The passage was long. Narrow in sections at first, barely wide enough for me to squeeze through, and lined with soft moss that squished under my fingers like damp cloth. The deeper I went, the more the air changed. Not colder but warmer, somehow. And thick. Damp enough that I had to stop and breathe through my sleeve, the scent of spores and wet soil clinging to every breath.

  The singing resonated deep within me with every step I took.

  It was everywhere now, vibrating through the stone, through my ribs, through the hilt of the dagger tucked close beneath my coat. The tunnel pulsed gently, like something alive was breathing just beneath its skin. After numerous bends, it finally opened.

  I stepped into a vast chamber, unbelievably big. The ceiling was too high to see. Far above, bioluminescent fronds dangled like chandeliers, swaying softly despite the stillness of the air, lighting the "sky" above like stars against the night. Massive mushrooms stood like trees, their caps wide enough to cast full shadows. Some glowed softly, others pulsed like beating hearts. My feet sank slightly into the mossy ground, the floor giving off warmth like sun-soaked soil.

  This was the Underbloom.

  It was exactly like Lys’s paintings. Every glowing stalk with crimson bark, every curling fungal vine, every shimmering pond nestled between pale roots - I’d seen them on canvas, months before I ever found this place.

  It took moments, but I noticed that I wasn’t alone.

  Figures moved through the grove - slow, graceful, and not entirely human. Their shapes were bipedal, mostly, but lumpy and asymmetrical at the edges. Faces half-hidden behind blossoming gills or under capped domes. Their limbs flexed too fluidly, joints bending wrong as if there wasn't a bone in their body. But none of them paid me any mind. They walked among the mushrooms like they belonged to the forest itself. As if they'd grown from it. If anything, they made an effort to be free from my path.

  The choir sang from every direction. Dozens of voices - hundreds, possibly thousands - layered into a single harmony, wordless and vast. It pressed against my skull like a fever dream. Not quite overwhelming, but far from relaxing.

  I didn’t know where to begin searching. I was lost, the Underbloom appeared to sprawl in all directions for miles.

  But then -

  Stolen story; please report.

  A voice rose above the rest.

  Clear. Sweet.

  Lys.

  I turned and ran towards it, frantically.

  I didn’t need to see the path; the song led me. Through soft glades and around glowing brambles, over a fallen red-capped log that breathed as I leapt over it, down into a glen where a small, still pool lay nestled in a cradle of moss.

  In its center, standing knee-deep in the water like a statue risen from the earth, was her.

  Lys.

  Or rather, what remained.

  Her body was tall and pale now, sculpted from smooth, living mycelium that shimmered faintly beneath the water. Her arms were graceful, but too long. Her hair drifted like a curtain of trailing lichen. Her eyes, thankfully her eyes were still hers, calm and cool, staring ahead at me. And her voice, when she sang, was still Lys.

  I plunged into the water without thinking.

  It was warm, strangely soft, and it embraced me as I half crawled and stumbled against its surface. I reached her after what felt like minutes of scrambling, and clung to her waist, sobbing, pulling at her - trying to free her. Trying to break whatever spell had taken her.

  Her hands moved slowly. She touched my face. Her fingers were cool and still smelled of paint and crushed herbs.

  And the singing stopped, suddenly, all around me. A startling deafening silence.

  She crouched down, folding herself low until we were face to face.

  “You found me,” she whispered, voice gentle and full of bittersweet joy.

  “I hoped you would.”

  I couldn’t speak. I shook my head, still crying, unable to understand. "Lys... Lys."

  “I’m home,” she said, in a bittersweet tone. “I was never meant to stay up there. My people... we were meant to live down here. The song, it helped me remember what I was. What I am. What could can become.”

  I choked on my words. “Please come back with me. We can leave. I’ll take you out of here, please, I'll find a way to cure you. Please, Lys, we need to go!”

  She smiled and kissed my forehead. It didn’t feel cold like I expected.

  “I can’t,” she said. “Not anymore. I've made my choice, but-”

  I buried my face in her chest, sobbing.

  She let me cry. She held me in silence.

  “But you can visit,” she said. “You can join me. Whenever you’re ready.”

  I looked up. She wasn’t pleading. She wasn’t trying to trick me. It was just an offer.

  “If you want to stay,” she said, “there’s room here for you and me. And if not, you’ll hear me, even up there. I'm not breaking my promise. I'm always with you, but... I need to be here. This is where I belong."

  I stayed a while longer. I don’t know how long. Hours at least, possibly days maybe. We talked, reminisced, and she assured me that she was fine, that this was her choice. No one forced her into this, but this was her destiny, her calling. None that heard the song could avoid it forever.

  But I wasn't ready, my mind still so unsure. I couldn't imagine the life she led now. I couldn't fathom joining the choir. So, with tears in my eyes and a heavy heart, I left.

  Years passed. I never stopped working the apothecary. I now brewed the dream-root tea in the morning and kept the shop tidy, just how she liked it.

  At night, when the Market began to bustle and the wind rattled the shutters, I would open the window.

  And I would still hear the song.

  Always faint, always drifting up from somewhere below. And in it, always, her voice. Clearer and louder than all the rest.

  I no longer cried when I heard it. I just listened.

  Then I would return to her easel, brush in hand, and paint the grove again.

  The Underbloom with all its colors, its shapes, its light. With the most beautiful woman at the center of it all.

  And every painting brought me closer to making that choice.