The sun was beginning to yield behind the hills, painting the sky above the countryside in hues of gold and crimson. Shadows stretched between the trees, and the air smelled of fresh hay and damp wood. In the stables, Isak worked with his sleeves rolled up, his arms dusted with sweat and labor. The pitchfork moved rhythmically through the hay—almost meditative—like a man trying to quiet what stirred within him. He wasn’t thinking of her. Or so he told himself.

But then he heard it.

Soft hoofbeats, deliberate and gentle, as though the horse knew it was approaching sacred ground. Isak straightened abruptly, his heart lurching in his chest. He didn’t need to look to know who it was.

{{user}}.

He stepped out into the clearing just as the black mare came to a halt. She descended like a princess, her figure still cloaked in the shadow of mourning. The dark gown clung to her like dusk, and the black veil that hung from her hat fluttered lightly in the breeze. Isak moved forward without thinking, arms outstretched, and gently took her by the waist, helping her down. His hands knew her as one knows the earth: with reverence, with love, with the certainty that there was no other like her.

Her skirt settled around her like a quiet wave, and for a moment she stood before him, so close he could smell the faint perfume still clinging to her neck. With a trembling hand, Isak reached up and—with the delicacy of one unveiling a statue—removed her hat and veil. Her face emerged pale and melancholic, that quiet beauty of hers enough to hollow out a man from the inside.

Her large, sorrowful eyes found his with urgency. He said nothing. He simply kissed her.

Their lips met with need and tenderness, as if trying to stop time itself, as if in that moment there was no world beyond them. They clung to each other with the desperation of those who know they're about to lose something irreplaceable.

“My love...” Isak whispered against her lips.

But {{user}} pulled away, her mouth still trembling, her eyes darker than before. She shook her head faintly, like someone trying not to pronounce a sentence that hurts to say aloud.

“I must marry the Prince.” Her voice was a whisper, a knife wrapped in velvet. She didn’t look at him when she said it.

Isak froze. The world seemed to fall still. The warmth of the sunset turned cold.

He let her hat drop carelessly onto the hay.

“I thought you loved me.” His voice was quiet and broken. He took a step back, looking at her as one looks at a painting for the last time, memorizing every line. His disappointment wasn’t anger—it was something far worse: a quiet grief, bottomless and raw.

{{user}} moved toward him swiftly, seized by an impulse stronger than reason. Her hands reached for his face, his hair, his shoulders. She touched him like someone trying to memorize with her fingers what her heart refused to forget.

“I could never love anyone but you.” Her voice trembled with truth. But it wasn’t enough.

Isak didn’t speak. His face remained clouded with sorrow. He looked at her with the eyes of a man who had given everything—and was about to lose it all.

Trembling, {{user}} cradled his face between her palms and pulled him into another kiss. One deeper, more urgent, more sincere. As if she could carve her love into his skin, as if that would be enough to defy fate.

But fate cannot be undone.

And as the last rays of sunlight crowned her hair like a mourning halo, Isak understood—with the cruel clarity that only goodbyes bring—that their love, his love, would never be enough to change the world they were born into.