Kiane Week Day Two: Flowers/Daisy
After running away from Megadoza, Diane has finally found a friend and something to look forward to every summer.


When the Daisies Bloom

Diane has never cared much for flowers. Most of them, while pretty to look at, don't fill her stomach. And whenever she spent too much time marveling at the blossoms, yellow and white, vibrant pink and soft blue, with small petals and elaborate calyxes, the daylight would fade too soon, and she would have to fetch water in the gloom of the night or endure the thirst. In Megadoza, no one had an eye for these short-lived bursts of color when they turn a dull stretch of grass into a painting. Even if she had cared to ask before she left her people and their mindset for an autumn adventure, no one would have told her the names of these blossoms. For the longest time, she doesn't know they have names.

Until she finds a Fairy by the riverside.

He has trouble remembering his own name, just like she has trouble pronouncing the complex syllables the first few times. Harlequin. Unlike anything a Giant would call their child, almost like a piece of foreign music. But he gives each flower they stumble across a name and a story.

The yellow, starshaped ones that like to show their faces to a crowd of same-looking blooms – daffodils.

The tiny buds in blue and purple that are the first to crawl out of the earth after the cold – crocuses.

The pack of upside-down tankards that will turn the ground between the forest trunks a short walk south of Diane's cave into an indigo carpet – bluebells.

Whenever Diane goes to the river to fetch water, Harlequin flies beside her and points at a shrub here or a bush there. Some won't produce buds before a few more months. But Harlequin describes them in such detail, from the way the blossoms will rustle with the wind to the scent they will share with the world, that Diane can imagine it all. This way she learns to identify broom, bluebeard, and summer lilacs before they change their green attire for a colorful dress.

The days grow longer. An orchestra of crickets gives daily concerts, and as long as Diane doesn't have to see the bugs, she can enjoy their play without a disgusted shudder. Even at night, the air outside her cave tickles her bare arms with warmth.

She lies on her back and plays with a flower crown Harlequin made for her. A few turns of his forefinger, and the blossoms of the meadow across the river have danced in the air, held the hands of their neighbors, and formed a circle of merry ball guests in pink and white and violet.

"Harlequin?" Diane asks, and he sits up to look at her. "How do you know so much about flowers?"

He tilts his head, a move he always performs when he ponders. "I grew up surrounded by flowers, I think. Everyone there knew them by name, and some people took the names of flowers they liked for themselves. It must seem like a weird thing for a Giant…"

Diane shakes her head. "I don't find it weird. I would have rather learned about flowers than about weapons and the different ways to gain honor in battle. That's why I went away. Everyone at Megadoza only cares about fighting for the sake of fighting. Why did you go away?"

"I don't remember. I think I wanted to help someone… but my head's all fuzzy."

Diane rolls over until Harlequin's face hovers mere inches away from her nose. Her breath distorts his hair, and a pink shimmer covers his skin.

"Maybe you wanted to help me!" Diane says. "Since I found you, you have helped me to tell the good fruits from the ones that make my stomach all twisty. And you have taught me everything about flowers. I would have never found the little waterfall or the stone circle on the other side of the beech forest without you. It's been a lot more fun than anything I did back with the other Giants. Can I tell you a secret I never told anyone?"

Harlequin has forgotten to blink, and he almost forgets to nod too. Diane fights down her giggles. What she is about to tell him is important.

"In the third night after I found this cave, a snowstorm roared outside. My fingers wouldn't move because of the cold, and I forgot to collect wood for a fire. The rooms of Megadoza aren't warm, the stone always spreads this cold that seeps through your toes and then your entire body. But at least there were other people around, many orphans who huddle close to each other. In this cave in the middle of the storm, I didn't have anyone else. That's when I made a wish. I held my lips close to the earth – because that is the only way your wish will be heard – and asked for the earth to send me someone to help me. A friend to share this cave with. And since that night, I always whispered the same wish to the earth. I only stopped after I found you. You fulfilled my wish, Harlequin."

Again, he has forgotten to blink. His eyes shimmer as she looks at her.

"I'm sorry," he says with a hoarse voice.

"Why?"

"For the horrible things you had to go through."

"You apologize too much." With these words, Diane plucks a white freesia from her crown and shoves it into his hair, knocking him over in the process.

The next morning, a ray of sunshine caresses Diane's cheek. For a handful of heartbeats, she snuggles deeper into her bed made out of dry leaves and squeezes her eyes shut. But then she sits up. Harlequin's slow breaths have maintained their rhythm. He can sleep for hours, probably days on end without growing tired of it. A shame considering all the amazing new things the day may have in store for them.

