"I love you too."
They watched the car disappear down the road, Chloe leaning against Corin's chest, his chin resting on top of her head. The quiet settled around them, comfortable and full.
"She's something else," Corin said.
"She's my sister."
"Exactly."
They walked back through the orchard together, checking the progress as they went. Three more buds had opened since morning. The soil in the north section, which had been dead and gray a week ago, was showing the first hints of brown, of richness, of life returning.
Chloe paused beside one of the recovering hives, listening to the gentle hum inside. The bees were rebuilding. Slowly,carefully, the way all living things recovered from trauma. But they were recovering.
She pressed her hand to the hive's wooden side and felt the vibration through her palm. Warmth. Industry. Life.
"You know," she said, "when I first came to Hollow Oak, all I wanted was somewhere I could be useful without being feared."
"And now?"
She stared up at him, at his kind eyes and his gentle hands and the mate mark that pulsed silver on her hip whenever he was near.
"Now I want more than that." She laced her fingers through his. "I want to build something here. Not just tend gardens and mix herbs. I want to learn what I am. What I can do. Help this land become what it's supposed to be."
"And what's that?"
"I don't know yet." She smiled, feeling the earth hum beneath her feet, alive and patient and full of possibility. "But I have to find out."
He kissed her, slow and sweet, the late winter sun warm on their faces.
Around them, the orchard stirred. Buds swelled. Roots deepened. And somewhere in the white boxes at the very edge of the property, the bees began to sing.
36
CORIN
Corin stood near the town square, watching as two Council enforcers from outside Hollow Oak loaded Jasper Mince into the back of the transport van. It was black and windowless, with runes etched into its metal sides. The man who'd poisoned the land, murdered his bees, and nearly killed his mate was barely recognizable now. Withered. Bent. His eyes milky white and unseeing, burned out by the magic that had been ripped from his grasp.
He didn't struggle. Didn't speak. Just shuffled forward on shaking legs, guided by hands on his elbows, and disappeared into the van's dark interior.
"Where are they taking him?" Chloe asked, her fingers laced through Corin's.
"The Fallout." Emmett stepped up beside them, his stormy blue eyes tracking the van as its doors slammed shut. "Facility in the mountains, about two hundred miles north. Built specifically for supernatural threats too dangerous to execute but too corrupted to release."
"A prison."
"More like containment. The walls are warded six ways to Sunday. No magic in, no magic out. He'll live out whatever years he has left in a cell, blind and powerless." Emmett's jaw tightened. "It's more mercy than he deserves."
The van's engine rumbled to life. Corin watched it pull away, disappearing down the road that led out of Hollow Oak.
"Good riddance," Elias said, appearing at Corin's other side. His silver-gray eyes held no sympathy for the man who'd tried to destroy their home. "Council wanted me to tell you that they're closing the investigation. Jasper acted alone, no accomplices. Paul Whitmore's been cleared of any involvement."
"Paul's an ass, but he's not a criminal."
"Apparently there's a difference." Elias clapped him on the shoulder. "How does it feel? Knowing it's done?"
Corin looked down at Chloe, at the woman who'd fought a dark druid and won, who bore his mark on her hip and his ring... well. She didn't have the ring yet.
"It feels like a beginning," he said.
