Dahlia and the Garden of Light - Chapter 24: Chapter 24
You are reading Dahlia and the Garden of Light, Chapter 24: Chapter 24. Read more chapters of Dahlia and the Garden of Light.
New York was alive — loud, endless, electric. A city that never slept.
Then the earth trembled.
The first quake struck just after sunrise. A low rumble, like a beast waking beneath the streets. Seconds later, chaos shattered the morning.
Sirens screamed. Windows exploded. Steel groaned. People ran without knowing where to go — into the open, into danger, into each other’s arms. It was instant and unforgiving.
Dahlia and Amy had arrived just two days earlier, volunteering at a downtown health center. They were organizing supplies when the floor heaved beneath them like a living thing.
Dahlia didn’t panic. She had trained for this.
While others ducked and screamed, she moved — calm, precise, all instinct and training. Amy followed without hesitation, helping drag the injured from the shaking rubble as the ceiling cracked above them.
Outside, the city had changed.
Smoke billowed. Cars burned. Cries echoed between buildings. Cell towers failed. It was a war zone, with no warning.
And Dahlia — a single figure in a torn t-shirt, blood-slick gloves, and a braid full of dust — became a quiet storm.
She organized triage under a collapsed pharmacy awning. Took command when the local medics froze. She pulled bandages from overturned trucks, created IV lines from plastic tubing, wrapped fractured limbs with her jacket sleeves.
In the chaos, her gift worked silently.
A shredded petal slipped into a child’s blanket. A crushed marigold under a cracked helmet. No one noticed. But they healed.
And Dahlia kept moving.
By hour twenty, her fingers were raw, her voice hoarse, her bones aching. Amy forced her to drink water, muttering curses and prayers under her breath. Jack called in from an aquarium-turned-shelter on the east side, his calm voice cutting through the panic.
Then, on day two, the second quake hit.
It was sharper. Meaner. It didn’t rumble — it roared.
Buildings that had leaned now collapsed. A scream cut the sky as a rooftop slid from its moorings and crashed below.
Dahlia was sprinting across a debris field when the world split again.
She heard the steel snap before she saw it — the twisted groan of a metal frame giving out — and rushed toward the sound.
That’s where she found him.
Markus Hale
Half-buried beneath a pile of steel beams, a man was shouting orders even as blood poured down his face.
“Lift from the base — no, dammit, the base! You’re gonna make it worse—”
Dahlia dropped to her knees beside him. “Sir, you’re injured. You need to stay still.”
He turned toward her, wild-eyed and sweating, but alert. “I’m fine. The others—there’s a kid under that truck.”
“I’ll get to them,” she said quickly, scanning his leg. “But if you keep talking, you’re going into shock.”
He looked her dead in the eye. “Then move fast.”
Her fingers were fast, careful — cutting away debris, checking pulses, shouting to nearby volunteers. A beam pinned his thigh. Deep laceration. Likely fracture. Bleeding too fast.
She glanced around.
No time. No stretcher.
Dahlia knelt, pressed her hands to the wound, and covertly slipped a daisy — crushed from her pocket — beneath his vest.
“I’m Dahlia,” she said.
He blinked at her. “Markus Hale. U.S. Army. Not fond of daisies.”
“Good thing this one’s for luck.”
Seven Days of Rubble and Revelation
They worked side by side after that.
Markus refused to rest. Dahlia didn’t even pretend to try. They were magnets — drawn not by flirtation but by grit, survival, and the unspoken understanding of those who’d seen too much too young.
They carried stretchers over broken streets. Tore open crushed doorframes to rescue the buried. Took shifts sleeping on concrete. Swapped rations like old soldiers. Cursed the cold. Laughed between screams.
On day five, a boy was brought in with blunt trauma, unresponsive.
Dahlia whispered something into his ear. Slipped a single lavender bud under his collar.
Markus watched.
Fifteen minutes later, the boy was breathing steadily. No one questioned it.
Except Markus.
