Chapter Three: The Voice Beneath the Petals
1622 Words
--
I thought saving Rae would bring peace.
But peace is a lie in Roseheath.
It’s been three days since we pulled her out of the Bloom, and she hasn’t spoken more than a dozen words. She just sits on the porch wrapped in an old shawl, staring into the fog. She flinches at shadows. She won’t drink tea unless I make it exactly how she used to — steeped until bitter, with honey and a splash of milk.
She doesn’t remember the creature in the ice, or the mimic with her face.
But sometimes, she hums a lullaby my mother used to sing.
And when she does, I know some part of her still remembers the real pain.
So do I.
---
I’ve barely slept. Each time I close my eyes, I see that claw breaching the ice. I wake up choking on flower petals. Crimson ones. I spit them out into the sink and rinse the blood from my teeth. They always vanish by morning, like the Bloom doesn’t want to be caught leaving breadcrumbs in the waking world.
Thorne said it was the side effect of exposure — hallucinations, memory shifts, phantom smells. But I know better.
The Bloom isn’t done with me.
It’s blooming inside me now.
---
The first time it happened was in class. Mr. Galen was droning about the American Civil War and the classroom smelled like chalk and mildew. Then, suddenly, the ceiling peeled open like wet paper.
And there it was — the red sky of the Inner Bloom, leaking into my world.
A thousand echo-birds burst through, their wings made of glass and grief. They circled the room once, then vanished as suddenly as they came. No one noticed. Not even Galen.
Except for me.
And the girl in the back row.
She looked right at me.
Smiled.
And blinked with eyes that bled shadows.
---
Later that day, I found her in the hallway. She leaned against the lockers, one boot tapping a slow rhythm.
“You saw them too,” I said.
She arched a brow. “Did I?”
I stepped closer. “Who are you?”
“Someone who lives in the cracks,” she said. “Someone who’s been watching you.”
“Why?”
“Because you’re loud, Iris. Bloom-loud. You left footprints all over the in-between. It’s messy.”
I felt cold. “Are you a Bloomwalker?”
She laughed, short and sharp. “Hardly. I’m something older. More forgotten.”
She leaned in. Her breath smelled like jasmine and decay.
“Be careful who you drag out of the Bloom. Not all echoes like being remembered.”
Then she was gone.
Just… gone.
Like she stepped sideways out of the world.
---
I told Thorne that night.
He went pale. “What did she look like?”
I described her — black lipstick, faded hoodie, that too-steady smile.
His voice dropped to a whisper. “That’s Maeve.”
“Who’s Maeve?”
He hesitated. “A mistake.”
“That’s not an answer.”
He sighed. “She used to be one of us. A Bloomwalker. But she crossed too many times. Bound herself too deeply to the in-between. Now she’s not alive… or dead. She’s a splinter.”
“Is she dangerous?”
He looked at me. “She’ll only kill you if you’re interesting.”
“Great,” I muttered. “Guess I’m fascinating.”
---
That night, I dreamed of Lumi.
She stood at the lake’s edge, barefoot, wearing the hoodie I buried with her.
“Iris,” she said, her voice echoing like it came from underwater.
I stepped toward her. “Is it really you?”
She smiled — but her eyes were wrong. Empty. Bleeding petals.
“You let me drown,” she said.
“No,” I whispered. “I tried to save you.”
“But you chose Rae instead. You left me behind.”
“I didn’t know where you were—!”
“You never came.”
“I’m coming now!”
She tilted her head. “Too late.”
The water behind her boiled.
Then she was gone.
---
I woke up sobbing.
Petals in my mouth again.
Worse this time. More of them.
Thorne showed up without knocking. He looked at my sink, saw the stains.
“You’ve been marked.”
“Marked?”
“The Bloom knows you’re a doorway now. Something came through with us. Something left its scent on you.”
“Maeve?”
He shook his head. “Something older.”
I stared at the mirror. My eyes looked darker. My skin paler. Something in my face no longer belonged.
“What does it want?”
He was silent.
