“No! Dear girl, you made no bargains at all!”

It took a few moments for that statement to register in Eric’s dizzy head, but it flowed into the emptiness inside her. Her aching sorrow was not banished, not completely, but for now a fizzing excitement took its place.

“It worked!”

“Oh! What did you do?”

“The shady edgelord guy hovered by my side creepily so… I just made them shake hands.” Erica gestured awkwardly, but Gardener was doubled over laughing. She kept laughing until Erica began to grow concerned, and she reached out for the being’s shoulder.

“A-are you okay?”

“Shady edgelord guy!”

She collapsed again into giggles, and this time Erica joined her. Finally, when their giggles had subsided, she spoke.

“How do you even know what that means?”

“Ahhhh… Souls don’t mean much without context.” At some point, they had both flopped down on the grass, the nudity no longer bothering Erica. Gardener waved the lily she held in the air.

“I took a whiff to get your context. Your history.”

Erica shrank away.

“Ah… you saw everything?”

Gardener giggled again.

“Silly, I take care of all of the souls that pass through here. You have nothing to be embarrassed about.”

Erica had been ashamed of her small, secluded life but now wondered what Gardener thought she had been embarrassed by.

“I-… Never mind.”

No good could come of her asking.

“So what is so great about me not having made a bargain? Doesn’t that mean I just enter the cycle like normal?”

“Well! You could. Or you could use the saplings for yourself!”

“Um, didn’t you say they that they were going to make me die young?”

Gardener sat up and faced her.

“Yes and no. As they are now, they would absolutely do that. But things are a bit malleable. Ce n'est pas un jardin, no?”

“…What?”

“Ohkay! Souls 101. Your soul is a shapeless, formless thing. But with context, your soul becomes, well… you! Context plus soulstuff equals cute little gayby. That’s your body, your experiences, your knowledge, all of it adds nuance. And when you die, you take all that lovely context, pop it in the blender, pump it back into the soul, and kerpow! The soul can keep going for another life.”

Erica bit her lip, sitting up to face the being. She looked around at her garden, and thought. Gardener waited for her answer.

“And you said that mine was a garden, so… is my context the plants?”

“Got it in one! All of these plants, the flowers, the grass, it’s all your memories, your thoughts…” Gardener took another deep whiff of the lily. “Your desires.”

Erica looked at the hungry look in Gardener’s nebula eyes, and covered herself up again. She felt naked before that gaze. Well, she was naked, but somehow, she felt more naked than a lack of clothes could allow. She reached around for something intelligent to say.

“But if I was supposed to reincarnate with my memories, that means I would have kept my context, right?”

“Yep! Well, most of it. I would have come along and grabbed the top of the sapling for fuel, as well as stuff your new world didn’t know yet. For you, that would have been…” Gardener made a gesture and a complicated diagram sprung into being before her. Parts of it moved, pulling and tugging on other parts, and spiraling in ways that hurt Erica’s eyes. After a moment, the diagram resolved into a mass of roots, banded in differing colours. Some were long and sturdy, branching off into other roots. Others were thin wisps that hung limp. Gardener ran her long fingers through the roots and continued: “Physics after Kant, electronics, political or societal theory, psychology, virology… wow your world kept you pretty informed, didn’t it?”

Erica ducked her head.

“I didn’t have much to do except read.”

“Yep I could see that. Read, and look up pictures of-“

She was cut off by Erica’s embarrassed squeak. She giggled.

“Still, that’s a start. Twenty years of stories and an intense yearning for…” She glanced at the lily she still held.

“A start?”

“Well, if you’re going to make a go at this, you need a different way to grow biomass for the cycle. You need- I’m getting ahead of myself, aren’t I?”

She squared her shoulders with Erica and looked her in the eye. Probably. It was a little hard to tell, on a being without pupils.

“Erica, how would you like to reincarnate while staying… you. I can’t promise you any lives beyond the first, or any power that you don’t grow yourself. All I can promise you is a chance. Do you want it?”

Erica paused to look over the being in front of her. While it looked like a beautiful woman, its eyes were a constant reminder of its nature. Its expression, too, was… hungry.

“If you have read my ‘context’, then you know my world has many stories about those who make bargains with powerful beings. It never ends well for the foolish mortal. Why do you think I dodged the two before?”

Light flared in the depths of Gardener’s gaze and her whole body and expression tightened for an instant, then the being relaxed. When she spoke, her voice was formal. Older. More solid, and so utterly real that it did not need to bother with such petty things as ‘ears’ and ‘vibrations’

I offered you no bargain.

Erica shivered and nodded frantically, desperate not to have offended this being.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean- well that is to say I thought-“

Gardener giggled, and the giggly, bubbly, contradictory mess that Erica had been talking to was back.

“It’s okayyy. No worries! What you’re worried about is hidden prices, right? So how ‘bout this: I will offer you a bargain, but not like that. I will show you how to grow and become a self-sustaining entity, and in exchange, you will allow me to pick one of your two starting domains?”

Erica chewed her lip.

“Okay. First, what’s a domain?”

“For you, a domain is a tree! It’s a means of gaining power and a use for that power.”

“What would you choose, given the option?”

“Well it has to be deeply rooted.” The entity took a moment to giggle at her pun. “So my pick will be your strongest Yearning.”

Gardener took the lily she held and gave it a deep whiff, waggling her eyebrows.

“I would recommend the domain you pick to be a strength. Something you have a strong foundation in! Your Yearning will be an infrequent but strong source of power, but your strength will be a steady income!”

Erica blushed at the implication, but tried her best to focus. What could she even choose? She had no great talents, no lifelong skills. She had spent her life in a box, waiting to die.

Perhaps something of her inner turmoil showed on her face, because the next instant she found her arms full of Gardener.

“Hey, don’t be so down! You have lots of strengths!”

“Oh yeah? Sure, I picked up a hobby or two, but I spent most of my time reading! What sort of-“

Gardener smiled, watching her make the realization she had been hoping for.

“So! A bargain, then? Fulfilled after I finish building your new domains?”

Erica chewed on the idea for a moment.

“Okay. I pick stories for my second domain. I won’t have any if you don’t make them.”

“Excellent!”

Gardener placed the lily down for the first time since she’d plucked it, roots and all. She scooped up both saplings, and with a complicated gesture and a murmur, she stripped the bark and leaves from the golden sapling. Repeating the gesture did the same for the leaves, bark, and thorns of the other.

The being flicked the plant matter into the pool. When it broke the surface, it did not cause a single ripple, but the pool began to shine in a thousand colours that Erica could not name.

“Well then. Shall we?” Erica felt like she had a handle on the situation (as much as was possible) and was making a choice for herself. She stuck out her hand to shake. Gardener just giggled, and pulled her close.

“I don’t seal bargains with handshakes, cutie.”

Their lips met and sizzled painlessly on contact. Erica could not focus on the taste of her first kiss because of the overwhelming power flowing through her. Then, before she could regain her senses, Gardener pushed her into the pool.

Gardener hummed to herself as she wove new domains from the saplings that should never have been. She could have done the editing in the soulstuff’s true form, but she liked the little garden. ‘Stories’ was a bit vague, but she could make it work. It would prove a decent strength, probably. She could make it work.

Her own choice, however… It would take specific circumstances to grow. The goddess giggled as she remembered the poor girl’s face. It had been so much more amusing not to correct her misunderstanding. Still, if the girl wanted to try gaining power through sapphic love, Gardener would not stand in her way.

“She’ll have to build a domain for that, herself. I have quite a different Yearning in mind.”