The green shoot didn't last.
By midday, it had curled inward, its glow fading like a dying ember. Not dead—just waiting. As if it knew the ground wasn't safe yet.
Scarlett stood over it, arms crossed, boots caked with mud from the lakebank. Luna sat nearby, drawing spirals in the dirt with a stick. David napped under a blanket in the skiff, thumb in his mouth, exhausted from the night's tension.
Peace was fragile.
And Damien knew it.
He hadn't left.
Just stood at the tree line, silent, watching—not like a threat, but like a man who'd forgotten how to belong.
Then the comms panel on Scarlett's belt buzzed.
Not Mireth. Not Transcendence.
A private channel. Encrypted with Academy-level clearance—the kind only two people ever used.
Hers and Damien's.
She didn't answer right away.
But the message came through anyway, voice smooth, calm, stripped of hunger's echo:
"You were always the better architect, Scout."
She turned slowly. "I'm not listening to your sermons."