He didn’t say a word.
But that night, as they sat by a barrel fire warming their blistered hands, he looked at her differently.
Like he saw through her — not just the sweat, not just the ash-streaked skin or the blood on her clothes. He saw what she hadn’t told him.
He said nothing.
But he knew.
Rooftop Truths
On the seventh night, the chaos slowed.
Rescue teams took over. Tents were raised. Families reunited. Dahlia should have felt peace.
But instead, she felt the ache of something deeper — like a cord had been strung between her and this place. Between her and him.
She found herself on a rooftop with Markus, the city stretched broken beneath them. Sunset turned the wreckage gold.
“You ever stay in one place?” he asked.
She didn’t answer at first.
“No,” she said finally. “Not really. I move. I heal. Then I leave.”
He turned his face toward hers, unreadable. “What if you found a place worth staying for?”
She smiled faintly. “I haven’t yet.”
He nodded. “Then maybe you haven’t looked hard enough.”
Silence.
Then she whispered, barely audible, “There’s something about me you don’t know.”
“I know more than you think,” Markus said quietly.
She turned to him. “And?”
“And it doesn’t scare me.”
Something in her cracked — not broken, but softened. Like a bud finally daring to bloom.
She reached into her coat and pulled out a single seed — unmarked, small, brown.
“I plant these wherever I go,” she said. “One day, I’ll come back. See what grew.”
He looked at her hands.
“Then I hope I’m there when they bloom.”
Letters Home – Roots Stay Strong
Through every stop, every scare, and every smile, Dahlia wrote home.
She sent letters, videos, even dried flowers in envelopes. She told her brothers everything — even the parts that scared her — and they responded with jokes, warnings, and fiercely proud encouragement.
Eliot: “Be safe. But also… teach that Louis guy how to lose gracefully.”
Christian: “You’re a better doctor than I am. Admit it.”
Theo: “Next time we spar, I will win.”
Her father kept every letter in a wooden box labeled “Bloom Chronicles.”
William, still healthy and sharp, read them aloud to the staff every Sunday.
Then the earth trembled.
The first quake struck just after sunrise. A low rumble, like a beast waking beneath the streets. Seconds later, chaos shattered the morning.
Sirens screamed. Windows exploded. Steel groaned. People ran without knowing where to go — into the open, into danger, into each other’s arms. It was instant and unforgiving.
Dahlia and Amy had arrived just two days earlier, volunteering at a downtown health center. They were organizing supplies when the floor heaved beneath them like a living thing.
Dahlia didn’t panic. She had trained for this.
While others ducked and screamed, she moved — calm, precise, all instinct and training. Amy followed without hesitation, helping drag the injured from the shaking rubble as the ceiling cracked above them.
Outside, the city had changed.
Smoke billowed. Cars burned. Cries echoed between buildings. Cell towers failed. It was a war zone, with no warning.
And Dahlia — a single figure in a torn t-shirt, blood-slick gloves, and a braid full of dust — became a quiet storm.
She organized triage under a collapsed pharmacy awning. Took command when the local medics froze. She pulled bandages from overturned trucks, created IV lines from plastic tubing, wrapped fractured limbs with her jacket sleeves.
In the chaos, her gift worked silently.
A shredded petal slipped into a child’s blanket. A crushed marigold under a cracked helmet. No one noticed. But they healed.
And Dahlia kept moving.
By hour twenty, her fingers were raw, her voice hoarse, her bones aching. Amy forced her to drink water, muttering curses and prayers under her breath. Jack called in from an aquarium-turned-shelter on the east side, his calm voice cutting through the panic.
Then, on day two, the second quake hit.
It was sharper. Meaner. It didn’t rumble — it roared.
Buildings that had leaned now collapsed. A scream cut the sky as a rooftop slid from its moorings and crashed below.
Dahlia was sprinting across a debris field when the world split again.
She heard the steel snap before she saw it — the twisted groan of a metal frame giving out — and rushed toward the sound.
