Lotti let out a gasp. “Ooh, do you think I could do that?”
“Absolutely. I think you could do anything you want to do.” Or at least anything that was physically feasible for a very small flower with a base of feathery leaves, though really Terlu wouldn’t have put any limitations on the rose. “I see no reason why you and the other plants can’t be gardeners, now that you’ve finished proving you can be sorcerers.”
“No offense, but I’d rather be a gardener. It’s more important.”
Terlu grinned. “No offense taken. Itismore important.”
Pleased, Lotti hopped out of the greenhouse.
Terlu jotted a note in her journal about the results of her latest experiment and then collected the ingredients to be set aside for her next attempt. It was a shame that she didn’t have anyone she could ask to study the texts with her, because even after she decoded the sorcerer’s notes, First Language was notoriously tricky to parse. Ah well, it just meant it would take her more time—which she had, now that Laiken’s malfunctioning spell had been disabled.
Not a single greenhouse had died since they destroyed the ingredients, and she was allowing herself to hope that it was over. Additionally, Laiken’s ghost had dissipated after Lotti told him the news, which was further proof that they’d done the right thing.
Her theory was that a piece of Laiken had known he’d condemned his beloved plants, which was why his ghost hadn’t been able to let go. Now that his mistake was undone, he was at peace, which was nice. At the very least the upstairs bedroom was less windy, even if no one besides Lotti (who slept in a pot on the bedside table) was willing to claim it as their own—there were simply too many memories bound up in it for any of Yarrow’s family to move into the tower permanently, and the neighbor with the toddler didn’t want a home with either stairs or spells.
After everything was tucked away, Terlu headed out of the practice greenhouse. Reaching the rose room, she strolled through. One of the tiny dragons was busily flitting from rosebush to rosebush—ever since she’d left the door open, they’d chosen to help with pollinating, though they always returned to their sunflower maze by the end of the day.
The dragon, a golden one with sapphire-blue eyes, trilled at her.
“Come by the cottage later,” Terlu told her, “and you can have some honey.”
Satisfied, the dragon flew to another rose, balancing on the stem as the bloom bobbed beneath her weight. She stuck her snout into the center of the flower.
Continuing on, Terlu found Yarrow outside by the cottage that was formerly home to the feral gryphons—the gryphons, she’d been told, had been relocated to an unused shed on the other side of the island. Luckily, she hadn’t been involved at all in that maneuver. Yarrow was working with his father on the roof, fixing the shingles. She noticed that Yarrow was working below Birch, in position to catch him were he to ever lose his grip—she wondered if that was a conscious choice or instinct.He doesn’t even know what a great heart he has.
“Did you hear?” Terlu called up to him. “All the cracks are fixed!”
“That’s fantastic!” Yarrow said.
It would be a while before she’d have enough of a grasp on the magic for the old failed greenhouses to be properly enchanted greenhouses again, but they’d function just fine as they were, subject to the ordinary laws of how greenhouses worked. Some of the destroyed rooms had already been reclaimed, designated for plants that didn’t require unnatural heat or for plants that the gardeners wanted to keep in a normal seasonal cycle. Other reclaimed greenhouses wouldn’t be used until spring. Yarrow had his eye on one as a future home for herbs from the southern isles—he had seeds squirreled away and had been just waiting for the right space to plant them.
All of the gardeners had plans, and winter was the perfect time for dreaming.
“I thought we could add an extra celebration to the Winter Feast plans?” Terlu suggested. “Something that acknowledges that the glass has all been fixed?” She shielded her eyes from the sun. It reflected off the fresh blanket of snow, glittering so hard that it made her eyes water.
Helping his father first, Yarrow scooted over the roof and climbed down the ladder. A few rungs from the ground, he jumped off and landed near her. “How about a confection made of sugar glass?”
She’d been thinking a toast or some kind of speech, but that was a much better idea. “I don’t know what that is, but it sounds wonderful.”
He held the ladder while his father climbed carefully down. When Birch reached the bottom, Yarrow helped steady him. Chuckling, Birch said, “I’m probably too old to be climbing on roofs.”
“I told you that,” Yarrow said mildly.
“It sounds better when I say it myself,” Birch said.
Yarrow grunted.
“Will you two be joining us for dinner tonight?” Birch asked as he reclaimed his cane from where it had been leaning against the house. “Rorick caught some stripe fish, and he wants to grill them all while they’re fresh.”
“You mean he wants to show off how many he caught,” Yarrow said.
“Exactly that.”
Yarrow glanced at Terlu and lifted his eyebrows.
She shrugged. Whatever he wanted was fine with her.
“Not tonight,” Yarrow said. “But if there’s leftovers, save some for Emeral.” He took Terlu’s hand, and they walked back toward their own cottage.
