The blooms didn't die.
By morning, the ghostly white flower was still glowing softly on Sera's nightstand, unwatered, untouched. Outside, in the broken greenhouse, every flower in her garden—seasonal or not—stood tall and awake, as if they'd been pulled into some silent allegiance.
Sera stared at the petals for a long time before whispering, "What do you want from me?"
The flower didn't speak.
But it leaned ever so slightly toward her palm.
Lina arrived with an armful of books.
"Local history," she said. "Mostly nonsense and church gossip, but I found something buried in the library's restricted archives."
She flipped open one of the cracked tomes to a chapter titled "Wynn's Whispering Wards."
It was a single paragraph.
During the plague winter of 1875, a woman known as Celeste Wynn was accused of manipulating grief with flowers. Some claimed she could cure mourning; others claimed she spread it. She vanished the same week thirteen graves were unearthed and emptied. No bodies. Just roots.
Sera swallowed. "She was punished for healing."
"Or framed," Lina said grimly. "They feared her. Like they'll fear you."
Sera traced her finger over the faded ink. "So the power didn't end with her."
"No," Lina said. "But someone made damn sure it was buried."
Together, they scoured the shop's attic—where Mira had stored boxes labeled in her tidy, looping handwriting. Sera had never gone through them. The grief had been too raw.
Now, as dust clouded the air and cobwebs brushed her skin, she opened the one marked "Legacy."
Inside were dried flowers wrapped in silk, sealed notes, old journals, and a slim wooden box. Inside the box, nestled in dark velvet, was a set of pressed blooms arranged in the shape of a circle.
A wreath.
Each flower was carefully labeled in Mira's writing: Memory, Protection, Revelation, Silence, Grief, Echo, Desire, Binding.
In the center lay a slip of paper.
"If you are reading this, then the soil has stirred again. The flowers will remember everything you don't. Be careful which ones you wake."
Sera's hand trembled as she traced the petals.
The flowers were part of an ancient ritual.
An archive of emotion.
And she was its keeper now.
They arranged the wreath in the middle of the workshop.
Each bloom gave off a different energy—some warm, some biting cold. When she touched "Revelation," images flashed: a woman writing by candlelight, her ink running red; a child watching their home burn, not crying, only staring.
But when she touched "Desire," something else happened.
The room warped.
And suddenly, Lina was in front of her—not as a friend or a helper—but something more. Her lips parted, her eyes wide, not in fear but want.
The flower amplified everything.
Sera stepped back, heart pounding.
"I—I didn't mean to—"
Lina held her gaze. "I know."
They didn't speak for a long moment.
But the air between them had changed.
Not charged. Just known.
That night, a storm rolled in, thunder pressing against the windows like a fist.
And with it came another bouquet—left on the doorstep in the rain.
This time, the flowers were dead. Wilted and gray.
And tied to them was a note scorched along the edges.
"Stop digging. You don't know what you're growing."
Sera crumpled the note.
Too late.
The greenhouse had already begun to breathe.
As lightning lit up the sky, Sera stepped into the garden and spoke softly to the blooms.
They answered.
In whispers.
In memories.
In pain.
The petals had become an archive not just of her gift—but of generations of stories, love, and betrayal.
Someone wanted those stories forgotten.
But Sera had already remembered.
And she would not let them die again.