Natalie reached into the leaves and pulled out a small pod, curled tightly, smooth, and silver. "Found another one," she said. "It's warm."
Scarlet blinked. "You think it's alive?"
Jude took it gently. The pod pulsed faintly, like it had a breath of its own. "Maybe. We'll study it later. Document everything."
By dusk, they'd gathered two baskets of herbs, three strange seed pods, and a handful of leaves that shimmered in colors they hadn't seen before. Jude added notes to their glyph ledger, cross-referencing Lucy's maps with what Grace called the "song trail", the pattern of areas where watchers responded most strongly to sound.
That evening, he returned to the orchard late, exhausted but light. The fire was already lit, and the wives were gathered in loose clusters, some talking, others tending small fires, one or two writing in notebooks. Jude found Zoey sitting under the fig-glyph tree, her knees hugged to her chest.