Dawn arrived here jn North Cornwall without announcement, just a soft thinning of the dark. I woke to the quiet weight of it—the kind of stillness that belongs only to the first of May. Beltane. Even the air seemed to be holding its breath. From the open window of our tiny off-grid home, the morning slipped in cool and clean, carrying the faint scent of damp earth and wood- smoke from last night’s fire. The small copse beside us stood half in shadow, half gilded by the low su