There was a man who could make anything beautiful.
When he played, rivers slowed. Trees leaned in. Even stones wept.
But the one thing he couldn't do was keep what he loved. She was taken from him — not by cruelty, but by the ordinary fact that people leave.
So he did what no one had done before. He walked into the dark to find her.
Not with a sword. Not with a plan. With a song.
The king of that place was unmoved. But the queen — she had been taken there against her will once, and she remembered what it felt like to miss the sun. She wept.
"Take her," the king said. "But don't look back."
You know what happened. Everyone does. He looked.
But here's the thing no one tells you: the song still worked. The dark still listened. And the door — the door never fully closed.
