Dream d2662-s: The Door Returned as Found

I had a dream where...

I had a dream where the door was already open when I reached it. I stopped on the step to write that down before going in: unlatched, no sign of force, condition as found. Lano moved past my leg into the dark of the threshold, nose working at the floor seam.

Inside the letter house at the Ruins of Mistthwaite the pile was as large as the night before, or larger. I could not be certain. The letters were addressed to the office, to the station, to the role, and whoever had held those roles was gone. I did not count the pile again. I had counted it once and the count stood.

What I was there to do on the second night was something else. I had come to find who might be taught to keep the mark going forward. The answer was the same as it had been the first night: nobody. The letter house had no standing keeper. I wrote that down.

Lano circled once and settled near the pile, chin on her paws, watching me. I did not interpret this. She was warm in the room and the room was cold.

Two envelopes had arrived since the previous night, slid under the door. The door had been unlatched when they came through, or open long enough. I recorded the arrivals, noted their condition as sealed, noted that the office was absent, and set them on the pile.

The teaching part of the work had no one to receive it. I wrote the protocol into the register instead: how the marks were taken, what the symbols meant, what the condition codes indicated. If anyone came later, they would find the method and could continue from it. That was the form the teaching took in a place with nobody left.

I did not latch the door when I left. It had been unlatched when I arrived. The condition was returned as found.

---