But when Diane crawls out of the cave, and her eyes adjust to the brightness, she shrieks.

Snow. In the middle of summer. The meadow in front of her cave, a vast plain of grass blades yesterday, has disappeared under a white blanket. Weird yellow blobs are sprinkled across the snow. Diane reaches out with a finger and shrieks again when the contact lacks the expected cold.

Harlequin races outside, still a little confused after the sudden theft of his sleep. "What is it, what happened, are you alright?"

And he would have continued his barrage of questions if Diane hadn't grabbed him out of the air. With both hands she shakes him, up and down like an oversized rattle.

"WHAAAA!" she screams. "I shouldn't have told the story about the snow, I never wanted to make it snow, I take everything back, forget I said anything in the first place. And then do your magic and lift this course from meee!"

Harlequin's head bobs back and forth, but the pats he gives her fingers to calm her don't spare him from more violent shakes. "Diane, Diane, stop, please. Diane! Okay, I promise I do my magic. Everything will be alright. Just hold still for a moment."

Diane obeys but presses her eyes shut right away when the weird snow attacks her vision. If she doesn't look for long enough, maybe the white will go away.

A strange sound comes from Harlequin. By the eternal earth, maybe he is dying. The snow is killing him. And it's all Diane's fault because her story summoned the white devil to their threshold.

She needs several moments to realize he is laughing.

"Diane, it's not snow," he says, and the joy clings to each of his words. "Look again."

Maybe he has gone mad. But in the end, Diane trusts Harlequin and cranes her eyes open. The 'snow' still covers the meadow, despite her best attempts at wishing it away. Only that it isn't snow after all. Uncountable white flowers have sprouted overnight, an entire ocean of them, and the yellow dots make up their heads.

Harlequin wiggles free of her loosened grip and plucks one of the flowers to offer Diane a closer look. "They are called daisies. We had a cool early summer, so they are a little late. You can find them all across Britannia on plains and hills just like this. That's… what someone told me at least. I'm not sure."

"Next time, they should be more considerate than to scare me so much. I want a heads-up before they invade our lawn," Diane says and makes a face. But it's hard to stay mad with the funny-looking flowers for long.

Harlequin kneels down and brushes the flowerheads. "I like them. I didn't get to see them often in the forest, but when the daisies show their petals, you know summer has arrived. They also taste great in company with wild salad and beetroots. Did you know that they follow the sun with their bloom?"

"I didn't even know they existed until this morning."

A flash of pink colors Harlequin's cheeks. "Oh, you're right. Sorry."

"You apologize too much," Diane says with a snort. "But I like them too. As long as I don't have to think of them as snow. And I like summer even more. Let's make a promise, okay? At the beginning of every summer, we will watch the daisies in full bloom. Then we can celebrate a year of our friendship."

Harlequin smiles as he looks at Diane. A hint of distant sadness swims in the amber of his eyes, another promise broken, another life forgotten. But in this moment, he is happy. That's what Diane wants to believe.

He uses his entire hand to grab her outstretched finger and shakes it. "It's a promise."

Summer comes and goes. All while the daisies bloom on the fields surrounding their home, Diane and Harlequin find an excuse to waste time outside, chasing each other across the hills, spinning in senseless dances, or lying amidst the ocean of white flowers. Harlequin weaves another flower crown for her, a gift she tears apart in her endless enthusiasm and cries over the broken remains until he tinkers a new wreath, even lovelier than the last. She tries the salat he mentioned, but politely declines a second serving in favor of another piece of pork.

Diane has never cared much for flowers, but daisies in particular spread their roots inside her heart. All because of Harlequin.

Summer comes. They craft a garland of daisies and decorate the cave with it. Okay, Harlequin does most of the work, Diane's fingers struggle against the fragile shafts in vain, but she supplies him with bucket after bucket of new flowers to the point where he can't keep up anymore and has to admit his defeat with a laugh.

Summer comes. Diane lies on her back amidst the daisies and watches the stars. Their soft scent lingers in the air, even though they have closed their blooms. Harlequin sits on her stomach and points at the bright freckles in the sky's dark face, a few of which he recognizes from before she knew him. The small lights dot the sky like daisies in an endless blue field.

Summer comes. The air has warmed over the past days, and Diane no longer needs the blanket Harlequin made for her after she lay sick with a fever. And when she returns from the river with an armful of hunted boars, the first daisies stretch their heads towards her. She giggles and picks the prettiest one out of the gathering to surprise Harlequin with the good news.

But the cave is empty.

"Harlequin?" Diane asks. Her voice echoes from the barren stone walls. She drops the meat, and turns over the loose rocks, hurls them outside, even though she knows he would have answered her.

