The air was different that morning.
Elliot stepped barefoot onto the moss-covered porch, his breath catching as a strange warmth kissed his skin. It wasn't summer. Not yet. But the frost that usually lingered into the first weeks of the thaw had vanished overnight. The trees bordering the garden rustled with a whisper like silk—subtle, alert. Even the soil beneath his feet felt softer, alive in a way it hadn't been in weeks.
A few meters away, Lyra knelt silently, hand hovering over a patch of pale-green shoots. Her expression was distant, thoughtful. The plant below her trembled despite the stillness of the wind, curling toward her fingertips with eerie precision.
"It's early," Elliot said, approaching. "This bloom shouldn't be happening yet."
Lyra nodded slowly. "It's not just early. It's wrong."
They walked together between the rows of vegetables and medicinal flora, all subtly off. The bean vines had grown in spirals instead of straight lines, and the ivy clung to stones that repelled it before. Trees that bore no fruit now carried seedpods with glinting skins that shimmered under the new sun.
A change was settling in—not the kind that crept in over weeks, but one that surged like a tide, reshaping what had once been stable.
"I felt it before dawn," Lyra said, brushing back her silver hair. "The roots in the northwestern quadrant pulled deeper. They always sleep through the melt… but now they're stretching as if something is calling."
Elliot crouched beside a cluster of mushrooms that hadn't existed the day before. Their caps blinked faint blue when touched, exhaling a hint of citrus. "I think the entire garden's responding to something. But we haven't introduced anything new. Not since—"
"The night the sky cracked," Lyra finished. Her voice was low, almost reverent. "Stillfall is not as still as it used to be."
For hours they observed without harvesting—something about the change demanded respect, caution. The animals that usually skirted the garden's edges were absent. No paw prints in the soft soil. No shadows between the ferns.
Later, as clouds swelled on the horizon, Elliot sat beneath the figroot arch, his journal open across his lap. "It feels like the season changed overnight," he murmured. "But the trees still hold their spring leaves. The stars haven't shifted. So why… why do I feel like the land is breathing?"
Lyra joined him, folding her legs beside his. "Because it is," she said simply. "The garden's alive, Elliot. It always has been. But now it's remembering."
He turned toward her. "Remembering what?"
She hesitated. Then, with a finger, she drew a spiral in the dirt. "There was once a season that didn't belong to the cycle. A fifth rhythm, forgotten. It came after destruction. Before Stillfall. The land held it for a moment… and then locked it away."
Elliot stared at the spiral.
"Do you think," he said slowly, "we're entering that season now?"
Lyra didn't answer right away. The wind swept through the tallgrass behind them, and something echoed faintly—like a distant voice humming beneath the earth.
"Not yet," she finally whispered. "But it's waking."