The rooster crowed before dawn, as it did every morning, and Jasmine woke to the soft gray light filtering through her lace curtains. For a moment, she lay still, listening to the familiar sounds of the cottage the creak of floorboards as her grandmother moved in the kitchen, the hiss of the kettle on the stove, the distant call of birds waking in the woods.
She stretched beneath her quilt, her toes seeking the warm spot she had made through the night. Her room was small but dear to her: white walls, a shelf of worn books, pressed flowers hanging in frames, a window that faced east and caught the sunrise. She had lived here her whole life. She had never known any other place.
The routine was the same as always. She rose, slipped her feet into woolen slippers, and padded down the hallway. Her grandmother stood at the stove, her silver hair pinned back, her hands steady as she poured boiling water into the ceramic pot. She looked up as Jasmine entered and smiled a tired smile, but genuine.
Morning, child. You slept well?
Yes, Grandmother. Jasmine kissed the old woman's cheek and took her usual seat at the wooden table. The room smelled of bread and chamomile, of beeswax candles and the dried herbs hanging from the rafters. It was the only smell she had ever known as home.
They ate in comfortable silence, thick slices of bread with butter and honey, weak tea because her grandmother said strong tea stained the spirit. Jasmine ate slowly, watching the sun climb past the window, painting the garden in shades of gold and green.
After breakfast, she washed the dishes while her grandmother went to tend the chickens. The water was cold from the pump, and her hands turned pink as she scrubbed. She did not mind. The rhythm of it was soothing, familiar.
By nine, she was in the garden.
The garden was her domain, the one place she loved . Three generations of women had planted it her great-grandmother, her grandmother, the mother she had never known. Jasmine had learned the names of every flower before she learned to read: lavender and foxglove, rose and rue, marigold and nightshade. She knew which plants healed and which harmed, which bloomed in spring and which waited for autumn's cool hand.
She knelt in the soil, her fingers sinking into the dark earth, and began to weed. The work was slow, meditative. She worked barefoot, as she always did, the cool ground a comfort against her soles. Her grandmother said she would catch a cold, but Jasmine never did. The earth was kind to her.
The hours passed. The sun rose high, then began its slow descent. She stopped only when her grandmother called her inside for lunch a bowl of soup, a crust of bread, a glass of milk from their own goat. Then back to the garden until the light began to soften.
At four, she took her walk. The property was small a few acres of meadow and woods, bounded by a low stone wall that her grandfather had built before she was born. She walked the perimeter every day, her fingers trailing along the mossy stones, her eyes scanning the treeline. She did not know why. She had never seen anyone there.
She paused at the eastern wall, where the woods grew thickest. Beyond it, she knew, lay a road. Beyond the road, a town. Beyond the town, a world she had only glimpsed in books and the occasional magazine her grandmother brought from the village once a month. A world of cars and cinemas, of strangers and cities, of things she could not quite imagine.
She had asked, once, to see it. She was fifteen, and curiosity had burned in her chest like fever. Her grandmother's face had crumpled. She had gripped Jasmine's arms so hard it left bruises.
No, child. Never. They world is very dangerous.
Jasmine had not asked again. But sometimes, in the quiet of the afternoon, she stood at the wall and wondered.
Today, as she stood there, a shiver passed through her skin . The light seemed to dim, just for an instant. The birds in the trees fell silent. She felt a weight in the air, a pressure against her skin, as if something was watching her from the woods between the trunks.
She held her breath, her heart quickening. But the moment passed. The birds resumed their song. The sun returned, warm on her shoulders. She shook her head at herself and turned back toward the cottage.
Her grandmother was waiting on the porch, her hands folded together . Her eyes were fixed on the woods, and there was something in her expression that Jasmine had never seen before. Fear, maybe.
You were at the wall again, her grandmother said. It was not a question.
I was just walking.
The old woman nodded slowly. Her gaze lingered on Jasmine's face, soft and sad. You have your mother's eyes, she said. And her restlessness.
Jasmine did not know what to say. Her mother was a ghost, a photograph above the hearth, a story that began and ended with a closed door. She knew that her mother had died when Jasmine was a baby. She knew that her grandmother had raised her alone, had kept her hidden in this pocket of green. She did not know why.
Come inside, her grandmother said. I'll make us dinner.
That evening, they sat by the fire. The cottage was warm, filled with the scent of woodsmoke and stew. Jasmine worked on her mending a tear in her grandmother's apron, a loose button on her own dress. The old woman dozed in her chair, her knitting forgotten in her lap.
Jasmine's thoughts wandered. She thought of the wall, the woods, the strange weight she had felt in the air. She thought of her dreams, the ones that came more and more often now. Dreams of eyes watching her from the dark. Dreams of a voice that whispered her name in a language she did not know but somehow understood. She would wake from them breathless.
She had not told her grandmother. Some things felt too heavy to speak.
The fire crackled. Her grandmother's breath slowed into the rhythm of sleep. Jasmine set aside her mending and went to the window, pressing her palm against the cold glass.
Outside, the garden lay silver under the moon. The lavender was dark, the roses black. And at the edge of the woods, something moved.
She stared, her heart stopping. But there was nothing there. Only shadows, shifting with the breeze.
She told herself it was nothing. She told herself she had imagined it.
But when she went to bed that night, she left the candle burning on her nightstand. And when she finally slept, she dreamed of red eyes burning in the dark, and a voice that said, "Soon".