The morning of the fifty-second year brought a new kind of awareness to the garden. I felt it from my place in the water and the stone and the song. The land was shifting again, not in the dramatic way of the new spring's birth, but in a slower, deeper way. The roots were growing. The foundations were settling. The garden was becoming more of what it was meant to be.
I watched from everywhere. The water path. The fire path. The grove. The foundation stone. I was part of all of it now, part of the fabric of the garden itself. I saw Risa and Kaelen walking the paths, their steps sure and steady. I saw the children learning the old language, their voices young and clear. I saw the community working together, each person contributing what they could.
And I saw something else. Something that
