if the island hadn't fully decided to wake.
He stepped onto the path.
White stones, old and uneven, stretched ahead. Moss grew between them. Grass, too. On his left, a low wall of stacked rock followed the edge of the slope. On his right, a narrow garden was growing wild. Herbs filled the soil. Their scent hung in the air, faint and sharp.
He walked without rushing.
Thaliak had no real roads. Only stone paths, carved and worn, weaving across the hillside. The island rose in layers. Wide terraces stacked above each other. Between them, staircases descended like rivers of stone.
The houses were all white. Not clean white, but a weathered, chalky shade that blurred into grey where the sea wind touched it. Green streaks ran down some of the walls. Others had vines growing up their corners.
No building here tried to stand out.
He passed under a curved arch. A fig tree grew from the center of a small square, its thick trunk leaning east. At its base sat a low table covered in baskets. A woman sorted roots there, pulling them apart with steady hands.
"Morning," Sumi said.
She didn't look up.
"You want ginger?"
He shook his head, smiled.
"Not today."
He kept walking.
A little farther, the sea came into view. Gray-blue and calm. The tide rolled in slowly, brushing the stone pier with gentle sound. Nets were laid out to dry along the dock, still heavy with fish. Scales glinted in the low light.
A fisherman crouched beside them, checking the knots.
"You're up early," he said.
Sumi stopped near the edge.
"Couldn't sleep."
The man pulled a knife from his belt and sliced a torn length of rope.
"You have anything in your house?"
"Some bread. Maybe rice."
"That's not what I asked."
The man reached into a nearby basket. He pulled out two fish and wrapped them in a piece of woven kelp, tying it with twine. He handed them over without looking.
"Bring me something back next time. A story. A song. Whatever."
Sumi accepted the gift with a quiet nod.
He took the higher path next.
The trail passed through garden terraces. Neatly kept. Marked with stones and stakes. Green rows pushed through the dirt. He smelled onions, pepper leaves, wet earth. A man was working there with a wide-bladed hoe. When he saw Sumi, he stopped.
"Still haven't planted anything?"
"Not yet."
"You should. The soil's soft this week."
Sumi nodded.
"Maybe tomorrow."
The man pointed his hoe toward a bundle near the edge of the field.
"Take some when you come back. Tomatoes. Shoots. Something sweet. Don't just eat bread and fish."
Sumi gave a faint smile and kept moving.
Children ran past him, bare feet slapping the stones. Two girls chased each other with branches. A woman hung long strips of drying leaves across a line, humming under her breath. Lanterns still flickered in doorways, waiting to burn out.
The island was fully awake now.
Not loud. Not busy. Just moving. Slow and solid.
No one here paid.They borrowed.They traded.They gave without asking why.
He passed the final curve and stepped into the open.
The library stood alone at the center of the upper terrace.
It was square. Built of heavy stone. No windows. No carvings to decorate it. Just a building meant to last. Four thick columns framed the entrance. Above them, the oldest symbols of the island were etched into the stone. Faded. Scratched by time.
The roof was low and flat. Covered in dew.
A wide staircase rose to a single door.
Sumi slowed as he approached.
The door was tall. Built from dark wood streaked with red. It held no handle. Brass studs marked where the boards joined. No locks. No hinges. Only one rule.
Push.
He stopped at the base of the stairs.
The fish were still in his hand. His coat hung open. A breeze moved around his collar.
He looked up at the door.
And waited.
Not thinking.Not breathing.Just waiting, for something he couldn't name.
Sumi climbed the steps and pushed the door open.
The wood groaned softly under his palm, as though it recognized him. Inside, the air shifted. It was cooler. Still. Steeped in the scent of old parchment, dry ink, and cold stone.
The library exhaled around him.
Thin shafts of morning light fell from narrow slits high above, catching the dust that floated through the air. The ceiling stretched far out of sight. Shelves lined the walls from floor to arch, filled with books and scrolls stacked like silent thoughts.
The silence inside wasn't empty.It was held.Crafted by centuries of quiet.
One of the scholars looked up as he entered.
He was old, thin, with stooped shoulders and fingers stained dark from decades of ink. He smiled faintly.
"You're early again, Sumi."
"As always," Sumi replied.
The man nodded once and returned to his notes.
Others glanced in his direction. Some greeted him with a subtle gesture. Others watched longer, with a quiet caution that no longer bothered hiding itself.
Sumi was used to that.
He passed between the reading tables, each one cluttered with open manuscripts, tools for tracing symbols, scraps of translation. Low voices echoed through the chamber. A debate about dates. A disagreement over grammar.
No one raised their voice here.
He climbed the spiral stair to the upper level.
His seat waited in the same place it always did.
A narrow desk beside a tall slit-window that opened toward the sea. The horizon looked painted today, flat and pale, unmoving. He set his satchel down, pulled out the book he had left behind yesterday, and opened it.
The pages were thick, yellowed, soft at the edges.
Runic alphabets.
Each symbol twisted across the parchment like a shape trying not to be seen. The strokes were precise but strange. Some seemed to twitch at the corner of his vision, as though the ink had resisted being pinned down.
Sumi studied them in silence.
He did not read them.He listened.
The morning passed without weight.
A student approached once, uncertain.
"How would you read this one?"
Sumi offered an answer. Then asked a question of his own. They spoke briefly. The interaction was clean, clipped, respectful.
Later, another came with a rubbing from a weathered tombstone. He pointed out an inversion. A missing curve. The hours moved that way. Quietly. Without interruption.
Light shifted across the floor. Then again.
He turned a page. Annotated a margin. Frowned slightly at a contradiction he hadn't noticed before.
The world outside faded.
He nearly forgot the tear from the morning.Nearly forgot the bundle of fish resting by the door.Nearly.
The unease never left.
It sat beneath every thought. Every translated line. Every curve of ancient ink. Not loud. Not sharp. Just present.
Like something moving in a room behind the wall.
When he left the library, the sun had begun to descend.
The island was warmer now. The white stones caught golden light. The sea air felt heavier. He returned home the same way he had come, greeting those he passed with a small nod or nothing at all.
His house waited with its usual silence.
He stepped inside. Set his things down. Washed the fish. Lit the fire.
Cooking was simple. Movements familiar.
The scent filled the room. He ate standing. His mind was still elsewhere.
Afterward, he stood with one hand resting on the edge of the table. The dishes were cleaned. The pan was drying near the hearth. His shadow swayed slightly on the wall.
And then he felt it.
Cool. Slow. Sliding across his cheek.
He reached up, but stopped.
He knew.
Another tear of ink.
Left side this time.
His breath stilled.
He turned his head.
And the sky tore open.
A bolt of red light slammed down through the clouds.
Not lightning.Not reflection.A pillar.
Massive. Violent. Solid.
It struck the library.
The sound didn't come right away.First came the light.
It swallowed the walls of his house.Painted the stone.Split the sky.
Then the thunder followed.Slow.Heavy.Final.
The floor shook. A bowl slid from the table. His knees locked in place.
He did not run.
He didn't speak.
The ink drop fell from his cheek to the ground.
And the world, finally, had answered.