Keira laughed at Hiro and shook her head. “He consulted me first before he did anything. Thank goodness. The story will be for another time! I assure you it has good out comes.” Her voice stirred the babies and she quickly got them out of the room before the crying came. “Easy you two!”

Sapphire looked up at him and chuckled. “Everything can talk, we just  can’t hear it like the Gods can. The water whispers… The plants talk and sing. Even rocks have their own voices through the mighty Earth.” She bent down and smelled the bushes as she chuckled more.

“It’s not just our voices that float in the air Hiro…” She looked fondly down at all the flora around them and chuckled a bit more. “Mother is the Earth Mother, of course she can. She sings with them and has conversation with them. Drae caught her once and thought she was crazy before she did the same thing I did to you. They are helpful when scouting and when going on missions. All they want to do is help you. Though like people there are some bad eggs.”

She began to prune the flowers and instead of their voices going sad the flowers got more joyful. “They don’t always experience death like we do. Trees can feel themselves dying but flowers are a bit different. They get more lively when you prune them since it will make them grow more. Does it hurt? Only for a second, some flowers would tell you. Ask the Rose bushes and they will majestically tell you that it is for the better.” She let the butterfly bush go and smiled up at Hiro.

“We Rosenites are like that too Hiro. We may lose some of us to slavers, trackers, hunters… but we will always come back more beautiful. Sometimes even more deadly.”

Hiro listened Sapphire as she explained how the the flowers could talk.  it helped that she was related to a Goddess, Hiro mused.  She told him that everything can talk, including the water, the air, and the rocks.  ". . . And flames?  They can talk?  For all the fire I've controlled, all the flames I've launched, I don't know if I heard anything.  Maybe it's something I'm missing.  Maybe my dad could hear it, maybe that's a reason he became so strong, he could use all the elements.  He started off being able to control fire, and he learned the other elements.  If I could hear fire, it would help a lot, I think.  Maybe it's just that I haven't tried listening. yet."  Hiro considered how he would go about learning how to hear the flames.

"I guess you're called 'Rosenites' for good reason," he said with a laugh.  "You're all related to a Goddess in someway, and close to the earth, at least as far as I can see.  It's amazing."  Hiro could hear all the friendly flowers talking to them.  Sapphire started pruning the flowers, and he could hear them getting happier, as Sapphire explained the flowers felt more lively when they're being pruned.  Hiro smiled back at Sapphire.  Then she mentioned slavers, he tilted his head.

"Slavers?  Slavers kidnap Rosenites?  Why?  Hunters and trackers too?  You're people, not cattle or something."

Sapphire thought intensely on if all elements had voices like the earth did. “I think so. I think that they can talk and that only a few very gifted people can read them. I think all elements have a wave of emotions that regular people like us cannot understand. Maybe what we should do is ask someone close to their element like my mama? I mean a volcano is earth too maybe she could let us know if it can talk.”

Sapphire laughed a bit and shook her head. “We’re not all related to the Goddess Angela but we are all related to the very first Rosenite. She who watches us as if we’re all her children. She watches from her tall towers while the five queens rule Arri in her stead. I may be blood-related to the first Rosenite but Willow is the Matron Mother of us all. I guess my mama and aunts don’t really rule Arri as much as Grandma Willow lets them do whatever they want until they cross a line they shouldn’t.”

She stopped for a moment and her blue eyes looked up at him. “Arri is known for the most beautiful women but it wasn’t always like that.” Her movements slowed as she thought about it. “We’re an experiment gone wrong to some people. We’re a gift to others. We need to be sought out and destroyed like the animals we are according to some. It started out with just one. Over the centuries we rescued people from slavers, risking our lives, to save those that didn’t have a chance. We would turn them and let them live with us. Our city grew as did our culture but still people want us dead.”

She mused lightly as she pruned the last of the plants in front of her. “My extended family is very small because some time ago Adeluna, under the last kings, attacked us. They killed many of us but my family pulled together. It’s why we helped when the queen needed us. To rid the world of those who would hunt us.”

Hiro knew someone who would know how to talk to fire, how to listen to the voice of fire.  But the problem was finding him.  "True, a volcano is part of earth, but it's rock, I know a lot of people associate the earth with life and plants, but rocks are part of the element of earth too.  The rocks and the soil.  Plants need soil to grow in, and they need the air and light to live too.  My father would know about how to talk to fire.  He could control all the elements, but he was strongest with fire.  He was once called an Avatar in the world we came from.  I wonder if he's still there, in that other world.  I know I asked him to let me make my own somewhere, to become a hero like him, but he took me to a completely different land, a place far away from the land I came from.  It feels like there's a mystery kept from me, that I wasn't told what happened.  What happened to the world I came from?  I should probably talk to Lady Angela about this too, because she knew my father, and she would know more about this.  It weighs heavily on my soul.  I just haven't spoke much about it to anyone.  I don't know if he's okay, or if Mom's okay either."

Hiro listened to Sapphire as she explained about the first Rosenite, Willow.  There were 5 queens of Arri, the sacred lands of the the Rosenites, and the original Rosenite, Willow, was a result of some kind of experiment gone wrong (in some people's eyes), that some people wished to wipe out, and they had to rescue other Rosenites from slavers or people who wished to kill them.

"That's terrible that people would wish to wipe out your kind, or enslave them.  Slavery and genocide . . . people can be so horrible!  I would protect you if anyone came after you.  You can guarantee that.  I wouldn't let anyone hurt you, you're my friend," he placed his hand on hers, and smiled confidently at her.  He could back up his words, he was strong, and a man of his word.