That’s where she found him.
Markus Hale
Half-buried beneath a pile of steel beams, a man was shouting orders even as blood poured down his face.
“Lift from the base — no, dammit, the base! You’re gonna make it worse—”
Dahlia dropped to her knees beside him. “Sir, you’re injured. You need to stay still.”
He turned toward her, wild-eyed and sweating, but alert. “I’m fine. The others—there’s a kid under that truck.”
“I’ll get to them,” she said quickly, scanning his leg. “But if you keep talking, you’re going into shock.”
He looked her dead in the eye. “Then move fast.”
Her fingers were fast, careful — cutting away debris, checking pulses, shouting to nearby volunteers. A beam pinned his thigh. Deep laceration. Likely fracture. Bleeding too fast.
She glanced around.
No time. No stretcher.
Dahlia knelt, pressed her hands to the wound, and covertly slipped a daisy — crushed from her pocket — beneath his vest.
“I’m Dahlia,” she said.
He blinked at her. “Markus Hale. U.S. Army. Not fond of daisies.”
“Good thing this one’s for luck.”
Seven Days of Rubble and Revelation
They worked side by side after that.
Markus refused to rest. Dahlia didn’t even pretend to try. They were magnets — drawn not by flirtation but by grit, survival, and the unspoken understanding of those who’d seen too much too young.
They carried stretchers over broken streets. Tore open crushed doorframes to rescue the buried. Took shifts sleeping on concrete. Swapped rations like old soldiers. Cursed the cold. Laughed between screams.
On day five, a boy was brought in with blunt trauma, unresponsive.
Dahlia whispered something into his ear. Slipped a single lavender bud under his collar.
Markus watched.
Fifteen minutes later, the boy was breathing steadily. No one questioned it.
Except Markus.
He didn’t say a word.
But that night, as they sat by a barrel fire warming their blistered hands, he looked at her differently.
Like he saw through her — not just the sweat, not just the ash-streaked skin or the blood on her clothes. He saw what she hadn’t told him.
He said nothing.
But he knew.
Rooftop Truths
On the seventh night, the chaos slowed.
Rescue teams took over. Tents were raised. Families reunited. Dahlia should have felt peace.
But instead, she felt the ache of something deeper — like a cord had been strung between her and this place. Between her and him.
She found herself on a rooftop with Markus, the city stretched broken beneath them. Sunset turned the wreckage gold.
“You ever stay in one place?” he asked.
She didn’t answer at first.
“No,” she said finally. “Not really. I move. I heal. Then I leave.”
He turned his face toward hers, unreadable. “What if you found a place worth staying for?”
She smiled faintly. “I haven’t yet.”
He nodded. “Then maybe you haven’t looked hard enough.”
Silence.
Then she whispered, barely audible, “There’s something about me you don’t know.”
“I know more than you think,” Markus said quietly.
She turned to him. “And?”
“And it doesn’t scare me.”
Something in her cracked — not broken, but softened. Like a bud finally daring to bloom.
She reached into her coat and pulled out a single seed — unmarked, small, brown.
“I plant these wherever I go,” she said. “One day, I’ll come back. See what grew.”
He looked at her hands.
“Then I hope I’m there when they bloom.”
Letters Home – Roots Stay Strong
Through every stop, every scare, and every smile, Dahlia wrote home.
She sent letters, videos, even dried flowers in envelopes. She told her brothers everything — even the parts that scared her — and they responded with jokes, warnings, and fiercely proud encouragement.
Eliot: “Be safe. But also… teach that Louis guy how to lose gracefully.”
Christian: “You’re a better doctor than I am. Admit it.”
Theo: “Next time we spar, I will win.”
Her father kept every letter in a wooden box labeled “Bloom Chronicles.”
William, still healthy and sharp, read them aloud to the staff every Sunday.
End of Dahlia and the Garden of Light Chapter 24. Continue reading Chapter 25 or return to Dahlia and the Garden of Light book page.