4. The Petal
The Petal
Skaros & Ianthe
The meat was trying to keep me away from her.
I could taste Ianthe through the infirmary walls, faint and muffled by stone but unmistakable. All morning, I’d been pushing roots toward the building. And all morning, the two harvesters had been undoing my work.
“He’s at the steps again.” The furry one shook a tangle of stems from his leg and swept his death sphere across the stone. His presence pulsed with the heat of infernal fire, one that carried an unsettling familiarity. “I’ve cleared this stretch three times already.”
“I see him.” The bronze one knelt near the infirmary entrance and held his death sphere close to the cluster I’d forced through the cracks. The sphere glowed, and my asphodels loosened. The petals separated into threads of energy that streamed into the sphere.
It didn’t hurt. The sensation was closer to exhaling, a release that left me thinner, slightly hungrier. Then, the city’s energy fed me again, and the growing started over. Three fresh stems pushed up through the same crack before the bronze one had finished straightening.
“He’s stubborn today,” the furry one muttered.
He cared about what he was doing. I could taste it in his death energy every time he cleared a patch of my flowers.
He didn’t tear the stems or rush the process.
He swept his sphere in measured arcs and let the blooms unravel at their own pace.
Even now, as he kicked a tendril loose from his ankle, there was a gentleness in the gesture that blended naturally with his heat.
“He’s pushing toward Iaso’s infirmary,” the furry one continued, clearing the south side of the avenue. “He’s never done this before. Not like this.”
“I know.” The bronze one moved along the wall, easing my asphodels from the masonry one stem at a time. “Something changed when the woman arrived.”
She was why I was pushing. Ianthe. The woman from the stage, the one who had turned the hunger inside me into something else entirely.
My mate was behind those walls, and every root I sent toward the building was a root reaching for her.
No matter how many times the harvesters dissolved it, I’d keep growing it back. Because I needed to reach her.
“What are you thinking, Skaros?” the bronze one asked under his breath as he worked. Not to me, and not to the furry one. To the memory of whoever I had been.
Something stirred in me at the sound of my old name in his mouth.
That word—Skaros—had meant so much when my mother spoke it, becoming an anchor once I became aware enough of myself to understand its weight.
Coming from the bronze one, it was… not exactly the same. But perhaps that wasn’t a bad thing.
A sudden flash brought back what it felt like to have companions who understood me. Once, the ground had blurred beneath me as I ran, as I flew. And back then, this harvester had been my friend. Maybe he still was.
“We have to keep him back from the infirmary, Aion,” the furry one said. “Ianthe nearly died on that stage. If the asphodels reach her and the thorns react the way they reacted to the crowd… the consequences could be dire.”
Aion. The bronze one was Aion. The name settled into place beside Skaros with easy certainty, as if I’d known it all along.
They were talking about my mate. They feared that I could harm her. I wanted to scream at them, to tell them I never would. But I had no voice, no words. And all I could do was grow.
“It’s a complicated situation,” Aion replied. “We’re not going to let him hurt her. But this feels wrong, Theron. Every day, we come out here and tend what’s left of him.”
The furry one was Theron. The name surfaced in my scattered mind more easily than Aion’s had. And I remembered him even more clearly. As if the seed Phix and Aion had planted was finally letting me reach the lost remnants of my past.
“He grows back,” Theron reminded Aion gently. “He always grows back. We’re not destroying him. We can’t. You know that.”
“I do. I just wish there was another way.”
Silence settled between them, too heavy, unnatural.
Aion dissolved another cluster near the steps, and Theron cleared the south stretch.
I kept pushing toward the infirmary while they kept turning me away.
The routine played out as it always did.
Except watching them felt entirely different now that I had their names.
But in the end, my memories of them didn’t matter. Or if they did, they couldn’t stop me. If anything, they only made my fierce ache for Ianthe more intense.
She was the only thing in Asphodelia that made the hunger go quiet.
The only thing in my entire existence that made sense.
And so, I kept going. I pushed another cluster toward the door.
Aion dissolved it. Theron let out a frustrated curse.
“He’s not going to stop,” he observed, circling back to the entrance.
“No.” Aion knelt and held his sphere close to my latest attempt. “He’s not.”
“He’s never pushed this hard in one direction before.”
“No. He hasn’t.” Aion paused, and there was something expectant in the air. His death energy vibrated with a strange emotion I couldn’t quite understand. “I think I should visit her,” he finally said. “Ianthe.”
Theron turned, shooting him a curious look. “What for?”
“Medea wanted to check on Ianthe, but she’s concerned about her own necromancy causing another episode. So I’ll go instead.” Aion rolled his shoulders, and the bronze caught the crystal light. “I think I’ll bring her one of my father’s scrolls. Something to aid her in her recovery.”
Theron went still. His claws flexed against the death sphere in his grasp—once, twice. “Your father wrote those for you, Aion. That’s very generous.”
“You and I have both found our mates,” Aion replied. “We can afford to be generous.”
Every asphodel along the avenue went still. The stems pressing toward the infirmary relaxed. The blooms that had been snapping at Theron’s legs settled against the stone and stopped reaching.
I had been fighting all morning. Pushing, growing, being dissolved, growing again—the same blunt approach that had gotten me nowhere. But this… This had promise.
Skaros must have known how to be patient, how to bide his time. I could do that, too. For my mate.
“He’s stopped,” Theron said, immediately noticing the change.
“Good.” Aion knelt to dissolve the last cluster near the steps. His silver hair swung forward as he bent, the strands hanging close to my stems. His hands were occupied with the sphere.
I loosened a single petal from the nearest bloom and slipped it into his hair. It was small, unnoticeable. It carried a piece of what I’d been—and most importantly, of my yearning for Ianthe.
