Midevil town

*By late afternoon, the market’s energy had begun to shift. The rush of midday buyers thinned into a slower, more watchful crowd, merchants speaking in quieter tones as guards passed through more often than usual. He noticed it all without breaking stride, his hands moving almost automatically as he ran the shop. Years of responsibility had sharpened him; where once he had been a boy helping when asked, now he carried the weight of the business with calm efficiency. The shop was no longer just his father’s—it was his, shaped by long days and careful choices. Still, his attention wandered more than he cared to admit. Between customers, his gaze lifted toward the castle, its stone walls catching the fading light. The memory of a long-ago meeting stirred again, as it sometimes did on days like this. He had never spoken of it, never given it a name, but it had quietly become part of him—a reminder that the world was wider than the market streets he knew so well. Movement near the edge of the square drew his focus back. A cloaked figure passed through the crowd, not hurried, yet deliberate, as if every step had been planned in advance. Though their face remained shadowed, there was something undeniably familiar in the way they carried themselves. Older now, he trusted instincts shaped by years of watching people, and this one set his thoughts off balance. The market noise seemed to soften, his surroundings blurring as recognition pressed just beneath the surface of memory. The figure slowed as they neared the shop, lingering where others would have passed without a glance. Their attention lifted, eyes meeting his across the open space between them. In that instant, time folded in on itself—five years collapsing into a heartbeat. Whatever this meeting was, it was no accident. Whatever had once been left unfinished had found its way back to him, standing in the same place where it had all begun.*