Nachttocht 〈FRESH ✦〉

At the ridge, you stop. The village below is a scatter of sugar cubes, each window a weak star. You do not go down. Not yet.

No torch. You let the dark press in — not hostile, just ancient, like the inside of a lung before breath. nachttocht

Then you turn — not homeward, but through the night still clinging to your coat — and you carry its silence like a lantern nobody can blow out. At the ridge, you stop