Sage winterwood's Arc

Chapter 21 of 29

The compass led Sage across three ridges before the ground changed. Grass spread out before her, but not green. It was lilac, soft and thick, rippling like water in the wind. She waded in to her knees. At the center of the field stood a single flower. Its petals shifted through every color as she watched, glowing faint and strange. This was it the first plant for her journal. Sage knelt beside it. Her compass needle spun useless now, pointing nowhere. She had found the bloom. But she did not know how to take it home. If she pulled the stem, the roots might tear. If she dug wrong, she could crush it. This was the only one for miles. One mistake would kill it, and there was no second flower to try again. Day faded. Sage decided to make camp and study the plant before touching it. She unrolled her pack and set up a small tent of woven leaves and sticks. She built no fire near the bloom. She sat and watched the petals turn violet, then gold, then blue. She still had no plan. A rustle came from the grass. A black bird with yellow markings hopped onto a bent stalk. It cocked its head and stared at her with one bright eye. Sage went still. The bird opened its beak. "Careful hands," it said. "Careful hands." Sage's breath caught. The words were her mother's. She had said them once, teaching Sage to lift a seedling without breaking the roots. "You can talk," she whispered. The bird bobbed. "Talk. Talk." It flew down and landed by the flower's stem. Then it drove its beak into the soil and tugged, showing her. It pulled loose a clump of lilac grass, roots and all, and dropped it at her feet. Sage understood. The bird was not showing her the flower. It was showing her the soil. The bloom did not grow alone. It fed on the lilac grass around it. To move the flower, she had to move the whole patch, roots tangled together, undisturbed. She worked through the night. She did not pull the stem. Instead she dug wide, cutting a circle around the bloom, keeping the lilac grass rooted beside it. The bird watched from her shoulder, repeating, "Careful. Careful." At dawn she lifted the whole clump into a bundle of wet cloth from her pack. The petals still glowed. The roots stayed whole. Sage sat back, hands filthy, and laughed. She had the flower. She had it alive. The bird hopped onto the bundle. It would not leave. "Home," it said. "Home." "You're coming with me, then," Sage said. She had her first rare bloom for the garden. But the journey back stretched long, and the roots would dry within days. She had to reach her garden before the flower she had saved began to die.