Rumi didn’t remember deciding to come here. One moment she had been somewhere in the city, and the next she was walking the worn stone path along the wall, the steady rhythm of her steps leading the way.
Her fingers brushed against the fortress wall as she walked, trailing along the rough surface. Her jaw tightened slightly. For a second, she tried to remember what “normal” had felt like. But instead, all she could think of was Jinu.
Her steps slowed.
She could still feel it, his pull. Annoying. Persistent. Real enough that it hadn’t faded, even now.
“That was a mistake,” she muttered, because if it had been a mistake, it would have been easier to forget.
She stopped, and her fingers stilled against the stone. Just for a second. Or a moment longer. The memory of Jinu shifted. Their first encounter. The moment everything changed, when boundaries became blurred, and she felt herself falling.
The way he had looked at her, like he saw way more than he should have.
She felt his eyes brush past the surface of her skin, deep into something she had tried to bury.
The quiet edge in his voice, like every word had to fight its way out.
The space between them that night was too close and not close enough all at once.
And then nothing. Or at least that was the narrative she told herself.
Rumi exhaled slowly, her gaze drifting out over towards the city below. The world below did not know the battles they endured. Gwi-ma was now gone, and so was he.
It should have meant something. Something final. There should have been a shift in Rumi. So why did it not feel that way? Why did she feel the same?
A faint breeze stirred past her, tugging lightly at her hair, carrying the distant hum of the city up to where she stood. For a moment, she closed her eyes, holding in her breath, letting the moment wash over her. And there he was again; his name being whispered on the breeze.
Her eyes opened, and she straightened her posture. “Enough, Rumi, he’s gone”.
Rumi stayed where she was, in the quiet, waiting.
