Cordelia
you are a vast forest
full of beautiful and vibrant stories
N
ight drips away like ink. It always disappears in the same manner that it appears. It is a liquid that fills the sky. It pulls the stars in, as though they belong to the night. As if they could ever belong to anything at all. Cordelia peers up into the early morning light of dawn on the steppe. Autumn is gnawing on the edges of summer, but she does not yet hold a claim to the season. Elk roam across the step, with puffs of vapor. The kind you can only get in the cool early morning just before dawn. There is a stillness to this world of early morning, it is unlike any other. Cordelia is waiting for a flower to bloom. A flower they say only blooms once every seven years. A rare lily, or at the very least related to it. The botanist has a glass bell jar readied to scoop the flower up and nestle it inside.Cordelia wonders if she will be able to catch the flower before it goes to sleep again. Then, in the gentle cascading rays of early morning light, the flower begins to open. It has pastel blue petals. Somehow, this seems fitting to her. As though it should be a pale blue when it first stirs. She carefully inserts a trowel beneath the ground. Cordelia takes great care to insert the blade as far down as she can. She wants to avoid damaging the roots. If only the old adventurer were a mage. What she would give to have magical control over the flora. A wistful sigh escapes her lips as she carefully scoops the flower from the ground and into the bell jar. There are tiny holes in the glass to allow for oxygen to permeate the environment. Her goal isn't to kill the flower, but to preserve it in this state.
She fastens the top of the jar securely before holding it up to view in the early morning light with a satisfied smile. "There. Now to get you home." She proclaims to the flower before tucking it into the pouch she wears at her side.
