The ink is still wet on the page, a dark pool spreading like a bruise across the parchment, and I can feel the cold seeping into my fingertips, a chill that originates not in the air but in the marrow of my bones, as if the very act of writing has drawn the warmth out of my hands to fuel the words that I am forcing into existence with a quill that feels less like a tool and more like a splinter of bone. I am writing this to you, Margaret, though I know that by the time this letter reaches the hands of the courier, and then to the village, and then to the house where you sit by the window watching the rain batter the glass, I will be gone, not in death, but in a state of being that is far more terrible than death, a state of permanent suspension where I am neither here nor there, neither man nor spirit, but something in between, something that exists only in the space between the heartbeat and the silence that follows. We have been married for forty years, and in all that time, I have never felt so profoundly separated from you, never felt the weight of your absence so heavy on my chest, even though you are sitting in the room next to mine, your breathing a soft, rhythmic sound that I can hear through the thin walls, a sound that has been the background music of my life since the day we first met in the market square, where you were selling baskets woven from willow and I was haggling over the price of iron nails, my hands already stained with the rust and dust of the forge, your hands clean and pale and smelling of the river. I am a blacksmith, or I was, until the day the fire in the forge did not answer to my bellows, until the metal refused to take the shape I demanded of it, until I realized that the heat I had been generating was not in the coal but in my blood, and that my blood was running cold, not with the winter air, but with a fear so old it had calcified in my veins, a fear that I had carried with me since childhood, a fear that I would run out of time, that the hours would slip through my fingers like sand, that I would reach the end of my days with the work unfinished, with the promise unkept, with the love unspoken. I told myself that I was a master of my craft, that I could bend the iron to my will, that I could conquer the elements, but I was a liar, a coward who hid behind the hammer and the anvil, who believed that if I could make something strong and lasting, then I too would be strong and lasting, that the permanence of the metal would somehow transfer to the flesh, that the durability of the object would somehow extend to the soul. But the metal is cold, Margaret, and it does not care if I live or die, it does not care if I am a good man or a bad one, it only cares about the heat, and when the heat is gone, it is just dead weight, just a shape without a purpose, just a mirror reflecting nothing but the emptiness of the forge. I remember the day I first met you, and how the sunlight fell through the open door of the stall, catching the dust motes that danced in the air, and how you looked up at me with eyes that were the color of the sky after a storm, and how I felt, for the first time in my life, that I was not alone, that there was someone in this world who saw me not as the blacksmith, not as the man with the stained hands and the broken back, but as Thomas, the man who loved to sing off-key when he thought no one was listening, the man who kept a collection of stones from the river bank, each one smooth and round and perfect in its own way, and I told you about the stones, and you listened, and I felt a warmth in my chest that was not from the forge, a warmth that was quiet and steady and real, and I knew then that I wanted to spend my life with you, that I wanted to build a home with you, that I wanted to grow old with you, but I did not know how to say it, I did not know how to bridge the gap between the man I was and the man I wanted to be, so I stayed silent, and I went back to my forge, and I hammered the iron until my arms ached and my breath came in short, sharp gasps, and I thought that if I could just make one perfect thing, one thing that would last forever, then I would be worthy of you, then I would be able to speak, to love, to live. But the perfect thing never came, and the years passed, and we grew old, and the stones on the shelf gathered dust, and the songs grew quieter, and I became more and more obsessed with the idea of time, with the ticking of the clock on the wall, a sound that seemed to get louder with each passing day, a sound that threatened to drown out the silence, to drown out the breath, to drown out the love. I started to work longer hours, trying to catch up, trying to make up for the lost time, but the more I worked, the more I fell behind, as if time was a river that was flowing faster and faster, carrying me away from the shore, away from you, away from the life I had built. I stopped looking at you, I stopped touching you, I stopped speaking to you, and I thought that I was saving you, that I was protecting you from the ugliness of my decay, from the horror of my fear, but I was wrong, I was so wrong, and I know that now, I know that you were not afraid of me, you were afraid for me, you were trying to reach me, you were trying to pull me back from the edge, but I was too deep in the water, I was too far from the shore, and I could not hear your voice, I could not feel your hand, I could not see your face. I am sitting in the dark now, the candle has burned down to a stub, and the shadows are long and stretching, reaching out for me, and I can feel the presence of something else in the room, something that is not of this world, something that is waiting, something that is hungry, and I know that it is not the devil, it is not a demon, it is time, it is the time that I have wasted, the time that I have squandered, the time that I have denied, and it is here, and it is taking me, not with a claw, but with a whisper, not with a scream, but with a sigh, and I am going with it, I am letting it take me, because I am tired, Margaret, I am so tired, and I want to rest, I want to sleep, I want to be with you, not in the flesh, but in the spirit, not in the world, but in the dream, not in the here, but in the always. I am writing this by the light of the last candle, and my hand is shaking, and the letters are blurring, and I am afraid, but I am also calm, because I know that this is the end, and the end is not a defeat, it is a release, it is a liberation, it is a return to the source, to the place where we all come from, to the place where we all go, to the place where there is no time, no space, no pain, no fear, only love, only peace, only you. I forgive myself, Margaret, I forgive myself for the years of silence, for the years of absence, for the years of fear, and I hope that you forgive me, too, and I hope that when you read this letter, you will know that I loved you, that I have always loved you, that I will always love you, and that I am sorry, and that I am gone, and that I am with you, and that I am at peace. The candle is going out now, the flame is flickering, the light is fading, the darkness is closing in, and I am closing my eyes, and I am breathing in, and I am breathing out, and I am letting go, and I am letting go, and I am letting go.