The fire crackled gently in the hearth, its warmth seeping into the old stones of the cottage walls. The smell of rosemary, wild mint, and something faintly sweet drifted in from the kitchen, where tea brewed in a chipped tea kettle. Outside, the sound of water dripping could be heard as the wind tickled the trees after an early afternoon shower, leaves whispering and petals nodding and the earth began to slow down as the sun slipped ever lower.
Mira sat in her old rocking chair, a thick wool blanket tucked over her legs, its corners worn from years of use. In her lap rested a wild rabbit, its fur tangled with bits of clover and moss. She stroked it absently, fingers wrinkled but sure, as though she were brushing back time itself.
Two girls sat cross-legged on the rug before her, eyes wide, silent except for the occasional shift of fabric or breath held in anticipation. They were the same age Mira had been when it all began – barely into girlhood, not yet certain where the world ended and magic began.
"You've heard the stories, I know," Mira said, voice soft as falling ash. "But most don't tell them quite right. They forget things. Or change them. Or leave out the rabbit." She smiled down at the creature in her lap, who blinked slowly and twitched an ear.
"This little one?" she continued softly, "She was there from the beginning. Long before I knew what she was. Long before I knew what I was…"
The girls leaned forward, drawn in like seeds to sun.
Mira's hand paused on the rabbit's fur. Her eyes turned toward the dancing firelight, and for a moment – just a moment – they glimmered with the same depth as the still forest pond.
"It started," she said, "with a garden that wouldn't grow. And a girl who was tired of not being seen."
The fire crackled on, but her voice slipped gently into the past, and the girls before her could almost see it: a younger Mira, barefoot in a crooked garden, kneeling in the dirt as she whispered to a rabbit no one else could hear.
The village hadn't trusted her. Not then. Some were kind, most were polite, but when the sickness came and she healed the first child, the whispers began. Witch, they called her. Blessed and cursed. Some wanted to thank her. Others wanted to hide her. And a few… wanted to use her.
They came with horses and blades, cloaked in the language of "fair trade" and "greater good." When she said no, they demanded. When she resisted, they chased her.
She had no weapon. Only her breath, her bare feet, and what she had learned from the rabbit.
So, she ran.
She ran like the world had narrowed to pulse and dirt, dodging between trees she knew by name, leaping brambles like she was born to leap. Her legs burned. Her lungs screamed. But she wasn't Mira anymore.
She was the wind behind the whiskers. The heartbeat under the roots.
She dove under a low-handing tree where three roots arched like fingers – and she did not stop. She crawled deeper, into the hollow dark beneath the tree, where moonlight dripped through moss like silver threads. And there…
There she found them.
Tiny seeds, glowing like fireflies. Nestled in a nest of soft leaves. They pulsed when she touched them. And from somewhere beneath the bark above her, a voice – not a voice, but a feeling – reached her.
'These seeds do not grow in hands of anger. But where love is sown, the thorns will guard.'
Mira paused in her story, lost in thought and one of the young girls at her feet spoke up softly, "Cael?"
"Yes," she said, a smile stretching the wrinkles of her face. "Cael, my sweet, sweet Cael."
"Cael?" asked the other girl, a small frown of confusion on her soft unmarred face.
"The forest was quiet the day I met him. He had always been part of the village of course, but we never had a chance to cross paths. I fully believe he made an effort that day to meet me. It was heavy with summer heat. Dragonflies drifted lazily above the reeds and I moved carefully among their roots…"
Her apron had been half-full of leaves and moss.
Cael crouched nearby, turning over stones to find the creeping thyme she needed. His hands were dirt-streaked, and his dark hair curled at the nape with sweat. He wasn't a talker, which suited her just fine.
Still, something about the silence felt different that day.
"You're good at this," she said after a while, surprised by how her voice startle the quiet. "Better than most who visit the forest."
Cael gave a one-shouldered shrug, eyes still on the ground. "I listen."
She tilted her head. "To me?"
He shook his head, smiling faintly. "To the forest."
That made her pause. Most villagers feared the forest. Spoke of it as if it had teeth. Only Cael seemed to hear it the way she did – soft, patient, alive.
She watched him carefully place a sprig of thyme into her satchel, more gently than anyone ever handled her.
"I think," he said suddenly, not looking at her, "if you'd been born anywhere else, they'd have called you a saint. Or a queen."
Mira blinked, the words striking deeper than she expected. "But not here."
"No." His gaze met hers. Steady. Sad. "Here, they call you dangerous. Because they don't understand what you are."
She didn't know what to say to that.
So, she sad beside him instead. The two of them beneath a tangle of branches, the smell of earth and summer thick around them.
"I don't want to be anything special," she whispered, almost ashamed.
Cael's voice was soft. "I know. That's why you are."
There was a silence so full it rang in her ears.
Then softly, as if unsure whether he was even allowed to say it, he added, "If you were ordinary, I'd still want to be with you."
Her breath caught. For once, she didn't have words either. Just the hush of leaves, and her heart pounding quietly in her throat.
She didn't touch him. He didn't reach for her. But something passed between them all the same.
Not a promise. Just… a truth.
And when he stood, brushing the dirt from his hands and offering her a small white blossom he'd tucked behind his ear, she took it without hesitation.
The girls sitting at her feet both gasped at the same time, drawing her out of her memory.
"A white blossom?" asked the first girl, her eyes wide on her small face.
"Yes," smiled Mira, touching the white flower tucked in her hair. "I don't know where he found it. I have searched this entire forest and never found another like it."
"What happened to him?" asked the second girl, running her hands over her arms and scooting closer.
"We'll get there," chuckled Mira, returning to stroking the rabbit. "Stories take time to unravel or they lose the power of their words. It grows late and you two must be out of the forest before true dark. Stay together as you go, and I will tell you more when you return."
She watched them wrap their tiny cloaks about their shoulders and gather up their baskets, bustling out of the small cottage with the energy of the young. She could hear their excited voices fading as they hurried along the path back to the village.
"Will you choose one of them to teach?" asked the rabbit softly in the warm silence.
"Perhaps," she whispered. Her mind was drifting back to a time when a soft hand held hers and a faint wheeze drifted between his lips before he left her with the same white blossom she had in her hair. A single tear trickled down her cheek, disappearing into the wool of her blanket.