Chapter 99: The Ripples in the Well
The cove welcomed them back with the deep, resonant peace of a place that had been faithfully held in their absence. For a week, they did nothing but rest. They slept late, ate Tessa's simple, hearty food, and walked the familiar paths without purpose, relearning the language of their own home. The silence here was not an absence; it was a composition the percussion of waves, the wind's melody in the pines, the harmonic hum of insects in the gorse.
