They called her Fig, though no one remembered why. Names had become strange things in the years after the Great Unraveling, half-kept, half-lost, like dreams upon waking. She lived in the time before the winds turned, before the sky cracked open and bled fire, before the world forgot how to breathe.

And now, long after, a letter arrived.

It was not delivered by post, for there were no posts anymore. It came folded into the wing of a crow, black as memory, silent as regret. The bird landed on a crooked branch outside the remnants of a window and waited until the letter was taken. Then it vanished, as if it had never been.

The letter was written in a hand that remembered beauty. Ink pressed into paper like a whisper into snow.

Dear Fig,

The air is cooler now. The winds that once scoured the land with poison have turned eastward, gentler than before. They no longer kill as they once did, though sometimes, when the rain falls hard and fast, the old ghosts rise from the soil, and we remember. We remember the fear that once walked openly among us, and the many who did not survive its passing.

I write to tell you: we remain.

Fewer than before, yes. And marked, each of us carrying the long shadow of what came before. But we are still here. Still human. You once feared that the Great Unraveling would take more than lives, that it would take our Soul. That we would forget how to marvel at a falling star, how to feel the quiet ache of love, how to sense that strange, sacred presence that lives both in the heart and in the farthest reaches of the sky.

But we remember.

You taught us how to look into the fire and not look away. To see the cruelty, the madness, and still choose to keep the ember of Soul alive. Yes, there was chaos. Yes, some turned on each other. But others... those who made a vow to protect the invisible, the sacred, the tender, kept the flame. And when the fires burned out and the silence returned, they stepped forward. They carried the light. Not a blaze, but a glow. Enough.

We are grateful. And we know how to be grateful because of you.

You were not alone. There were others, keepers of the inner world, guardians of the quiet flame, who held fast through the storm. Like shepherds in the dark, they tended the fire, even when the night howled.

Now that survival is no longer our only song, we begin again. We teach our children poetry, so they may know the comfort of words. We teach them to speak to the animals and the trees, not as masters, but as kin. We have learned to listen. We have learned to care.

They called her Fig, though no one remembered why. Names had become strange things in the years after the Great Unraveling, half-kept, half-lost, like dreams upon waking. She lived in the time before the winds turned, before the sky cracked open and bled fire, before the world forgot how to breathe.

And now, long after, a letter arrived.

It was not delivered by post, for there were no posts anymore. It came folded into the wing of a crow, black as memory, silent as regret. The bird landed on a crooked branch outside the remnants of a window and waited until the letter was taken. Then it vanished, as if it had never been.

The letter was written in a hand that remembered beauty. Ink pressed into paper like a whisper into snow.

Dear Fig,

The air is cooler now. The winds that once scoured the land with poison have turned eastward, gentler than before. They no longer kill as they once did, though sometimes, when the rain falls hard and fast, the old ghosts rise from the soil, and we remember. We remember the fear that once walked openly among us, and the many who did not survive its passing.

I write to tell you: we remain.

Fewer than before, yes. And marked, each of us carrying the long shadow of what came before. But we are still here. Still human. You once feared that the Great Unraveling would take more than lives, that it would take our Soul. That we would forget how to marvel at a falling star, how to feel the quiet ache of love, how to sense that strange, sacred presence that lives both in the heart and in the farthest reaches of the sky.

But we remember.

You taught us how to look into the fire and not look away. To see the cruelty, the madness, and still choose to keep the ember of Soul alive. Yes, there was chaos. Yes, some turned on each other. But others... those who made a vow to protect the invisible, the sacred, the tender, kept the flame. And when the fires burned out and the silence returned, they stepped forward. They carried the light. Not a blaze, but a glow. Enough.

We are grateful. And we know how to be grateful because of you.

You were not alone. There were others, keepers of the inner world, guardians of the quiet flame, who held fast through the storm. Like shepherds in the dark, they tended the fire, even when the night howled.

Now that survival is no longer our only song, we begin again. We teach our children poetry, so they may know the comfort of words. We teach them to speak to the animals and the trees, not as masters, but as kin. We have learned to listen. We have learned to care.