The Garden

{if Show Chapter Id == true} Chapter Id: 9 | Chapter Id (variable): {Chapter Id}

{endif}{if Garden Event == false}You take a quick stroll through the garden. The beauty and peace calms you. Since you find nothing noteworthy to do here, you decide to return to the main hall. {else

}{if Garden Level == 0}While wandering in the garden, watching the countless kinds of flowers, the insects, the birds and bushes, surrounded by a place so hostile to wildlife, your mind also begins to wander. You've never been here before. It's the beauty of the place, its splendor, that has kept you from coming here. And it still feels wrong, to walk among statues, artificial ponds and elegant, well-groomed flowers. Technically the Kingdom of Anstael is egalitarian; it was not forbidden to walk the gardens unless they were of the royal family. But the reality was that guards and nobles would throw judging looks at you, at the very least. Nobles "teaching lower folks a lesson about their place" when they dared to walk their favorite place wasn't unheard of either.

Now that you actually saw the garden of Sankao, you understand why nobles would try to make you feel unwelcome. The beauty of the place definitely came with its peace and tranquility. Peace and tranquility that require for few people to actually wander the garden. You stop at a beet of hyacinths, their little purple leaves in full bloom.

"They are pretty, aren't they?"

You spin around. A woman stands before you; she looked well off, delicate and graceful.

"I'm so sorry, I will leave immediately!", you stammer.

"Oh no, please stay. Be my guest." Her voice was probably the friendliest you had ever heard. "I love it when people appreciate these flowers. Not many do." She kneels down and starts pulling weeds around the hyacinths. Your first instinct is to follow her lead and also pull out the weeds but then you feel a tug of insecurity. You have never been in such a situation. What is the protocol for randomly meeting a probably noble woman who does peasant work? Thanks to Raphaels mentorship you were able to be a guard for a noble person without being executed but the main take-away of those lessons was “restrict interactions to the barest minimum and hope it’s not a chatty nutjob noble”.

“What is it? You look bothered”, the woman interrupted your thoughts.

"You are not ...?" You hesitate.

"A gardener? No." She laughed. "I guess I'm as noble as they come. Isn't the bigger mystery, what you are?"

"Oh, sure. I -", you felt the urge in you to lie. Tell her you are a temporarily embarrassed merchant of spices. Or already Lieutenant. But alas, what good would a lie do? "I'm a simple soldier, milady. Tarian. It's an honor to make your acquaintance.", you answer.

"No need for the formalities, Tarian. Just call me by my name. Oh, I am named after these by the way." She pointed towards the hyacinth.

"Hyacinth? That's a beautiful name."

"It is, isn't it? My mother picked the name for me." She looks in the distance. A profound sadness had crept into her eyes, so much so, you don’t dare to ask any questions. After a brief silence, she sighs. "I ... I should probably go. But a friend of hyacinths is a friend of mine too. Feel free to visit me here again."

While Hyacinth leaves you keep looking at the hyacinths. You probably would have left earlier, but it would have been a bad look to follow her immediately. And quite possibly dangerous if watched by the wrong eyes. You made absolutely sure, she was out of sight, before you finally also leave the gardens.

{elseif Garden Level == 1

}

This time, it was your turn to approach Hyacinth. She was again taking care of her namesakes, the hyacinths.

“It’s nice of you to visit me again, Tarian”, she greeted you without even checking who you were.

“Some sixth sense you have”, you answer.

“Just process of elimination”, she said. “Speaking of process by elimination, do you want to help me? It’s quite rewarding work.”

You sit down next to her and start ripping out weeds just as she does. You didn’t find it as rewarding, as she claimed it to be. Would your muscles grow from it? Would you learn something about how to overcome your opponent from it? Would anything change, just because you ripped out some weeds? No. It would only grow back, mocking you the very next week for your futile attempts to bring order into such short-lived nature. But you didn’t say any of that. You just worked.

“Do you think it’s fair?”, Hyacinth asked. God, why did she look so … ****?

“What?”, you ask.

“Rooting out the weeds. Do you think it’s fair?”

You ponder this for a moment. “What would fairness even mean, we are talking about plants”, you finally answer.

“Look at these weeds. Every week new ones grow, trying to claim this place, next to those beautiful hyacinths. And because they are beautiful, we give them water and rip out any weeds, so only the Hyacinths get the water. Then, when the Hyacinths are at the height of their beauty, we rip them out and stuff them into a room to dry up within days. And with their beauty, the worth of the flower fades as well.”

This was the kind of nonsensical talk, that Raphael had always warned you you’d have to endure if you actually climbed too far in rank. But you wanted to entertain her thought.

“Shouldn’t these ones be plucked yet? To me, they seem to be over their zenith.”

“You are correct Tarian. I asked for these to be left to me. I will take care of them until they are fully withered. And if I still can, I will do the same next year.”

“These flowers mean a lot to you, don’t they?”

“If only you knew”, Hyacinth answered. “But look at me, getting melancholic again. I don’t want to bore you. How about you visit me another time, I’m sure you have more important things to do, than entertain me.”

“You don’t-“

“Ah, no, it’s fine, really”, Hyacinth interrupts you. “Just go, please. And if you want to make me happy, come here again, to listen to me.”

It’s a stark difference, between you and her, you think as you leave the garden. Your problems seemed so simple. Get strong, get smart, earn money. You weren’t sure if the problems she remained silent about so eloquently were complicated or simply detached from reality.

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