Remsl May 2026

“You’re the scribbler,” he said. His voice was the sound of dry bark flaking off a log.

I watched him for an hour. He did not stop. His fingers traced the invisible grain of an invisible log, and as they did, I felt something loosen in my chest. A memory I’d locked away—the smell of my mother’s apron, beeswax and flour—drifted past me like a petal. Then another. The sound of my father’s boots on the gravel path. The exact weight of a robin’s egg I’d found when I was seven. “You’re the scribbler,” he said

“I’m the archivist,” I said, clutching my notebook like a shield. He did not stop

He placed the invisible carving on the fountain’s edge, and for a moment—just a moment—the fountain was no longer dry. Water ran over the mossy stone, clear and cold, and I heard a child’s laugh from a year that no longer existed. Then another

It was not a name given at birth, nor a title earned in battle. It was a sound, a shape, a void in the shape of a man. Remsl .

“What are you carving?” I whispered.