Chapter 1429
In the dream, he stood at the center of the forest, alone. The trees whispered his name, not in menace but in longing. Their leaves shimmered with liquid gold. The roots pulsed beneath his feet, leading him forward, deeper into a heart of light. When he reached the center, he found her - not Rose, not Stella, not any of his wives, but the goddess.
She was made of every one of them and none. Her face shifted as he watched - eyes like Sophie’s, lips like Lucy’s, the curve of Zoey’s waist, the hair of Scarlet, the voice of Rose. But the energy... the energy was infinite. She reached for him, her touch neither cold nor warm, but everything. He stepped into her arms.
"You are the echo and the source," she whispered into his soul. "You are the seed and the bloom. Are you ready to become?"
He didn’t speak. He nodded.
And woke with a gasp.
The vines had opened.
Soft light filtered in from above - an opening in the ceiling that hadn’t been there before. Gold-leafed petals fluttered down through the shaft of sunlight. Lucy stirred beside him, her lips brushing his chest as she looked up, eyes dazed with sleep and afterglow.
"Did you dream of her?" she asked.
He nodded.
"So did I," whispered Stella from his other side.
And Sophie. And Emma. And Natalie. All of them had seen her.