Night in Greyhaven always came with fog.
As if the sea every day exhaled a cold breath that slowly swallowed the city.
Elias sat at the inn table with the small book in front of him.
He was not reading.
He only stared at the open pages.
Some words there he had memorized long ago.
But tonight his mind was not on the pages of the book.
His mind was on the city streets.
On the people slowly losing their hope.
And on something that might be born from all of it.
The inn door suddenly opened.
Cold wind entered with a large figure standing in the doorway.
Rowan.
His coat was wet from sea fog.
He looked more tense than usual.
"You're still here," he said to Elias.
"Yes."
Rowan closed the door and walked to the table.
"I found something."
Elias waited.
Rowan did not speak immediately. He only pulled a chair and sat with heavy breath.
"At the north dock."
Elias immediately raised his head.
"What?"
Rowan looked at him with an expression difficult to explain.
"Footprints."
"Bram's footprints?"
Rowan shook his head.
"No."
He opened his hands on the table, as if trying to describe something that didn't make sense.
"The footprints… were too large."
Elias did not speak.
Rowan continued in a softer voice.
"And not like human footprints."
The small fire in the hearth crackled softly.
The innkeeper woman watched them from behind the counter, but did not interfere.
"How large?" asked Elias.
Rowan raised his hand to knee height.
"At least this tall."
Footprints that tall did not belong to a human.
Elias felt something heavy in his chest.
"Was there only one?"
Rowan shook his head.
"There were several."
"Leading where?"
Rowan did not answer immediately.
He looked at the wooden floor for a moment before speaking.
"Toward the city."
Those words fell heavily in the room.
Luca, who sat on the stairs, suddenly stopped drawing.
The boy slowly turned toward them.
"He's walking," he said softly.
All eyes in the room turned to him.
Rowan frowned.
"Who?"
Luca looked at his drawing paper.
"The tall man."
Elias stood slowly.
"Why do you say that?"
Luca raised his paper.
In the drawing, the tall figure was no longer standing still.
He was drawn walking on the city street.
And behind him…
there were long tracks on the ground.
Rowan looked at that drawing with an expression that turned serious.
"The child drew this now?"
Luca nodded.
"I heard his footsteps earlier."
Rowan immediately looked toward the inn door.
"Footsteps?"
"On the street outside."
The room became very quiet.
Night wind was heard through the window gaps.
Elias walked to the door slowly.
He opened it.
Night fog immediately greeted him.
The street in front of the inn was empty.
The oil lamp hanging on the street pole swayed slowly in the wind.
Elias stepped outside.
The air felt colder than before.
He looked at the ground of the street slightly covered with thin snow.
And there…
was something.
Footprints.
Not human footprints.
The tracks were long and deep, as if something heavy had walked through that street.
One.
Two.
Three.
The tracks led toward the city center.
Toward the old church tower.
Rowan stood behind Elias now.
He saw those tracks and his face turned pale.
"That's the same as what I saw at the dock."
Elias did not answer.
He only followed the tracks with his eyes.
Fog made the road ahead of them look like a long corridor without end.
And somewhere in that fog…
perhaps something was walking slowly.
The church bell suddenly rang softly.
Not because someone pulled it.
Wind made it move.
But the sound felt like a warning.
Rowan spoke in a low voice.
"If that is truly walking into the city…"
He stopped.
"…then we are already too late."
Elias stared at the church tower in the distance.
In his mind, one realization began to form.
The Lament did not only wait for humans to lose hope.
It came to ensure that hope truly died.
And tonight…
Greyhaven might see it for the first time.