"Feed her well—she's the peony that will bloom our fortune." The old man tapped Laure's collarbone with a knuckle. The touch was theatrical, like a priest blessing a coin. Laure didn't cry. She smiled the way a person smiles when everyone is watching: precise, practiced. Her dress had been washed and ironed until the seams looked like promises. The whole farmhouse smelled like boiled potatoes and money being stretched thin. Eloise sat on the floor with her legs folded under her, a half-worn rag between her fingers. She watched the old man watch Laure. The house hummed: the kettle on the stove, a dog snoring in the corner, the village women pressed together like stitches around the kitchen table. "Please," Melanie said, voice threaded with equal parts hope and fear. "Tell us what you see. How—how will she do?" The fortune-teller let his eyes rest on Eloise a beat too long. He had the gaunt look of someone who spent his life reading faces for coin and then wanting more. He smelled of rosemary and dust. He whispered things that sounded like reading and sounded like judgment. He spread his palm and peered at Laure’s wrist, at the faint leaf-shaped mark tucked like a secret there. He nudged the girl's collarbone as if testing the soil for a root. "Peony," he said finally, slow and satisfied. "She blooms for others. She brings people together and brings wealth. Guard the peony