Page 120 of Beneath the Desert Bloom
He looked at her for a long time before answering.
And when he did, his voice was lower than the wind. “Long enough to know not to hope.”
They sat on the floor.
Not because there weren’t chairs. Not because they were too tired to stand. But because there was something about this moment that didn’t belong at a table. Something raw and warm and animal. Nora’s back leaned against the wall, her kneesdrawn up, one arm slung loosely across them. Asher knelt across from her, silent for a long time, hands resting palms-up on his thighs like he was waiting for permission from something older than either of them.
Outside, the wind pressed softly against the walls of the house, listening.
She watched him.
He was trying to start.
She could feel it. The slow, awful knowledge that once you say something aloud, it lives forever.
“You don’t have to,” she said gently. “Not if it hurts.”
He shook his head once. “It already hurts. But not saying it… hurts worse.”
He exhaled.
“I was a man,” he said, voice shaky. “Once. A long time ago. Not a Guardian. Not sacred. Just… a man.”
He looked up at her then, eyes shining, not with glow but something wet.
“My people were already leaving. Or dying. Or becoming something they didn’t recognize. I had nothing left. Not even a reason to keep breathing.”
“The land was already dying by then. Men were cutting into it with grids and fences and stakes. Lines in the sand to tell it who it belonged to.”
“Settlers,” she whispered.
He nodded. “Expansion. Industry. Whatever word makes it easier to explain. They weren’t listening. The land tried to cry out. No one heard it.”
He paused. His breath caught.
“But I did.”
She watched his throat work, saw the memory settle into his shoulders.
“It called me,” he said. “And I said yes.”
She didn’t speak. Just listened. Let him break open slowly.
“I thought I was offering my life,” he continued. “A sacrifice. But it wasn’t death the land wanted. It was shape. It needed a body. A protector. A witness. A weapon. And I…”
He laughed, short and hoarse.
“I was empty enough to let it fill me.”
His fingers flexed. His bark creaked.
“I burned for days. My bones broke and never knit right again. My voice was taken. My name. My face. But I became what it needed. And I waited.”
She leaned forward slightly.
“For the Bloom.”
He nodded.
