The Hidden Blossom wasn’t a tavern so much as a living, breathing thing. It hummed. Not with the low thrum of engines or the distant groan of a ship’s hull, but with the warm, bass note of contentment. The air, thick with the scent of spiced rum, simmering citrus, and the faint, sweet perfume of Eve’s Nectar, settled over Sarka like a blanket she didn’t know she was missing. Light from a dozen mismatched lanterns cast a mosaic of gold and rose on the walls, illuminating tapestries and the smiling, weathered faces of the patrons.
This was a haven. A pocket of the world where the jagged edges of people were allowed to be soft.
Sarka sat alone at a small table in the corner, a half-empty glass of potent, amber liquor before her. She had completed the delivery just an hour ago—crates of rare, moon-pale blossoms to the women’s clinic, the very heart of Eve’s enterprise. The transaction had been smooth, the payment fair, but the success felt hollow, an echo in the vast, empty chamber of her purpose. She was a pilot without a sky, a warrior without a war, her bioluminescent skin casting a soft, otherworldly glow that felt more conspicuous than comforting in this warm, earthly space.
She watched the room. Near the hearth, a man whose arms were a marvel of polished brass and articulated gears was dealing cards, his metallic fingers clicking with cheerful precision. At a table by the window, a woman with the large, luminous eyes and soft, downy ears of a snow leopard was sharing a small vial of Nectar with another woman, their faces soft with relief. Here, their differences weren’t just tolerated; they were part of the vibrant tapestry. They were family.
Sarka felt a sharp pang of longing, an ache so profound it was almost a physical pain. She was adrift, a ghost from the deep earth, and she didn’t know the first thing about how to belong.
The tavern door swung inward with a sudden, cheerful burst of energy, admitting a gust of cool night air and a woman who seemed to carry the entire outside world in with her. Niahmahar’i was a riot of impossible color against the warm, muted tones of the Blossom. Her hair, a cascade of teal and magenta braids, seemed to capture the lantern light and throw it back in a vibrant storm. Her dark, voluptuous figure was hugged by a corset and shorts, a walking celebration of curves and confidence, with thigh-high boots that beat a rhythm on the floorboards that was all her own.
She didn’t just enter; she arrived.
“Eve! You magnificent old pirate!” she called out, her voice a melodic boom that cut through the low thrum of conversation. She sauntered to the bar, her hips rolling with a liquid grace that turned every head in the room. “I’ve brought you treasure!”
Eve looked up from wiping down the bar, a genuine, tired smile spreading across her face. “The only treasure I need from you, Mar’i, is one that doesn’t require dusting.”
“Where’s the fun in that?” Mar’i laughed, reaching into a woven bag slung over her shoulder. She produced a cluster of large, iridescent shells, their interiors swirling with shades of violet and pearl. “From the spires at home. For your collection. And,” she added, her voice softening slightly, “a suitable offering for a bit of your magic.”
Eve’s expression warmed. She took the shells with a reverence that contrasted Mar’i’s playful energy. “You know the price of my magic is always a good story, not coin.”
“Then I’ll have to give you both,” Mar’i said, leaning conspiratorially over the bar. “But first, a small favor. My hands are chapped from the rigging on the last run.” She held out her palms, which were indeed red and raw from the ropes. “A little Nectar for a fellow sailor?”
Eve chuckled, nodding. She ducked under the bar and came up with a small, dark glass jar. “Don’t go spreading it around that I give away samples.” She unscrewed the lid and scooped out a small amount of the shimmering, purple salve. She took Mar’i’s hands in her own—the gnarled, ailing fingers of the healer gently applying the cool, soothing balm to the chapped hands of the adventurer. It was a quiet, intimate moment of trust and care.
As Eve worked, Mar’i’s dark, sparkling eyes, ever in motion, began their familiar scan of the room. She greeted friends with a nod, shared a smile with a stranger, her presence a warm, infectious current that flowed through the entire space. And then, it landed. In the quiet corner, a small island of stillness in the tavern’s sea of life.
A woman with skin the color of moonlight, her hair a funky braid, a soft, internal light pulsing gently from her skin. She was beautiful, alien, and profoundly, achingly alone. Mar’i saw the woman not as an oddity, but as a kindred spirit. A brilliant, lonely star burning in the dark. The playful energy in Mar’i’s eyes shifted, softening into something more profound: intrigue, and a deep, instinctual pull.
Eve finished applying the Nectar, giving Mar’i’s hands a final, gentle pat. “There. Don’t go picking any more fights with krakens until tomorrow.”
