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The forest edge lay shrouded in pre-dawn mist when Gabriel returned to his cabin nestled against the old oak.
In his gauntleted hand, he carried a single bloom wrapped carefully in a fold of his pads.
Marie was already awake; she always seemed to sense when he came back from the night’s hunt. She stood in the open doorway, brown braid falling over one shoulder, arms crossed against the chill. Her light brown eyes searched him first for wounds, then softened when she found none.
“You’re finally here,” she said, though the scold held no real heat.
“Had to take the long way.” Gabriel stepped closer, breath fogging between them. “Didn’t want to crush it.”
He opened the pad. Nestled in the dark wool lay a flower no larger than a child’s palm: petals the deep violet-blue of a twilight sky, edged with faint silver that shimmered as though moonlight had been caught and pressed inside them. A thin thread of pale luminescence pulsed gently along each vein, alive, breathing.
Marie’s hand rose halfway, then stilled. “Is that…?”
“Starveil,” he said. “Found it high on the frost-crags above Radiant Heart Pass. It only blooms once every thirteen years, under the Hunter’s Moon. The old herb-wife in Veylwood used to say it chooses who carries it home.”
He offered it to her the way a knight might offer a sworn blade, palm flat, steady, and reverent.
Marie took the flower as though it might vanish if she moved too quickly. The silver edges brightened at her touch, sending tiny motes of light drifting upward like cold fireflies. She lifted her gaze to his.
“You climbed the frost-crags. In the dark. For this.”
Gabriel shrugged one shoulder, the gesture small and almost shy. “You said last spring the winter had stolen all the color from your garden. Thought you might like some back.”
A laugh escaped her, soft and startled. She cradled the Starveil closer, watching the light play across her fingers. Marie rose on her toes and kissed him fiercely,