That silence said everything.
---
Rae started whispering names in her sleep.
Some I didn’t recognize.
Some I did.
Lumi.
Mom.
Thorne.
Me.
And one name that made my blood run cold.
Riven.
---
Thorne nearly broke the coffee table when I told him.
“You’re sure that’s what she said?”
“Twice.”
He stood up. Pacing.
“Who is it?” I asked.
He rubbed his temples. “Riven isn’t a who. It’s an echo-king. A congealed thing. It was once human — maybe. But now it’s the Bloom’s hunger given form.”
“How can the Bloom be hungry?”
He turned to me. “Because it’s made of loss. And loss always wants to be fed.”
I swallowed hard. “Why would Rae know that name?”
“I don’t know.”
“You think it’s inside her?”
“I think it’s near her.”
“And me?”
His silence again.
I hated his silence.
---
The next day, I went back to the lake.
Alone.
The dock was rotted. The air still smelled like iron and lilacs. My feet crunched over dead leaves and dragonfly husks.
I sat at the edge and whispered, “Lumi…”
Nothing answered.
Then — a ripple.
I leaned forward.
And saw something in the water.
A face.
Her face.
But not right. Not really her.
This one was stitched together from shadow and memory.
And it smiled.
---
Thorne dragged me back.
“You can’t just call out like that,” he said.
“I saw her.”
“It’s not her.”
“She looked like her.”
“That’s how it works. The Bloom knows your grief. It builds masks out of it.”
I pulled away. “Then how do I find the real one?”
His jaw clenched. “The only way is through.”
“Then take me back.”
“Iris—”
“I mean it. We found Rae. Now we find Lumi.”
“You’re not ready.”
“Then train me.”
He stared at me.
“You don’t understand,” he said quietly. “If you go back again, you might not want to leave.”
I stared back.
“I don’t want to stay,” I said. “I want to bring her home.”
---
We made a deal.
Three days.
Three days of training.
Then we go back.
---
Day one: memory binding.
Thorne lit candles shaped like sleeping skulls and made me relive my worst days. My parents’ funeral. The day Lumi vanished. The time I slit my palm in middle school just to feel something.
Each time, I had to anchor myself with a memory of light — a moment of truth. Of love.
It was harder than it sounded.
Day two: echo exposure.
He brought me to a place where weak echoes wandered like mist. I had to walk among them without reacting.
One whispered my name like a prayer.
Another wore Lumi’s eyes.
I didn’t flinch.
Day three: bloomwalking.
He showed me how to step sideways.
Not physically — emotionally.
How to let grief open the door without falling all the way in.
“Think of it like diving,” he said. “But you have to bring your own rope.”
“And if I don’t?”
“You drown.”
---
At the end of the third day, Rae spoke clearly for the first time.
“I saw her,” she said.
“Who?”
“Lumi.”
My heart froze. “Where?”
She looked past me. Her eyes unfocused. “She’s in the orchard. The one that sings.”
Thorne’s face went pale.
I looked at him.
“What is it?”
He said one word.
“The Silent Orchard.”
---
It wasn’t a place.
It was a legend.
A forbidden garden in the deepest part of the Bloom where lost souls bloomed fully. Where the grief was too old, too thick to unravel. Where echoes screamed silently — too loud for ears, too sharp for minds.
“Only one Bloomwalker ever came back from it,” Thorne said.
“Who?”
He didn’t answer.
And that’s when I knew.
“Maeve,” I whispered.
He nodded.
“She lost herself there,” he said. “Came back something else.”
“So will I,” I said, “unless we move fast.”
Thorne sighed.
Then handed me a petal carved from bone.
“Take this. If you see yourself forgetting… crush it. It’ll pull you out.”
“And Lumi?”
He met my eyes.
“We don’t pull people from the Orchard,” he said. “We bury them there.”
“Not this time.”
---
That night, I stood at the threshold again.
The Bloom pulsed in my chest like a second heart.
Thorne held out his hand.
I took it.
And stepped into the dark.
- Writer