Mar’i laughed, flexing her hands and relishing the soothing coolness. “I’ll try to restrain myself.” She gave Eve a final, grateful smile and turned, her eyes immediately finding the quiet corner again. The woman hadn’t moved, a solitary island of moonlight and sorrow. Mar’i felt that pull again, the instinctive need to understand the story behind the stillness.
She moved away from the bar, her boots making soft, rhythmic sounds on the wood. She didn’t walk directly toward the woman, but took a winding path through the tables, a bright fish weaving through coral. She was giving her space, a chance to notice her, to react. But the woman, Sarka, simply watched her approach, her bioluminescent skin pulsing with a faint, steady rhythm, her expression unreadable.
Mar’i stopped at the table, not sitting, but standing beside it, a respectful but undeniable presence. She held up one of her now-glistening hands.
“You look like you’re carrying a storm in a teacup,” Mar’i said, her voice softer than it had been at the bar, a low, melodic hum that didn’t intrude on the quiet. “And I happen to know the best cure for that is a little bit of magic from a friend.”
Sarka’s dark eyes, like pools of obsidian, flickered from Mar’i’s face to her hand, then back again. She didn’t answer, but she didn’t look away either. It was an invitation, however slight.
“I’m Mar’i,” she offered, her smile warm and disarming. “And you look like you could use a friend.”
A beat of silence passed, thick with the tavern’s ambient warmth. Sarka’s gaze was intense, as if she were weighing the very atoms of Mar’i’s soul. Finally, she spoke, her voice a low, rough timbre, unused to casual conversation. “I am Sarka.”
Mar’i didn’t press. She simply pulled out the empty chair and sat, settling into it with an easy grace that made the small space feel companionable, not crowded. “Well, Sarka. That’s a start. A name is a powerful thing.”
Sarka watched her, a flicker of something unreadable in her dark eyes. “I am a pilot,” she said, a statement of fact, but one that seemed to carry the weight of her entire existence. “I am looking for a purpose beyond carrying cargo.”
Mar’i nodded, her expression turning thoughtful. She leaned forward, her forearms resting on the table. For a fleeting second, a shadow passed over her eyes, a flicker of a memory so painful it felt like a physical blow. The scent of ash and the roar of fire seemed to echo in the tavern’s warm air. She pushed it down, as she always did, burying it under the weight of a practiced, charming smile.
“I left my island because it was gone,” she said, the words slipping out before she could stop them, more honest than she intended. She quickly corrected course, her voice regaining its smooth, melodic cadence. “I mean… I left because I had to. There was nothing left for me there. Sometimes you don’t get to choose to sail away from everything you know. Sometimes the sea is the only path left.” She gestured around the bustling room with a sweep of her hand, the movement a little too sharp, a little too desperate. “This place… this is for people who’ve made that journey. We’re all a little lost, a little broken, a little… remade.”
Sarka’s gaze dropped to Mar’i’s hands, which were now resting on the table. They were strong, capable, the skin already healing from the Nectar’s magic. Her own hands, hidden in her lap, were a roadmap of scars and calluses from a life of labor and escape. A life of digging, not healing.
As if reading her thoughts, Mar’i held up her own hands, turning them over. “These hands know the sea. They know ropes, they know charts, they know how to read the wind.” She smiled, a gentle, knowing thing. “They don’t know how to heal. But Eve’s hands… they do. That’s her magic. We all have our own.”
She looked from her own hands to Sarka’s, her expression full of a deep, uncomplicated respect. “Your hands, Sarka. I bet they know how to fly.”
Sarka’s gaze sharpened, the obsidian of her eyes focusing with an intensity that made the air between them crackle. “They do,” she rasped, the admission stripped bare of any boast. It was a simple, powerful truth. “Better than anyone’s.”
A slow, brilliant smile spread across Mar’i’s face, not of victory, but of recognition. She had found it. The core of the lonely woman sitting across from her. “I believe you,” she said, her voice dropping to a conspiratorial whisper that was somehow louder than the tavern’s noise. She leaned in closer, the scent of the sea and the Nectar on her skin a tantalizing mix. “You’re a pilot looking for a purpose. I’m a navigator who’s tired of running in circles. Eve built a haven on the ground for people like us.”
Mar’i leaned forward, her voice dropping to a conspiratorial whisper that was somehow louder than the tavern’s noise. She glanced from Sarka to the vibrant, accepting chaos of the Hidden Blossom, then back again.
“What if we could build one in the sky?” she breathed. “A ship that isn’t just for carrying cargo, but for carrying people. A flying haven.” Her voice was filled with a feverish, infectious wonder. “A place where a woman with glowing skin and a woman with colorful hair can just be. A place for the hybrids, the outcasts, the dreamers. A home with no anchor.”
