The sun hadn't risen yet.
The room was still dim, dust dancing in slanted slivers of fading candlelight.
Heian reached beneath the pillow as he always did—expecting warmth, silk, her.
Instead, he found paper.
A letter.
He didn't recognize her handwriting at first. It was softer than she ever was with her voice. Curled letters, ink kissed into the page like apologies left unsaid.
By the time he read the first line, he knew.
She was gone.
Not gone like the muses who fade into drugs or lovers or obscurity.
Gone like someone who knew exactly what she was doing.
He didn't scream.
He didn't tear the sheets or shatter the easel.
He simply sat.
For a long, long time.
The letter rested on his knee. His thumb pressed into the word "real" until the paper tore slightly. He read it again. Then again. Then again.
And finally, he whispered—
"You weren't real until I ruined you."
He walked to the mirror.
His reflection stared back—not a monster, not a man.
A priest who lost his god.
His fingers trembled.
He reached for his ink.
Not the red.
Not the black.
But the white.
Pure. Unused. Reserved for beginnings.
He dipped his brush.
And on the blank canvas, he painted only this:
Her name.
Nothing else.
Just five letters.
L I O R A.
He didn't cry.
He didn't move.
He waited.
As if she might walk back in the room.
As if her absence might become a presence.
As if the ritual of her name could summon her ghost.
Because in that moment, he finally understood—
He had not lost his muse.
He had lost the only thing that ever dared to love the monster...
before he painted her into one.
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