*The Backward Watch at the Silent Fair*

I swear this happened on the road last winter, when the sickness had the cities locked tight and the fields full of prayer flags. If you are new to these routes, hear me plain: when you find unfamiliar keys in your pocket, do not go looking for the doors they fit.

Where Every Clock Stands Still

“I swore to myself I would never speak of what happened that icy night. Yet here, with the lantern in my hands and your eyes on me, I confess: there is a place beneath the city where time itself curled up and died, and I followed a stairway that never ends.”