The Yumeost nodded once—a small, almost human gesture. Then it picked up its broom, turned, and walked into the fog. Before it vanished, it looked back over its shoulder.

The Yumeost paused. Why?

“Then I’ll stay until that day,” Kael said.

Kael stood alone in the plaza. The pile of film reels—his mother’s laugh, the wedding kiss, the child’s step—lay at his feet. He knelt and gathered them into his arms. They were cold. They weighed nothing. They weighed everything.

“Don’t take that one,” he said, his voice cracking.

Kael looked down at the pile. One of the reels caught his eye: a woman with dark hair, laughing, reaching out her hand. His mother. She had died when he was twelve. In his dreams, she still made him breakfast. In the waking world, he hadn’t visited her grave in years.