Chapter 4: Petals in the Wind
It rained that morning.
Not a storm. Not even a proper rain—just a hesitant drizzle, as though the sky couldn't decide if it wanted to weep or merely watch.
Aria Solenne walked through it with her umbrella tilted low, watching puddles ripple at her feet. The reflections shimmered and shifted—fragments of buildings, broken silhouettes of birds overhead. The city blurred into watercolor.
Her boots tapped softly on the cobbled path. Each sound echoed longer than it should've, as if the world had forgotten how to absorb noise.
Even the stray cat that usually lounged near the bakery window was gone.
And for the first time in weeks, she felt seen—but by something that wasn't human.
⸻
The bookstore door was ajar.
Not shattered. Not forced.
Just… open. Like a mouth breathing.
She paused on the threshold, rain dripping from the curve of her umbrella. The air smelled like old paper and something faintly metallic beneath.
"…Mrs. Yune?" Her voice cracked slightly.
No response.
Only the soft rustle of unseen pages, turning themselves.
Her heart picked up—just a flicker, like the memory of fear. She stepped inside, slowly, carefully.
The shop appeared untouched at first glance. Nothing overturned. No signs of a struggle.
Except the light in the back room.
It flickered once.
Then again.
And then—it went out entirely.
Aria stood still for a long time.
She didn't go back there.
She made tea instead.
She placed two cups at the counter—one for herself, one for the absence of Mrs. Yune. She didn't drink it. Just let it steam quietly in the hush, watching the bloom of fog crawl along the windows.
⸻
That afternoon, the world tilted.
She was walking through the market—past wilting vegetables and distracted vendors—when a sound sliced the air.
A scream.
A woman collapsed near the fountain. People gathered like moths—drawn, but hesitant. Someone shouted for help. A few pulled out their phones. Others just watched, unsure whether this was tragedy or theater.
Aria didn't move at first.
The woman lay twitching on the stone path, her skin as pale as bone. Her lips were tinged blue, like the cold had stolen her breath. Her hands spasmed once—twice—and then stilled.
But before they did, the woman's eyes snapped open.
And locked onto Aria.
Not random.
Not accidental.
Direct.
And then—she smiled.
It was a hollow, broken smile. Blood dripped from the corners of her mouth, trailing down her chin like ink bleeding through parchment.
Aria stumbled back a step, nearly dropping her bag.
No one else reacted. No one seemed to see what she saw.
The smile. The blood. The unspoken recognition.
Someone said the word "seizure." Others whispered "virus." But no one looked at her.
No one saw what she had seen.
⸻
That night, the news said nothing.
There were no reports of an illness. No footage of the collapse. No alert. No warning.
Just silence dressed as normalcy.
But Aria's flower had grown again.
Three heads now.
The petals pulsed faintly in the moonlight, as though exhaling. As though waiting.
And on her mirror, in letters scrawled in fog, were words she did not remember writing:
"She awakens where others fall."
She didn't touch the mirror.
Didn't wipe the words away.
They faded slowly on their own, like something watching her decide whether she was ready.
⸻
That night, she dreamed again.
This time, the world burned without sound.
A city crumbling in golden fire, people turned to shadows as buildings wept ash. A sea of eyes blinked from the cracks in the ground—unblinking, endless, infected. And there, in the center of it all:
A girl.
Barefoot. Standing knee-deep in a lake of soot.
Her white dress was stained at the hem, the crimson rising like spilled wine, slow and irreversible.
Aria recognized her.
But she couldn't say why.
The girl raised her head. Her eyes were empty, but knowing.
And that voice—soft, feminine, ancient—spoke again, coiling around Aria's spine like velvet strangling a rose:
"Run, little bloom. Or become the fire."
⸻
She woke up crying.
She didn't know when the tears started. Only that they didn't stop right away.
Outside her window, the sky had split.
Not broken. Not shattered.
But wounded.
A single thin seam of red light glowed across the clouds—like the heavens had been cut open, and something on the other side was beginning to bleed through.