But then she caught his scent, and it forced a closer look. He smelled of the forest in the heart of winter—like chilled cedar and frosted loam, all blanketed in snow. Scents marked by the absence of smell, signifying recession and urging rest. A proud rack of branching stag’s horns adorned his holly-wrapped crown, and there was a look to him that was far more wild than jolly.
Was this a Holly King impersonator? Though he was one of the many influences on Father Christmas, their purposes were far from the same. The Holly King oversaw all of fall and winter, and in his interactions with humans kept them accountable toward the lessons of those seasons—to harvest, and then to let fall fallow, to retreat, rest, regroup, and be ready for the new year when it comes.
The old man slid his gaze her way. “Are you ready for Yuletide, daughter?”
Rowan started, caught off-guard by the challenge in his question. Clearing her throat, she said, “You’re really committed to your character.”
“Andyouare avoiding my question.” The look he gave her said he wasn’t letting her off the hook.
She flushed. “Sure. I mean, I’m here, aren’t I?”
He leaned forward, gazing at her with lightless eyes. “But have you done all you need to do before the New Year?”
She opened her mouth to snark again, but nothing came out.
Finally, she said, “I don’t know. I haven’t known in a long time.”
The Holly King nodded. The train came to a slow rolling stop at her terminal, doors sliding open. She shot to her feet and wiped a palm across her eyes to compose herself before tugging her roller bag forward to disembark.
“Well,” said the Holly King, “you have eleven days left to figure it out. I see a busy season ahead for you, so…” He pulled atwig from his crown and snapped it as she passed to exit the train car. “You had better get to it, Rowan.”
“Wait, how did you know my…?”
She turned to look back. The car she had been riding in stood empty. An unruly shivering passed through her body, but she had no time to linger and wonder. She pressed on to the gate.
“Canceled?”
They had canceled her connecting flight. The only plane that would get her to Elk Ridge before the Solstice. It had still been active on the departures board all of fifteen minutes ago when she disembarked her plane from Orange County.
A surge of people had already queued behind the customer service desk, forming an impossibly long line, and everyone else was on their devices, trying to mitigate the damage to their night. Rowan pulled out her own phone and collapsed back against the wall, letting out an audible groan.
“My thoughts exactly,” muttered a baritone voice.
The distinctive-looking man beside her lounged against a wall display covered in boughs of holly. Though he was roughly her age, there were streaks of silver in his tidily coifed jet black hair. And even though it had been years since last she’d set eyes on him, recognition hit with a surprising jitter in her stomach.
“Gavin McCreery?”
At the sound of his name, the man looked up from his phone, deeply set brown eyes catching her own. Something flicked over his face and his lips parted, and for a moment, she felt exposed. Her breath caught in her chest.
Then it passed. His face was neutral again as he said, “Rowan Midwinter?”
So itwasGavin. She shifted her gaze from his eyes back up tohis hair, forcing herself to face the reminder of what happened when she magicked mad.
Gavin had beaten her at a debate championship after preparing extensively with a private tutor his father had hired to coach him. She’d gone home in a fury at the unfairness of it, and then channeled that toward the first thing that came to mind when she thought of Gavin: the head of thick, silky hair she imagined he spent a lot of time preening over.
“May hairs of black be hairs of gray before the sun sets on this day.”
She’d chanted the words while burning a few of those dark hairs into the flame of a plump white candle.
Rowan hadn’t expected it to work, but the next day Gavin had come to school with silver blooming at his temples. She’d never figured out how to reverse it, and she was too ashamed of what she’d done to ask the coven for help.
The joke was on her, though—it suited him. Very well.
On top of that, the day after his hair changed, Rowan had woken up with a head of snow-white curls. The rule of three made manifest.
Whatever energy you put into the world returns to you threefold.
Not always literal, but in this case, very much so. And so once a month, for every month since, she’d had to dye it to cover the evidence of her shame. A bottle of her trusty “For Auburn Waves of Mane” rolled around in her backpack at that very moment. She’d reached the end of her current cycle and had a fresh dye planned for later that night. That was, if this flight cancellation didn’t strand her somewhere without a shower.
