Not the End
Time did what it always did after legends finished speaking.
It went on.
Seasons shifted in subtle ways—never full day, never full dawn, but a softening of night that allowed growth without blinding it. Noctyrrh learned to measure itself not by prophecy, but by progress: rebuilt streets, new councils, arguments that ended in compromise instead of blood.
Lumi lived among it all, unremarkable in the way that mattered most.
At twenty-two, she woke early and slept late. She wrote until her hands cramped and then walked until her thoughts untangled. People sometimes recognized her. More often, they didn't.
She liked it that way.
Blake remained close—never crowned, never absent for long. At twenty-four, he had learned how to lead without looming. He trained guards who questioned him. He listened to stewards who disagreed. He came home tired in the good, earned way.
They did not pretend life was simple.
They argued.
They laughed harder afterward.
Love was no longer something that happened to them.
It was something they practiced.
One night, the wind shifted unexpectedly, carrying with it a cold sharp enough to sting. Lumi stood at the edge of the city, cloak pulled tight, watching the fields ripple under starlight.
Blake joined her without speaking.
"Do you ever miss it?" he asked eventually. "The certainty?"
Lumi considered the question carefully.
"No," she said. "I miss who I thought I had to be. But I don't miss being her."
Blake nodded, accepting that without sadness.
The night moved around them—not listening, not waiting.
Just existing.
As the hour deepened, Blake was called away briefly—nothing urgent, nothing dangerous. Lumi stayed where she was, letting the wind comb through her hair, letting memory settle without sharpness.
For a moment, she felt the echo again—not pain, not power.
Presence.
She smiled softly into the dark.
I whispered goodbye, but as the wind touched my cheek, I thought I felt him smiling, telling me that this was not the end.