If you travel past the forest, past highstones and then even farther still, until you are not sure whether you walk in dreams or in reality, you will eventually stumble across a stream cutting through the empty landscape, its waters silver-white and flowing backwards. Follow this stream to where it disappears among a whispering grove of birch trees, then trace it farther still, until the thin trunks open before you and reveal the grove’s center. At its heart stands an oak, old and twisted, bare black branches reaching up to the stars, the silver stream flowing into a cleft in its trunk. There are no other animals around you, no life in sight except for the trees. It should be a frightening place, and it is; but there is also a sense of peace that settles over you, and you understand suddenly, clear and quiet and certain, that whatever closure you are seeking, you will find it here.