Echoes in Alehouse

Rain needled the alley like a code best left unread, yet inside the timbered hush vibrated in amber warmth. A lute string snapped a warning—twang, brittle as a prayer cut short—and the fiddler grinned as though answering some secret summons. Foam bled down the edge of a lonely mug, pooling like time that insists on moving backward. The black cat traced spirals near the hearth, its tail declaring omens to anyone fluent in shadows. Field note 77-B: Interior tavern, west quarter, floor slick near threshold. Tankards raised high by damp-cloaked figures; tray balanced on hopeful wrists; lamplight trembling under rafters. One keg scrawled with the riddle—Where Vojta?—letters pressed in haste, still wet at the serif. No sign beyond this token, no whisper threading through the chords. If Vojta crossed this room, his prints have braided into fire and ale, leaving us only music’s ghost and a question that will not dim.