#but then again so did my sister with her moss harvesting endeavors

[protoindoeuropean]

btw this was the napping spot

if you even care

[corvidstoneage]

unedited short story. straight from my head onto the paper

Prologue

It started a few months ago when Lia’s boyfriend Danial fell off his garden. I know they needed to pair her with another gardener, but did it have to be Victor? Imagining Lia stuck on a garden with him for weeks on end gave me the shivers.

He was the sort of gardener who put in the bare minimum for his garden to even function. It did it’s job, harvesting water from the clouds that never seemed to rain in the Sanctuary but it was a skeletal thing made up of all wood and moss.

Walking through the terraces beneath the looming tower I came to the entrance to Danial’s garden. It was a beautiful thing full of all kinds of trees and flowers until the accident. A few of the ferns he had even managed to scavenge from the ruined desert outside the Sanctuary, a dangerous endeavor. Now the leaves and petals drooped sadly everywhere besides the gathering pool in the center.

Next to the pool Danial sat in his wheelchair struggling with a bucket of water. The healers had said in time he would be able to walk again but they had expressed doubt that he would ever be able to control water again. That’s why I was here.

Being the second born daughter I didn’t have the same obligations Lia did to attend the academy or to lift the gardens out over the desert. But Lia loved Danial and so I loved him too. So every day for the past three months I’ve been coming up to his garden to help him water the plants.

Even with the two of us it took much longer without magic and the garden was dying. Still, this garden represented nearly ten years of Danial’s life, gathering and maintaining it. So I was determined to save as much of it as possible.

Bending down, I picked up an extra bucket and walked over to the pool.

“Hey Danial”

He looked up smiling, “Hey Alli, how was the walk up?”

“Roger’s flowers are in bloom again,” I replied, dipping the bucket in the pool.

“How he convinces them to bloom so often I’ll never understand,” he shook his head, lifting the bucket into his lap and starting to wheel himself over to a young looking maple tree, “I never could get mine to bloom more than once a month.”

I lifted my bucket and headed over to a nearby cluster of poplars with tulips growing underneath. Nestled in the trees was a small wooden bench, intricately grown out of olive wood.

I remembered the first time I had seen that bench. I had been sent to fetch Lia from the garden for dinner. She had been running late that day so I jogged my way up the terraces making a few stops for directions from other gardeners until I found Danial’s garden. I walked in only to be blinded for life by my older sister kissing Danial. The green boughs of the newly formed bench cradling them both. Gross.

I instinctively wondered if Victor had a similar bench on his garden. “It’s not fair!”

“I know right? He gets such a vibrant purple from his lilacs too.”

“Not that! The Claiming. She hates him! And he’s just gross!” I flung the water a little too aggressively at the tulips.

“Ah… I’ll admit he wouldn’t have been my first choice either. He was available though.”

I spun around, furious. “Not your first choice? He doesn’t even have a proper garden! And the only reason he’s available is because all the girls found him too creepy to work with! Do you not even care about Lia?”

He flinched. Good.

“Alli… you know I love Lia. But there’s nothing I can do. I can’t even participate in the Claiming.” He flicked his hand at the water in the pool as if demonstrating his lack of powers.

“I’ll do it then! I’m not letting him have her!”

He smiled sadly. “You’re floating Alli.”

Letting out a frustrated sigh I lowered myself to the ground.

“You know that won’t work,” he said, rolling himself over to me, “Gardening takes gentleness with the water. Girls are too strong, it’d be like trying to make jewelry with a sledgehammer.”

“I haven’t had the fountain water! I’m not as strong as Lia. I can do it!”

Whether he actually thought I could do it or simply didn’t want to argue about it I don’t know, but he looked up at my glowering five foot frame then and said, “well I suppose we better start practicing then.”

The Claiming

It was a warm and slightly breezy day when we set off up the tower for the Claiming. Lia was pushing Danial’s wheelchair for him despite his complaints that she’d mess up her new dress and he was perfectly capable of pushing himself.

I was walking behind them with Dad who looked both proud and worried. He was a third born son so had never been a gardener himself. We grew a garden at home of course, everyone did. But it wasn’t a proper garden. Not one of the massive ones like Danial’s that soared through the sky harvesting clouds. But he knew the stresses of the job from his sister, who lifted a garden still.

As we rounded a corner in the path we came to Victor’s garden, just as big as Danial’s but somehow even more wilted and sickly. Standing in front of the garden was someone I desperately wished would look wilted and sickly himself. Victor the scumbag.

He strutted up to us as if we weren’t all glaring daggers at him, grabbed Lia’s hand off Danial’s wheelchair, and proceeded to kiss it in a most obnoxious fashion.

Ignoring Dad’s displeased growl he turned to me, “Ah, Alli, still just as beautiful as your sister I see.” He gave me a wink, “perhaps you should join us on my garden sometime.”

Lia and I both made slightly strangled choking noises as he strutted away. Her out of disbelief, Me because I’d get in trouble if I curb stomped his ugly face in the dirt.

Eventually we made it to the plateau just under the top of the tower and Lia had to turn to the right to finish the ascent on the opposite side of the rift from us. I scarcely noticed the crowd jostling around us I was so focused on what I was about to do. We said our goodbyes in a blur and then headed up the left staircase to the top of the tower. The crowd thinned out as we went. Only the families of those taking part in the ceremony and the participants themselves would be on top. Everyone else would watch from the plateau at the bottom of the rift a fact crucial to my plan.

At the top the elders began explaining the ceremony, not that I was listening. I was too focused on Lia. She was knee deep in the fountain, her hair braided over one shoulder full of flowers from Danial’s garden. It was a game of his to put as many of them in her hair as he could without her noticing. She always noticed but she let him do it anyway and then kept the flowers in a jar in her room.

She was peering down into fifty foot wide crevice between us, obviously searching for Danial in the crowd below. I followed her gaze and found him towards the front of the crowd looking up at her. Tears running down his face.

The elders started to wrap up the introduction and a large bell rang announcing the start of the ceremony. I turned my attention to Victor. He was the oldest so he would be going first.

The ceremony was basically just a simple trust exercise. The boy would step forward, call the girl’s name, and leap out over the crevice. The girl would then catch him midair by lifting the water in his body. Then he would just pull himself through the air in a neat arc. Quite a spectacle for those standing underneath, showing off both individuals’ skill in manipulating water. At least that was the hope.

The bell rang again and the boys stepped forward into a line a few feet from the edge of the rift. Ignoring Dad’s gesturing at me I crept up behind them as quietly as I could.

The third bell rang and Victor started to take a step forward, inhaling to call my sister’s name. He then tripped over my foot and ate dirt. :)

I then walked forward a couple of steps in front of the line, called Lia’s name, and flung myself into the abyss.

I only fell a couple inches before Lia caught me. The crowd beneath me let out a delayed gasp.

The elders started to lurch forward just as I looked back at Victor’s confused dust covered face and launched myself across the rift completely forgetting to control my power and slamming myself into Lia’s arms like a bird into a window. We both tumbled backwards into the fountain where I promptly smacked my head into a rock and blacked out. Quite a spectacle indeed.