[ the answer is not one he expects, and caught halfway through a bite, kaveh finally turns to look at alhaitham. the purple of the padisarahs, he says. alhaitham does not care about flowers the same way artists do. he does not see them with the same eyes, with the same mindset. yet, he asks nonetheless, and kaveh blinks once, twice.

the purple of the padisarahs. ]

I have read something of the kind, I believe. [ he has not. ] Or Nilou has told me about it. [ she has not. ]

[ kaveh bites into one of his rambutan, and recalls the memory. it comes, instead, so vivid in his mind, as though he has seen them himself. a perfect purple, from stalk to petals, dots of purple that decorated land in imitation to the sky and its stars. they are soft to the touch, softer than the padisarahs close to their house. he's sure, too, that he has a memory retelling their smell, sweeter, often used as an aphrodisiac. the padisarahs are flowers of love. kaveh recalls reading about that somewhere, perhaps a poetry book of liyuen origin.

no such book exists, no.

the thoughts, he realizes, make him acutely aware of the lack of padisarahs come autumn. it is not their season. time and time again, kaveh reminisces about them. ]

Am I to believe you have dreamed of padisarahs so purple they are rumored to glow come nightfall?