The vision hung between them, tangible and breathtaking. For a moment, the obsidian of Sarka’s eyes softened, the faint, steady pulse of her bioluminescent skin quickening with a flicker of that old, long-buried fire. It was the dream she had been clinging to in the dark, articulated perfectly by this woman she had met only minutes before.
But the dream crashed against the hard, unyielding shore of reality. The fire in Sarka’s eyes died, replaced by a cold, weary certainty. She didn’t even laugh. She just stated the fact, her voice a low, rough timbre.
“It’s a beautiful thought,” she said, the words tasting like ash in her mouth. “But I fly a V-100 Sparrow. It’s a single-seat cockpit. There is no room. Barely enough for me, not for you, not for anyone else.”
The finality in Sarka’s voice was like a physical blow, a door slamming shut on the vibrant world Mar’i had just painted. The energy between them curdled, the warmth of the vision cooling into the familiar chill of pragmatism. Sarka’s shoulders slumped almost imperceptibly, a subtle surrender to the weight of her reality. She looked down at her hands, resting on the rough wood of the table, as if they were the only things in the world that were real.
“It’s a dream,” Sarka repeated, this time softer, as if to convince herself. “That’s all it is. A pretty story to tell yourself in the dark.” She was retreating, pulling back into the solitary, armored shell she had built over years of lonely flight. The walls were going up, brick by brick, reinforced with the bitter mortar of experience. “I appreciate the thought, Mar’i. I do. But let’s talk about what’s real. I have a ship that fits one person. I have a reputation for being willing to fly into a hurricane if the pay is right. And I have… this.” She gestured vaguely at the tavern, at her life, a cycle of small, meaningless jobs that barely kept her fueled and fed. “This is all there is.”
Mar’i didn’t flinch. She didn’t look away. She simply waited, letting the silence settle, letting Sarka’s words hang in the air between them like a shroud. She let the rejection land, fully and completely. Then, she leaned forward, her entire posture shifting. The playful, flirtatious energy vanished, replaced by an intensity that was both sharp and profoundly perceptive. Her voice, when she spoke, was no longer a melodic hum but a blade, cutting clean to the heart of the matter.
“It’s not a dream,” Mar’i said, her voice low and steady, each word precisely placed. “It’s a promise. A promise you made to yourself a long time ago, the day you crawled out of whatever hell you came from.” She watched Sarka flinch, a flicker of pain in those dark, guarded eyes. “And you look like someone who’s forgotten how to keep promises. Especially to yourself.”
Sarka’s head snapped up, her eyes flashing with a dangerous light. “You don’t know anything about me.”
“Maybe not the details,” Mar’i conceded, her voice softening just enough to take the edge off, but not losing its piercing quality. “But I know the shape of the story. I know a survivor when I see one. I know someone who’s from somewhere else, a place they can’t go back to. I see it in your eyes, Sarka. It’s the same look I had the day I sailed away from Kir’i Isle and didn’t dare look back.” She paused, letting the parallel land with the weight of shared experience. “You didn’t just leave. You’re running from something. Or… you’re running for something. Tell me. Who are you flying for?”
The question was a key turning in a lock Sarka had forgotten was there. It was a question no one had ever thought to ask. They saw her skill, her strangeness, her solitary nature, but no one had ever asked about the why. The carefully constructed walls of her pragmatic isolation crumbled, and for the first time since she had emerged into the sunlit world, the raw, burning heart of her grief and purpose was laid bare.
Her voice was a low rasp, strained with the weight of a memory she carried like a stone in her gut. “My people. The Niraxi.”
The name hung in the air between them, fragile and ancient. Mar’i’s entire demeanor transformed in a single, breathtaking beat. The confident strategist, the perceptive empath, the playful rogue—all of it fell away, replaced by a look of profound, almost sacred awe. Her mouth fell slightly agape, her dark eyes widening. She had only heard the name in legends, stories whispered by old salts in smoky ports who traded with the farthest northern reaches. A people of living light, trapped beneath the earth. A myth to inspire dreams of rebellion. And she was sitting across from one, real and solid and radiating a quiet, desperate pain.
Mar’i whispered, her voice filled with reverence, “It’s true…”
A flicker of Sarka’s old pride returned, a spark in the endless night of her eyes. She gave a sharp, stiff nod. “The Verdant Order… they took our world. They hollowed it out and forced us into the dark to be their fuel. I escaped. I’m the only one. I’m…” She trailed off, the crushing weight of being the sole survivor, the last voice of her people, threatening to drown her.
The awe in Mar’i’s eyes ignited, hardening into a burning, righteous fire. This was no longer about adventure, or freedom, or even a flying haven. This was a legend made flesh, a cry for justice from the very heart of the world.
