On a scorched, silent Earth, Aileen walks alone with grief and a fading picture of green. Cities are ash. Wind carries grit. Then she finds the impossible: a hidden valley, one last garden refusing to die. There she meets Mara, its fierce, solitary guardian.
They keep their distance at first. Careful words. Careful looks. Between fragile rows of tomatoes and white flowers, trust comes slow. Aileen works the soil, dirt under her nails, the smell of leaves after dusk. Mara watches. Listens. Gradually, her guard lowers. Something quiet takes hold.
Nights grow softer. A shared fire. Stolen touches in the dark. What forms between them isn't loud or easy, but it's real. A need. Proof that even at the end, the heart still reaches for someone.
Beneath the garden, though, the ground won't stay still. Tremors ripple. Vines glow faintly, stretching upward. And secrets tied to Mara's past surface, threatening everything they're growing. The earth itself is waking ancient, alien, undecided.
It could restore the ruined world. Or devour the fragile life they've found together.
When the planet chooses, will love survive the awakening?
***
Every story in the Aileen series stands alone, yet each reveals another fragment of her eternal search for love among the stars.
Across galaxies and ages, one name keeps returning Aileen. She's an alien wanderer, endlessly curious about the beauty and mess of human connection. Every planet reshapes her a little: a flash of neon light, the hush of waves against a forgotten shore, the quiet ache of a dying world. Through it all, she learns that love strange, fierce, imperfect is the force that binds everything together. What will she find at the edge of the stars when even forever begins to feel human?
