Chapter 407:Leaf’s Full Birth V
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The Fairy froze in the air, then darted down so quickly that Bat Bat had to lean back to avoid being clipped by the blur of wings.
Leaf rested her hand on the lid and said, "Open."
The tiny Flesh Fairy looked at the box, then at Leaf, then tilted her head as if offended by the size of the problem. She landed near the iron corner, placed both tiny hands on the edge, and hissed in concentration. Nothing happened.
Bat Bat covered her mouth immediately. Not because she was shocked. Because she was trying very hard not to laugh.
A second Flesh Fairy landed beside the first.
Then a third.
Then all five.
They hiss-clicked to each other, pressed their little hands against the lid, and pulled together with the grim collective seriousness of creatures doing something far too large for them and refusing to admit that fact.
The lid shifted.
Bat Bat failed.
The laugh came out of her in a burst so bright and delighted that even Auri’s mouth moved faintly at the edges.
"They are helping," Bat Bat said at once, as though the laugh had been one of respect and not joy.
"Yes," Sekhmet said.
That, at least, was true.
The lid came loose fully a heartbeat later and tipped aside. Inside lay layers of seed pouches, waxed wrappings, and bundled little packets taken from Iron House’s stores. Useful things. Ordinary in another setting. Not here.
Leaf floated over the opened box and stared down into it with full concentration.
The Fairies hovered around the rim, peering in as if they had just cracked open a chest of buried treasure.
Bat Bat crouched too, though far less usefully. "Can she tell which is which?"
Leaf did not answer at once. Her fingers moved through the air above the open box, not touching the packets, but feeling them. Then she pointed toward one cluster of bundled stock near the top left.
"These."
One Dryad stepped forward and lifted them out with surprising care for hands that looked built to rip flesh from bone. Leaf pointed toward the first prepared patch of softened ground.
"Plant there."
The Dryad bowed her head once and moved.
The moment the seeds left the box, the nearest little Flesh Fairy followed her like an escort.
Bat Bat looked at that and whispered, almost reverently, "She really is giving jobs now."
Yes. She was. And that mattered more than the seeds themselves.
Leaf had not frozen under responsibility. She had stepped into it.
The first Dryad sank the seeds into the dark loosened soil. Not all at once. In a pattern. A careful line. Two deeper. Three shallower. One to the edge. One to the center. Her plant-born instincts clearly knew things no one else needed to explain.
The Fairy hovering above her head made a pleased little clicking sound the moment the last seed disappeared under the ground.
Then the ground pulsed. It was not with full growth. Not yet. For now it was just acceptance.
Leaf turned back to the box and pointed again. Different packets. Different places.
A second Dryad took these.
Then a third.
Soon the scene had become a kind of ritual labor. Leaf in the center, choosing. The Dryads planted with deliberate care. The Flesh Fairies hovering above each planting point like tiny blood-bright spirits of approval and correction. Even the Flesh-Treant had not remained still. One great branch-arm lowered, mouth-palm opening to reveal soft fleshy interior lined not only with teeth, but with warm red growth-tissue. Another Dryad approached it, placed one of the emptied wrappers inside, and the mouth closed around it.
Bat Bat blinked. "It eats garbage too."
Sekhmet’s gaze shifted to the giant organism. "It recycles."
Bat Bat looked impressed. "That is even more offensive."
Auri said, "Only to you."
The second box opened more quickly.
This time Leaf did not need to tell the Fairies what to do. Two of them landed on the lid before she finished looking at it, and the others joined them immediately. They dragged it open with visible pride, then hovered back in a loose ring around their queen as if awaiting praise they were too dignified to request directly.
Leaf looked at them.
Then nodded once.
That was enough.
All five brightened.
Bat Bat clutched her chest again. "I cannot survive this household becoming cuter and more horrifying at the same time."
Auri glanced toward her. "You have survived worse."
"That is not a standard I enjoy."
Sekhmet let them continue talking while he watched the planting.
Patterns were appearing already.
Leaf was not scattering the seeds anywhere there was room. She was shaping the zone. Some went near the outer edge, likely for spread and hold. Some near the little blood-red trees. Some closer to the roots of the Flesh-Treant, which suggested a future link between its body and the growing ground. A few she deliberately did not plant at all. She placed those to one side and touched them twice, marking them for later use.
"Interesting."
She was not merely obeying. She was thinking.
The last packet from the first box went into the ground near a black rock seam where moss had only just begun to creep.
The moment the Dryad pressed the soil closed, the seam cracked wider and a thread of red-green vine slipped through it like a tongue tasting air.
Bat Bat saw it and made a delighted sound. "It started."
The others saw it too. The first seed response had begun.
Tiny growths pushed up where the planting had been done. Not full trees, not yet. But enough to show the seeds had accepted the Bloodlands zone at once. Red-veined shoots. Broad dark leaves edged in green. Thin curling vines. One little bulb that looked suspiciously like it might become another flower-mouth in time.
The Flesh Fairies crowded above the fresh growth with all the self-importance of supervisors claiming the success as partly their own.
Leaf smiled. It was not a proud smile. But a satisfied one. That was different.
Sekhmet noted it. "Good. Very good."