Mira finally steps out from behind the wheel housing — she can't stay crouched in the spray forever, not with the Keeper standing there so calmly. "What do you mean, a door?" The Keeper sets the lantern down on a flat stone, careful and unhurried. "A door doesn't choose who walks through it," they say. "It doesn't read the letters that pass through its slot. It simply opens when the right hand touches it — and closes again after." They tap the satchel lightly. "Someone else wrote that page. Someone else carved the oak. I was given the message to carry and told one thing: when the mill wheel stopped, the reader had arrived." The lantern flame steadies in the windless afternoon air. "I don't know what the letter says, Mira. Only you can read it." They hold the satchel out again, closer this time, the folded page visible inside.