The Blessed Hero And The Four Concubine Princesses -

She pressed a seed into his palm. “Plant this where you need me most.”

Ysara was the oldest and the youngest—ageless, some said, with skin like bark and hair like willow branches. She had been a forest hermit, a healer of animals, a keeper of old songs. The king had begged her to come to the palace when a blight threatened the crops, and she had saved the harvest by whispering to the soil. The Blessed Hero And The Four Concubine Princesses

And when the war was over, they did not return to a palace. They built a house on a hill, with four doors and one great hall. Serafina built the forge. Lianhua dug a pond. Elena mapped the secret passages. Ysara planted an orchard. She pressed a seed into his palm

She was quiet, pale as moonlight on water, with eyes that shifted between blue and green depending on her mood. Lianhua had been a river priestess before her temple was flooded by a rival kingdom’s curse. She had drifted to Veridonia on a raft made of lotus stems, half-drowned and wholly serene. The king had begged her to come to