Nymphflora Mossfern's Arc

Chapter 2 of 3

Nymphflora walked for days through black water and glowing mushrooms. The pull in her chest never let go. It tugged her back toward the old tree that had named her, and she followed it. She did not know what the feeling wanted. She only knew it grew stronger near the great trunk. So she stopped searching for the edge of her world and began to build a home instead. She chose a gnarled swamp tree near the old one. She pressed her hands to its bark and asked it to open. Slow at first, then eager, the tree hollowed and shaped itself around her. Vines dropped like curtains. Water lilies opened along the roots. By the third day she had a small round door and a warm dry room above the water. Then she practiced her magic. She knelt in the mud and tried to grow more than moss. She strained until her arms shook. A single thin bush pushed up, crooked and pale. A few flowers followed, weak and small. She sighed. This was not shaping a living place. This was barely more than the moss at her heels. "You are fighting it," a voice said. A tiny fairy hovered over the bush. She was no bigger than Nymphflora's hand, with dark hair full of moss and green wings that caught the light. Vines curled up her arms like they belonged there. She had followed Nymphflora since the blue moon, watching from the reeds, and now she came close for the first time. "You push the plants," the fairy said. "Don't push. Ask. The swamp is already alive. It only sleeps." Nymphflora frowned. "I don't know how to ask." "Feel where the water wants to go. Then help it." Nymphflora closed her eyes. She stopped straining. She listened to the pull in her chest and let it spread down her arms into the mud. Under her palms she felt hidden threads of water, waiting. She did not command them. She opened a path. Water slid between two pools and joined them. Reeds rose along the new channel. Then moss, then bright mushrooms, then flowers that glowed soft blue and pink. The blooms turned their faces toward her and pulsed like small hearts. The light spread across the dark marsh in a slow wave. Nymphflora opened her eyes and gasped. She had linked two ponds into one living stretch of glowing swamp. The pull in her chest eased at last. She finally understood what it wanted. It was not homesickness. It was purpose. The swamp was dying in the dark, and she was made to wake it. "That is what a nymphflora does," the fairy said. "Now you know your work." Nymphflora looked out at the endless black water beyond her small bright patch. She had woken one corner. The rest still slept. Her heart lifted and sank at once. She had found her purpose, and it was far larger than she was.