The village awakens to the soft melody of footsteps and laughter, each sound captured and sold in glass bottles. Old Mara, the keeper of echoes, arranges her jars with careful hands, each labeled with a date and the place it was caught. Buyers approach, eager for a fragment of memory or a voice long gone. "Choose wisely. Some echoes hold more than sound," she warns, her breath fogging in the chill air.
Lukas[/@ch_2], who stands before Mara's stall. His cloak is dusted with frost, and his eyes linger on a jar swirling with faint silver light. The market hums behind him, but he is silent, entranced by the bottled echoes.]
Lukas hesitates, watching the jar as it pulses with distant voices and laughter. He asks about its origin, but Mara shakes her head, offering him another—one filled not with laughter, but with the sound of footsteps, steady and rhythmic. "This one returned to us last night. Its sound does not fade," she says, sliding the jar across the table.
The echo of footsteps fills the air around him, growing louder with each step. Lukas pauses, heart pounding, as the sound refuses to fade. He glances back, but the path is empty—only the wind stirs the pine needles. The jar pulses, the footsteps inside relentless, unbroken.
Unable to sleep, Lukas studies the jar, searching for a pattern in the sound. He wonders if the echo belongs to a lost traveler or something older, trapped within the glass. "Who walks these endless steps?" he murmurs, voice trembling as the footsteps grow louder, overlapping his own.
"It will not stop," Lukas pleads, desperate for answers. Mara leans in, listening to the endless footsteps, her face pale. "Some echoes return because they have nowhere else to go. This one seeks a listener. Until you let it go, it will follow you," she says, her words heavy with warning.
As silence returns, Lukas feels the weight lift from his chest. Below, the village glimmers in the last light, peaceful once more. Yet somewhere in the mountains, the footsteps continue, searching for an ear willing to listen, their journey never truly ending.