“Then you’re not just a pilot,” Mar’i declared, her voice ringing with a fierce, desperate conviction that cut through the tavern’s din and drew the eyes of nearby patrons. “You’re a general in an army of one.” The words were more than an observation; they were a vow, a reflection of the army she herself had become after the mountain took hers. She leaned in closer, her gaze locking with Sarka’s, pouring every ounce of her own rebellious, grieving spirit into the connection. “And you can’t win a war with a single-seat tool. I know. I’ve tried.” Her voice dropped, laced with a pain so old and deep it was a part of her now. “You need a flagship. You need a crew. You need a haven not just for outcasts, but for refugees. For your people. For the ghosts we carry.”
Sarka stared at Mar’i, truly seeing her for the first time. The tavern, the noise, the scent of Nectar and spiced rum—it all faded into a dull roar. In its place was only this woman, this vibrant, impossible force of nature who had looked into the desolate landscape of her life and seen not an end, but a reflection of her own. She wasn’t just a flirtatious navigator; she was the first person to understand the full, crushing scope of her burden because she carried a matching one. She was the first person to look at the ghosts of Sarka’s past and not run away, but instead offer them a home. She was the first person to offer a real, tangible solution, born not from theory, but from the ashes of her own world.
A ghost of a smile touched Sarka’s lips, a fragile, hesitant thing. “The V-100 is just a tool.”
“And it’s a good one,” Mar’i agreed instantly, her fierce expression softening with pride. “But it’s not a home. Not yet.” She leaned back, her mind already racing, charting a course where there was no map. “So we use it. We take the hard jobs, the dangerous runs, the missions no one else is foolish enough to touch. We use your skill and my knowledge to build a reputation that’s more than just a name. We build a legend. We build our capital. We find our people. And we build our army. Starting with us.”
The words settled over Sarka, not as a dream, but as a plan. A blueprint for a war she had been fighting all alone. The last of the tension in her shoulders dissolved, replaced by the familiar, welcome thrum of purpose. The smile returned to her lips, no longer hesitant, but hard and determined. It was the smile of a warrior who had just been handed back her sword.
“Where do we start?” Sarka asked, her voice now steady, imbued with a newfound resolve.
Mar’i’s fierce, revolutionary expression melted away, replaced by a slow, wickedly familiar grin. The fire in her eyes didn’t die, but it shifted from a righteous blaze back to a seductive, playful flame. She leaned back in her chair, the picture of relaxed confidence, and gave a little shrug.
“With a drink,” she purred, her voice dropping back into that low, melodic hum that vibrated with promise.
She raised a hand and gestured toward Eve behind the bar, a signal of effortless, unspoken understanding. Then she turned her attention back to Sarka, her gaze a tangible thing, tracing the lines of the woman’s face, lingering on the soft, internal glow of her skin.
Sarka watched the transformation, watched the warrior-general dissolve back into the charming rogue. A week ago, she might have dismissed it as flighty, untrustworthy. Now, she saw it for what it was: another facet of a boundless spirit. A woman who could plan a war and celebrate a victory in the same breath. A woman who understood that even in the face of a monumental struggle, you had to claim moments of joy, of connection, of life. And Sarka, for the first time in a very long time, realized she wanted to claim one.
Just then, Eve arrived, not with two, but with three glasses. She placed them on the table with a knowing, tired smile, her gnarled hands moving with a slow, deliberate grace. She didn’t ask what they were celebrating; she simply knew. She was the one who had built the space for it to happen.
Mar’i picked up her glass, the amber liquid catching the light. She didn’t drink immediately. Instead, she held Sarka’s gaze, then glanced at Eve, including her in the circle. Her accent, usually a melodic, polished thing, shifted, thickening into the musical cadence of her home.
She placed a hand flat over her own heart, a gesture of profound sincerity. Then, she reached outward with both hands, her palms open and inviting, as if giving an invisible gift to them both.
“To da famly we fynda when da one we los’ gone,” she said, the words a raw, beautiful offering.
Eve gave a slow, solemn nod, her eyes crinkling with a deep, ancient wisdom. Sarka looked from Mar’i’s outstretched hands to Eve’s weathered face, and she understood. This wasn’t just an alliance; it was a lineage. She slowly reached out and picked up her own glass, the coolness of it a shock against her skin.
“To found family,” Sarka echoed, her voice a quiet, steady rasp. It wasn’t a question. It was an acceptance. A vow.
Eve simply raised her glass in silent agreement.
They tapped their glasses together, the three-way chime a small, clear sound that seemed to silence the noise of the tavern for just a moment. It was the sound of a beginning, witnessed by the one who made the space for it to be born.