The orchard was quieter now—not in the absence of sound, but in the fullness of listening. Everything hummed with a patient music. Even the wind seemed to move with thought.
But peace, Tian Shen knew, was never stillness. It was motion with meaning.
It began three days after the Heartroot's awakening.
A stormcloud bloomed over the far horizon—not grey, but a bruised violet tinged with molten gold. It didn't move with the wind. It pulsed. Like a heartbeat.
From the Watchpoint Tower atop the Whispering Pines, Ji Luan reported the phenomenon. "It's not weather," he said, voice low. "It's memory. And it's moving."
Elder Su stood beside him. "Something from before?"
"No," Ji Luan said. "Something that remembers what came after."
...
The orchard's boundary wards shivered. Not in alarm. In curiosity.
