Moonstone Quarry The bear that keeps to his own line

solharr’s gaze lingered on the bones they’d gathered, rough with time and stained by memory. the antler piece she turned in her paws caught the early light, gleaming like a shard of something holy.

callyope, he said after a moment. the name broke quietly, like old driftwood—simple, softened by salt and grief. she loved to talk.

a faint sound left him then. not a laugh, but a breath that remembered one. his eye narrowed with memory as he glanced toward the wind-scoured path they had walked together. even when there was nothing left to say… she would speak to keep the silence from swallowing us whole.

he paused, ears twitching faintly at the hush of morning. this altar—it’s not just for mourning. it’s for remembering. for keeping her voice somewhere the world can still hear it.

he didn’t speak of the way his chest still tightened at night, or how sometimes he turned toward the door expecting her shape to be there. that wasn’t fleur’s burden to carry.

instead, his gaze dropped to her—quiet, careful. she would have liked you, he murmured. and how much you talk.

a joke? perhaps the first he's been able to crack since her disappearance.