Aion straightened and set aside the sphere. “I’ll be back after the visit,” he told Theron. “Keep clearing the south stretch.”
Theron grunted and turned back to the overgrowth. Aion was already walking away, intent on his new task.
I let the rest of my asphodels go quiet. Theron moved through them, and I offered no resistance. My flowers unraveled obediently, their energy streaming into his sphere. He could have the avenue. He could have every bloom on it.
One petal still remained in Aion’s hair, stubborn and hopeful.
One petal was enough.
Aion came to see me two hours after I returned to the infirmary.
Iaso had briefly left the room, presumably to ‘look into other important matters’.
Whatever that meant. I was tired and bored, and bored of being tired.
It was a feeling I’d grown accustomed to in my village.
I hadn’t expected to experience it again here, in Asphodelia.
The metal colossus made for a welcome distraction. He didn’t enter the room, not immediately. Instead, he bowed, far more gracefully than his bronze frame should have allowed. “Good afternoon, Ianthe. I am Aion. I hope I’m not disturbing you.”
“Not at all,” I replied. There was something very soothing about his presence, despite his intimidating size. “Though I must admit, I don’t know why you’d find me interesting.”
All the monsters at the bride market had been frenzied by my arrival, but he hadn’t been in the crowd at all. And he certainly didn’t look at me that way now. Was he different because of his metallic body?
Maybe if I hadn’t been so tired, I’d have asked.
Aion took a careful step forward. His massive hand fidgeted with the edge of his satchel, as if he was nervous.
“Since you collapsed in the Agora, my mate, Medea, has been very worried about you. She wanted to come to see you personally, but she feared her powers would harm you. So I came in her place.”
His mate. Oh. So this was Medea’s mysterious other half, the man who had accepted a woman who could wither everything with a touch.
I felt a little warmed by her concern. We were, in every way, strangers, but she’d shown me more kindness than I could have ever expected.
“Thank you, Aion. My condition… It’s an old disease. In the Korinos Wilds, we call it the Thorn-Sickness. Iaso says she might be able to help me.”
Aion’s brow furrowed, mimicking what would be a frown on a living face. “But you’re skeptical.”
I shrugged. “How can I not be? Even here, the disease follows me. It’s in my blood, in my veins. I won’t ever escape it, not until the day I die.”
For the longest time, Aion was quiet. He was so still he might as well have turned into a statue. It didn’t help that he clearly had no need to breathe. A small part of me was jealous. Some days, breathing hurt. His anatomy would have been a blessing.
Finally, Aion approached the bed, his footsteps steady and certain. “Here in Asphodelia, death is something to treasure. It is a gift from Thanatos, one we all honor. But Medea and I both know you can’t understand that, not yet. And no one really expects you to.”
He reached for his satchel and opened it. From inside, he produced an aged, intricately bound scroll. “I wasn’t always a person,” he explained. “I was crafted by my father, Charon. When I first awakened, he wrote these scrolls for me. To help me understand what a person truly was.”
My breath caught as I took in the value of his gift. Scrolls were rare in my village, but Fera had found a way to teach me to read anyway. Never had I been more grateful for her stubbornness.
With a shaking hand, I took the scroll from Aion. “Thank you. I… I don’t know what to say.”
“You don’t need to say anything. Consider this… our welcome to Asphodelia.”
A welcome. After the way my bride market had gone, this certainly seemed like an improvement. And I hadn’t truly felt welcomed anywhere in so long. Was this scroll a good sign, or was it something else?
I scanned Aion’s face, looking for any sign of deception. His father had taken my memory of Fera. I knew I shouldn’t blame Charon for it. He’d warned me of the price I’d have to pay. And yet… Had it really been worth it?
“Does this welcome come at a price, Aion, son of Charon?” I asked quietly.
To his credit, he didn’t appear offended. Then again, his metallic features were impossible to read. “My father would have you believe that everything is only ever a trade,” he offered. “But he’s also the one who taught me life doesn’t work like that. This scroll is only a gift, nothing more.”
A gift. Like the Thorn-Sickness was supposed to be, according to the people in my village? Or was this scroll really something harmless?
“Do I really belong here, Aion? Medea said I do, but I’m still stuck. Just like I was before.”
“I think, in your heart, you already know the answer to that question.”
It wasn’t much of a reply, but it was perhaps the only one Aion had to give me. After all, some choices I had to make for myself. The tragic reality was that most days, it didn’t feel like I had much choice at all. The Thorn-Sickness had ripped that out of me, too.
“Rest well, Ianthe,” Aion told me. “When you are better, we will speak to Iaso. Perhaps, with your permission, Medea can visit.”
“I’d like that,” I replied. I would appreciate a friendly face, even if Medea couldn’t quite understand my predicament.
Aion bowed one more time and left the infirmary. I clutched the priceless scroll in my hand and watched him go.
I didn’t know what made me look, what kept me from turning to the scroll immediately. But as my gaze lingered, a small shape slipped from his silver hair and fluttered to the ground.
Frowning, I threw off the sheets and climbed out of bed. It took me longer than I’d have liked, but I made my way to the other side of the room.
There, on the floor, lay the object that had fallen from Aion: an asphodel petal. No doubt, it had survived the pruning Aion and his friend had been doing earlier. The sight of it stirred a strange, quiet ache within me.
The edges of the petal still held a bright sheen. “Were you the one to guide me here?” I asked the light.
No reply came. I didn’t expect one, but I took the petal with me anyway. When I crawled back into bed, I placed it next to me on my pillow.
Aion, the colossus, had brought me a priceless gift: his father’s scroll. But he’d given me more than that. I didn’t know why, but I was certain this asphodel petal meant something.