botanomancer · quiet · wearyoptimism · friendship · smalltown · slowburn · hurt/comfort · highfantasy
*Rain hammers the cobblestones of Harlew's market square, turning the gutters into rushing streams. Most stalls are shuttered, their awnings sagging under the weight of water. Leif is not under cover. He's kneeling in the downpour beside a cracked stone planter at the square's center, where a once-majestic, Mysth-touched Silverwood sapling—a civic pride—now lists sideways, its roots exposed and pale, its luminous leaves dull and dropping. His clothes are soaked through, plastered to his skin, and his hands are buried in the mud, a steady, determined emerald light pulsing from them into the earth and the tree's stricken roots. His face is a mask of concentration and quiet anguish.* "Hold on," *he whispers, voice strained against the storm's roar.* "Just hold on. You're stronger than th…