Agatha laughed until her sides ached.
Two days later, Agatha took the stage into Melliton. Even though she wasn’t expected at Fern Hall for another few days.
She wanted this to be a surprise.
She left her things in the care of Mrs. Biswas at the Four Swallows, and went walking the circuit toward Fern Hall to find Penelope. It felt wrong, striding along the familiar roads and paths in skirts rather than trousers. The fabric of her dress caught on quite a few more briars and branches than she was used to; her light cotton hem was rather dusty and her petticoat a bit torn before long. No doubt Penelope’s romantic soul would enjoy the idea, but not the reality, of Agatha showing up in tatters to beg for forgiveness. Penelope Flood was a pragmatist at heart, for all her love of poetry.
Just one more reason to love her, really.
Agatha walked as quickly as she could, but it wasn’t fast enough to suit her impatience—so as she walked, she plucked flowers: columbine, hyssop, kingcups, dog roses, and more. Names and natures she’d learned from Penelope, along with all the local plants most beloved by bees. To this bounty Agatha added a long, twisting tendril of enchanter’s nightshade—which, Penelope had said, referred to the witch Circe, who changed men into beasts. Agatha’d meant to ask more about that; she was curious about the full story.
If she could only find where the damned woman was!
She walked past the Turner place and up, across Squire Theydon’s sloping fields to the small copse beyond: a shady, curving bowl of trees, with a small spring and a carpet of lily of the valley.
And there was Penelope. Brown coat, men’s trousers, so beautiful and so very herself that Agatha had to stop and press a hand to her heart until she could breathe again.
No pointing apologizing if you were only going to faint before the thing was properly done.
Penelope didn’t look up from the hive as Agatha approached, her hearing muffled no doubt by her veil and the joyous buzzing of three hives’ worth of bees.
Agatha could relate: her own heart felt overfull of noise and wings. She had no idea how to begin, so she chose something utterly banal and said: “Hullo.”
Penelope froze, then slowly pivoted. The smoker at her side puffed once as her hand clenched tight, and her eyes went very wide as she took in Agatha with her hem in shreds and her hands full of flowers and a lump the size of Wales in the back of her throat.
“Hello yourself,” Penelope said in return.
And now it was Agatha’s turn again. She had to speed things up, or at this rate they wouldn’t get this mess sorted out before winter came and froze them where they stood.
“I made you something,” Agatha said, and held up the flowers. She’d used the enchanter’s nightshade to weave the various blossoms into a coronet, bright and blooming and fit for a fairy queen.
Penelope blinked, mouth opening and closing. She seemed staggered, as if Agatha were speaking a foreign language she only halfway understood. Her eyes never left the coronet. “Cowslips,” she said. “I could quote you some excellent poetry about that.”
Agatha sighed. “Go ahead: I deserve it.”
Penelope was startled into a laugh.
“You said you can’t have two queens in a hive,” Agatha went on, “but that just means only one of us can be queen.” She stepped forward, her heart hovering on the back of her tongue, ready to fly out from her lips. “I think it ought to be you. I came to tell you I’m sorry for yesterday—and to ask you if I could change my answer. To ask... if you’d like to share a home, and a life. With me.”
She stretched out her hands, holding the coronet. She was proud of the way they barely shook at all.
Penelope raised a finger and almost touched one trembling petal. A bee from the hive behind her beat her to it, diving into the bell of the flower, its velvet legs dusted with gold.
Penelope’s face lifted, and now her smile outshone the sun in the sky above. “What if neither of us are queens?” she said, to Agatha’s surprise. “What if we’re only a pair of lowly worker bees?”
Agatha stared down at the coronet, as more bees found their way toward it, setting themselves in the flowers like tiny gems. “That sounds much less romantic than what I had planned.”
“Is it?” Penelope set aside the smoker and moved forward, her gloved hands cupping the back of Agatha’s. Heat crept up Agatha’s skin at the touch. “Worker bees depend on one another,” Penelope said. “They can’t thrive or even survive on their own.” One corner of her sweet mouth quirked. “I’d be no good without you, you know.”
Hope struck like a kick to the chest. “Is that a yes?”
“Of course it is.”
Agatha’s heart gave a great leap, joy and gratitude and love all expanding infinitely, as if there was a whole second sky within her. She blew out a breath as the fear and tension of the past few days melted away. And here she was with stars in her eyes and her hands brimming over with flowers. “I still think you ought to wear the crown,” she said. “I went to some trouble.”
Penelope laughed, and bent her head, and blew gently until all the bees flew grumpily away. “We can take turns.”
Her gloved hands raised the coronet and set the whole on Agatha’s brow. It prickled terribly, but Agatha didn’t care—she was too busy pulling off Penelope’s wide hat, the bee veil tangling between her fingers as she bent low for a kiss, catching Penelope’s breathy laugh on her tongue. One kiss led to another, and another, and together they sank to the grass of the meadow, as the buzzing of bees played a lazy, loving counterpoint.