Gone. Has he remembered his past? Did the people he knew in his old home feel the same numbness in their stomach when he disappeared? Has he forgotten her the same way he had them? Harlequin promised to watch the daisies with her.

He promised.

Diane fails to realize she has crushed the daisy between her fingers until the petals rain to the ground. Like snowflakes they cover the place where Harlequin went to sleep last night, right next to the big mold in the pile of leaves where she sleeps.

A hiccup cramps Diane's throat, and her eyes sting. Rubbing them doesn't help. Her fingers are cold against her face. He promised.

And that's when his voice sounds from the cave entrance, and Diane's heartbeat jumps so high it pounds in her head. "Look what I found, Diane, it's the first—"

She suffocates the rest of his words as she plucks him from the air and squeezes him, so tightly that he could never possibly leave her side ever again.

"Are-are you crying?" he asks in between desperate coughs for air.

"Don't leave me, you promised to stay with me." The tears streaming down her face muffle her voice, but it doesn't matter. Harlequin hasn't left her. And when this realization grabs hold of her brain, Diane eases her grip just enough to let him breathe.

"I won't leave you. We promised to watch the daisies together, don't you remember? I found one at the back of the cave. It's a bit dented, but it still means summer has arrived, right? I'm sorry I made you cry, I thought I would be back before you noticed." Harlequin offers her the flower, and when she ends her stranglehold around his torso, he places the battered daisy in her hair. "Can you forgive me?"

Diane sniffs. "Of course. As long as you make sure to hold your promise from now one."

"I will."

Summer comes. Summer comes and goes many times, way past the point where Diane can count them with her fingers. One field of daisies blends into the next and the next, and the one after that. But no matter what happens, Diane and Harlequin always celebrate the beginning of the warm season surrounded by daises. If she could make a wish to the earth so that life went on like this forever, Diane would do so in a heartbeat.

But no flower can blossom forever.

The sun slowly climbs over the mountain peaks and bathes the meadow in soft pinks and oranges. Diane sits in front of the cave and taps the ground in an endless drum play with her feet. The early rays of day warm her skin, but instead of the pleasant feeling, her mind only focuses on the implications the morning carries with it.

Harlequin has been gone for a long time.

When he left, the moon has painted his skin in a ghostly white. Like the porcelain plates Diane once saw a merchant sell.

Now, the moon has gone to bed, and she searches the sky above the northern hills for a sign of Harlequin in vain.

She sighs. Harlequin promised to return, and he has never broken a promise he made to her. Still, she kicks the ground to give her feet something to do other than fantasize about running after him.

A blob of white beside her catches her eyes. The smile tugging at her lips comes on its own. Lured forward by the warmth of the morning sun, a single daisy has spread its petals and welcomes the summer. Around midday, the meadow might already wear its yearly dress of white flowers. Diane strokes the early daisy with her pinky, careful not to crush the small plant. All will be good. Harlequin has promised to watch the daisies with her. Even if he is a little disappointed that he didn't find the first flower, they will soon laugh and forget about it.

The birds shift into a new tune as the sun rises higher.

And then Harlequin emerges from the hills, and Diane's heart beats faster the closer he comes. He smiles that smile ridden with half-remembered pain and stretches his hand towards her.

He came back, he came back like he promised, and they will watch the daisies together, celebrate the beginning of summer, and they will chase each other across the field of snow-dotted grass, and everything will —

Summer comes. The stone walls of Megadoza emit a little less cold than throughout the rest of the year. Diane has nevertheless seized the opportunity to escape her training when another Giant distracted Matrona with a report on the last successful battle.

Outside of the Giant capital, a mild breeze brushes the dry grass, and the scent of wild roses and thyme greets Diane's nostrils. How wonderful to finally trade the endless combat sessions for a simple walk. There is nothing to worry about, except for the nasty butterflies bobbing across the plain in search for nectar. Diane narrows her eyes. Just because they top the ranks of the least disgusting insects doesn't mean she welcomes them to ruin this perfect afternoon.

One of the confused yellow butterflies discovers the sweet plant juice it is looking for, but Diane's Giant shadow succeeds in chasing the bug away. In its place, a white flower amidst the clover remains.

A daisy.

Where did she learn that name? The person who first taught her about this flower must have been someone important. But Diane's head is all fuzzy.

She kneels down and brushes the delicate petals. "You apologize too much," she says, but she can't figure out what this sentence means or why the words sprung to her mind just now.

Diane has never cared much for flowers. But something about daisies and the first days of summer sparks a warmth that makes the days at Megadoza more bearable.

If only she could remember…