Dream d2702-s: Well Kept, No Entry

I had a dream where...

I had a dream where the cold ran up from the path and found the backs of my hands before it found my face. I had been standing in the doorway long enough that the dusk had deepened half a shade.

Lano pressed against my left calf, warm through the boot. She was not looking at the room. She was looking out past me, toward the path, but she stayed.

The room behind me was in good order. The blankets were folded and left on the far chair. The hearth was swept and the ashes taken out. Nothing was displaced. The cupboard was latched. The shelf held what it had held when I came: three cups, a tin, a lamp. The lamp was cold. The window catch was set.

I took out the second book and opened it to the place where this house should appear.

There was no entry.

I had not written one, and there was none in the hand of whoever kept these pages before me. The place was here. The order was apparent. The second book contained neither fact.

Rurik sat at the far edge of the doorstep, just outside the frame, facing out into the cooling air. His tail was still. He had been there some time.

I looked at the room once more. The chair. The folded blankets. The three cups. The ashes gone. The lamp cold. The window catch.

I made no note. The second book records what remains when there is nobody to keep it. The place had a keeper tonight. Tomorrow it would not. Neither fact was in the book.

I pulled the door to. The latch caught. Lano moved ahead of me down the path, and the cold came with us both.

---