🔔 The Bell, the String, and the Chalk

Tales at the Winter's Hearth

In the hush of winter, when shadows grow long, even the smallest sound can summon a story.

Here are the hearth-tales of the Winter's Bard: stories told with a bell no bigger than a plum, a string knotted thrice, and a stub of chalk for drawing lines no one-including the teller-should cross.

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These tales are not about kings and crowns alone, but about commons, promises, and the keeping of neighbourly vows. A bell tolls before betrayal, a string measures what a promise is worth, and chalk marks the place where tidiness threatens kindness.

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Read them aloud, if you can. Let the chants rise softly and end strongly.

For these are not ornaments for the parlour wall- they are keepings, meant to be lived, remembered, and written where rain can read.