Rain had rinsed the city clean hours ago, but the garden held the scent of wet moss and steeped jasmine, clinging like an old confession. The circular aperture framed emptiness, a borrowed moon by day, and in its hollow, the moss-veined table bore a single bowl, cupping what little warmth dusk allowed. They say this courtyard repeats its gatherings every few decades—faces swap, whispers linger, truth never quite arriving. That tag on the plaster, rough and green as a riverbank: *Where Vojta?* It read less like a question, more like a verdict scrawled by ivy’s patient hand. No one sat on the bench; the slats sagged under vines as though tired of promises. From the far passage came the hush of leaves spiraling down, rehearsing the same fall their fathers knew. Folklore claims if the tea cooled thrice in that basin, a name would surface in the ripples. Tonight, steam thinned into nothing long ago, and still the circle waits. Vojta has not stepped into view.