Legend XIX – The Guardian of Silent Seconds

More about Legend XIX – The Guardian of Silent Seconds

Tells of a woman who lives on the edge of the hour, where the breath of the moment has not yet fully entered the world. She is called the Guardian of Silent Seconds. With hands as delicate as frost on glass, she gathers those seconds that would happen before they happen—and places them in a bowl of moonstone, so that the course of things slows down for a heartbeat. She loves the twilight, the hesitation, the moment between question and answer. Her footsteps sound like the rustling of a page reading itself. Some call her a thief of time, others a physician of the world's rhythm. Those who meet her recognize in her eyes the muted glow of later—a gentle, patient fire that lengthens the breath before it breaks. She walks across bridges just before lovers meet, taking the second's fall away so that the greeting does not happen too quickly. She walks through infirmaries before the pain takes shape, and with two fingers lifts the hard edge of the coming second, as if it were a fold in the sheet of the world. In the rooms of the unwary, she gathers words honed too sharply until there is room again for gentleness. No one knows where her bowl comes from. The chroniclers say it is forged from moon dust and veined with fine lines of yesterday and tomorrow. Within it lie a thousand small stillnesses, shining and clear, and when she raises them to her brow, one can hear the world daring an extra breath. But the clockmakers of the upper cities do not tolerate her. They love the punctuality of things and send messengers of brass and glass to complete their work. Whenever they reach her, they find only a place that was empty for the duration of a blink, a step where hesitation remained as thin silver, or a window that still bears the imprint of an unspoken word. Once, in a winter that seemed to rush by too quickly, when rivers overflowed their banks and people ran until the seconds turned to dust, the Keeper laid her brow against the bowl and collected time all night long. She carried it through the streets, placed it before doorways, hung it like little bells on window frames—and in the morning the city wasn't saved, but it had time. Time to bolt the river, to speak the name of a missing person without breaking, time to brew the first tea. Some call her guilty because she teaches courtesy to the end of things; others call her holy because she sets a chair for the inevitable, so that it may sit down before it cries out. Thus the terrible becomes smaller, portable like a stone in a coat. When children wake too early in the night and reach for their voices, she places a second between hand and grasp—a flat, smooth second on which fear slips. And when an old person stands at the gate of farewell, she bestows upon them a still breath, enough to raise their gaze one last time. Yet hA cloaked figure stands on a misty bridge, holding a glowing bowl of orbs. Behind, an ornate clock and ethereal lanterns illuminate the mystical scene filled with swirling feathers and fog.