Timeless Hearts

d always bee

e awe one reserves for monsters and miracles. Her grandmother used to say the attic was "where the

weight. Above, the air hung thick with mothballs and memory. Moonlight spilled throug

hadn't managed it at the service. Not when the pastor spoke, not when her fat

been the one who

ing horse and a trunk that smelled of camphor and time. It wasn't la

open

ass casing engraved with stars. A compass rose etched into the back. When she pick

letter. Cream paper

ten in curlin

oke th

ns are the only things that matter in time. This isn't a trinket. It's a key. And it only opens when the world forgets what it on

all my

Gra

rds until they blurred

ll, Gran," s

e watch

n radiant veins. The attic trembled beneath her. A wind roared to life from nowhere, swirling

hen-s

e world folded in on itself, and her body fell i

e street w

alms scraped cold stone. She blink

ges. Fog thick as soup curli

longer in

even in her

clinging to her skin were all wrong-tight jeans, a hoodie, a tech watch blinking futilely. No one here wo

I?" she

ootsteps.

rner. Dirty, eyes sunk

the taller one, "

s lost," said th

ed away, p

quickly, "I don

e grinned. "That's the t

adv

oice cut thr

't recomm

Coat flaring behind him. A silver-han

sneered. "And who the hel

smiled-shar

interr

tall one's knee with a sickening snap. The other swung-and missed. A swift

ger turne

" he

dn't move.

. Eyes-ice blue, unsettli

said softly. "That watch do

t instinctively

od. Historian. Time doesn't like when

breathless,

g his hand. "Before the Wardens

hesi

were calluse

if she took his hand, her life

ook it