Dahlia and the Garden of Light - Chapter 79: Chapter 79

Anderson Estate – The Bloom Room Forest, Morning Light
The underground bloom room had changed over the years — no longer a laboratory, nor just a sanctuary. Now it breathed like a hidden forest caught in a dream: the ceiling high and brambled with arching limbs; the walls pulsing softly with bioluminescent moss. It smelled of eucalyptus and warm earth. Vines wove gently along old stone shelves, curling around wooden beams and baskets full of dried seeds wrapped in paper.
Dahlia sat cross-legged on a moss cushion at the center of the Forest, her lap full of letters.
Sunlight poured through the newly installed skylight — a glass canopy that Christian had insisted on, saying plants deserved more than lamps. Birds sometimes perched on it, blinking down curiously.
She read slowly, one envelope at a time. Her fingers, still dusted with pollen, traced the lines of ink with reverence.
Theo’s letter was stained faintly with sap and jungle oil. He had drawn tiny vines along the margin.
"…Freja’s teaching the kids how to gut fish. I’m teaching her how to hum to roots. We’re terrible at each other’s skills, but it’s a good kind of terrible."
Dahlia smiled. She touched the woven bracelet around her wrist — the one she had made for him months ago, infused with the pulse of her light. It still glowed faintly with his touch. She had sent a new one better.
She reached for another envelope. Orchid’s handwriting had become sharper, more confident.
"Dear Sister Dahlia,
I made a squirrel pass out by accident. Mira said that means I’m getting stronger but I still can’t control the sparkle-burst. Derek says I need to meditate. Meditation is boring. Can I grow a tree on the beach if I whisper to a seed every night?"
Dahlia laughed aloud, tucking the page against her chest.
Another letter — this one from Derek.
"…I’ve been dreaming of the Serengeti lately. I don’t know why. There’s a lion that keeps looking at me, like it’s waiting. Maybe I need to go. To find what it means. Orchid’s doing well. Mira lets her swim under moonlight sometimes. She says it makes her glow."
She held that one for a long time.
Then Amy’s letter, shorter than the rest, full of soft ink smudges and pressed lavender petals.
"Honeymoon update: Jack made friends with a goat. I made friends with the owner of the goat. We’ve promised to send them seeds from your sunflowers.
I haven’t stopped glowing from the bracelet you sent me, by the way. I think it’s permanent now."
Dahlia leaned her head back against the trunk of the giant fig tree growing at the room’s center. The roots spread across the room like a sleeping guardian.
Steps approached. She didn’t turn.
“I brought tea,” Christian’s voice said from behind her. “Also, an incident report.”
She opened her eyes and smiled as he set a steaming mug down beside her.
“Did someone eat the wrong petals again?” she asked.
He nodded solemnly. “A surgeon thought he could brew a calming tea out of one of your night bloomers. Turns out, it causes lucid dreams and spontaneous singing. The operating theater became a musical.”
She snorted, covering her mouth.
“I fixed it,” he said, holding up a vial. “Petal counter-agent. Orchid helped me tweak it.”
“She’s eight,” Dahlia said, bemused.
“And she knows more about glowing moss biology than most of my staff.”
He glanced around the room, then leaned against the trunk beside her.
“I stop by here when I can,” he said, quietly. “It reminds me… not everything is triage.”
She looked at him, eyes soft. “You’re still healing people.”
“So are you.”
They sat in companionable silence, the tea warming their hands. After a while, Christian rose, pressing a pressed flower into her palm — a pale blue bloom from someone she’d once healed. She watched him go, coat fluttering.
—
A Few Hours Later – In the Greenlight Workshop
Down the hall, Eliot and Markus stood over a wall-sized map with fiberroot lines connecting dozens of glowing points. It looked like a constellation net — petals and roots crisscrossing continents.
“We added a node in Senegal,” Eliot said, tapping the west coast. “Thanks to Louis. He’s got an old cacao farm turning into a covert bloom nursery.”
“And one in the Himalayas,” Markus added. “Maria’s old outpost. Still intact. She sent vines grown from that rare orchid Dahlia healed last year.”
Eliot turned. “We’re nearly ready to open the first three distribution sanctuaries. All under the radar. All with the same goal — unbranded healing, trusted networks, and non-aggressive restoration.”
Markus nodded. “We’re not fighting empires anymore. We’re growing around them.”
They heard a soft hum and turned — Dahlia stood in the doorway, eyes on the map, fingers trailing over the glowing root network.
“You’re doing it,” she whispered. “You’re making a real garden of light.”
Markus stepped beside her. “We’re following your roots.”
“I just made things bloom,” she said softly.
“You made hope sustainable,” Eliot said. “And now it’s self-seeding.”
—
Evening – In the Library Garden
Dahlia sat alone by the small reflecting pool, sipping the last of her tea. The moon had risen full and bright.
She heard footsteps.
Markus approached, holding something wrapped in cloth.
“What’s that?” she asked.
He unwrapped it slowly — a piece of driftwood, smoothed and sanded, with carvings of vines, moons, and stars. Embedded in its center: a petal, glowing faintly.
“I carved it after reading Theo’s letter,” he said. “Thought you might need a reminder. Of what’s growing. Of what’s still possible.”
She reached out, touching the smooth surface.
“I don’t know where we’re needed next,” she said. “There’s so much healing still to be done.”
“Then we follow the light,” he replied.
And together, under the hush of leaves and stars, they sat in peace — quiet, glowing, and ready.
The garden, as always, listened. And the petals pulsed gently around them.