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The Thousand Routes Tree

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Sela Ordaz

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“She shook her hair in the cool breeze and inhaled, the scents of lavender and rose and jasmine sweet in the lucent air. They passed fields where delicately scented rosa centifolia bushes grew. "How was the rose crop this year?" "Excellent. We had a mild spring and a generous rainfall. Twenty to twenty-five blossoms on every branch. Our rose was indeed the 'queen of the flowers' this year, to quote the Greek poet Sappho." He lifted his chin and peered at her down his nose. "Our rose de mai is expensive, Danieeele, but far superior to others." Laughter bubbled in her throat. "Your Gallic pride is showing, Philippe." He expressed a puff of air between pursed lips. "Bulgaria? Morocco? You can't tell me their roses are better than mine." "Just different," she said with patience. "Moroccan roses have a rich perfume, and Bulgaria's Valley of the Roses produces lovely damascena roses scented with a brilliant tinge of pear.”

“My mother used to grow roses in her garden. We'd pick them together every morning." She fell silent, remembering how she'd carried on the tradition with her papa after her mother died. One by one they'd cut the flowers, each still so fresh that dew glistened on its petals and trickled down her trembling fingers. "Eight pink roses, seven white ones, and three sprigs of myrtle," she murmured, pointing at the pink and white roses in the line of bushes. "What is that?" "It's what I would always bring Mama- the same arrangement my father presented to her when he'd asked her to marry him." The story of their courtship had been her favorite, one Papa had told her over and over. She'd never tired of it, never stopped asking him to tell it to her. Before her mother had died, he'd always ended the story with a smile, saying, "Your mother is my true love." Once she was gone, his expression became solemn, shadows sinking into the lines of his brow, his teeth clenched tight to keep from grimacing. Then he would say, "Your mother was my true love." So Cinderella had learned how one word could change everything. And she had stopped asking her father for the story.”

“Gliding through the garden was a peacock. It might have even been thee same one I'd seen before, with a tall crown and gorgeous deep-blue chest. Arrogantly, he turned his face away from us, as if we were below his notice, and called out to the forest. From the trees came an answer, and he strutted off, king of his domain. "They are so beautiful." Pavi sighed. "Samir told me there is a flock that lives in the forest." "Roses and peacocks. It's like the setting for a fairy tale." I looked around. "It's going to take more than a kiss to save this place." I thought of the single rose blooming into the parlor when Samir and I had first walked through. "But it does feel sometimes like it's under an enchantment." One tall rose drew my eye, a castle atop a small hill, with tangles of white damask roses around it, as if on guard. The rose was orange and yellow with touches of pink, and I recognized it immediately from a hundred of my mother's paintings. It seemed larger than others of the same type, as haughty as the peacock, and I rounded the overgrown white roses to see if I could find a way in. Pavi, however, was enchanted by the damasks. "These are prime," she cried, burying her nose in a mass of them. "The perfect flower for rosewater. It will be clear and very, very fragrant.”