by Vela Roth
One of the most important tests of that comfort was whether she would feel at ease with his family. But just as important was making her family at ease with him.
Lio fed Cassia’s only loved one another bite of cheese. While Knight was busy gnawing on it, Lio ventured to ease his hand closer. Ears, chin or chest were canine favorites, but they still seemed too ambitious. Lio had only touched Knight when the hound was wounded. What if Knight associated Lio’s touch with pain? He aimed for the dog’s side.
Lio’s hand met dense, coarse fur. Knight didn’t flinch. Lio didn’t breathe. So far, so good. He tried giving Knight’s back a gentle scratch.
Under the outer layer of his protective coat, there were deeper layers of thick, soft fur. Lio ran his hand over Knight’s powerful frame, then slid his fingers into the warm smoothness of the dog’s ruff. Lio began to understand why Cassia found it so relaxing to cultivate her bond with the animal. It must have a similar effect on Knight, for he sat down and blinked his eyes in apparent pleasure.
Cassia came nearer and slid her hand into the dog’s ruff next to Lio’s. She radiated contentment. “Now seems like a good time to step. He is inebriated with delicacies.”
“Let’s see if he even notices we’ve gone.”
For good measure, Lio occupied Knight with yet another morsel while he stepped them. The dog leapt to his feet, taking a quick look around at his new surroundings, then sniffed Lio’s pockets thoroughly. Lio and Cassia laughed together again. He gave Knight the last crumbs of cheese while she told him what a good dog he was.
Cassia’s family had given Lio the final sign of approval. Now Lio could take her into his.
Cassia studied their new location with great attention, turning all around to take in the wild shrubbery and undergrowth. She looked up and gasped at the massive evergreen trees that towered overhead. “Where are we?”
“The grounds of House Komnena. Quite a bit of the Queen’s Orchard, the forest that surrounds Selas, spills over to us here.”
“How do such mighty trees grow in the darkness and cold? They have no spell lights and glass like the roses in the courtyard.”
“I’ll show you.”
Lio cast a quick cleaning spell on his slobbery, cheesy hands before taking Cassia’s again. As he led her between the trees, Knight trotted alongside them, wagging his tail, as if eager to resume their pastime from the last Summit. Cassia grabbed her skirts in one hand and followed Lio through the woods without a protest for her velvets.
As soon as they encountered a clearing, Lio paused in the middle of the open space. With one arm around Cassia, he pointed up at the sky with his free hand. “Look up and tell me what you see out of the corner of your eye. What hovers there on the edge of your vision, then disappears when you try to look right at it?”
“Light,” she exclaimed. “A glimmer. Sometimes a filmy glow.”
“It is the ward. We discovered long ago that even when the sun sets for the winter, plants still thrive in the light and shelter of the Queens’ magic.”
With the sky and one of Lio’s spells to light their way, they trekked across his family’s untamed grounds, under spruces and yews, between thorn thickets and holly bushes, through glades covered in brilliant fresh snow. By the time they emerged from the woods, he and Cassia were both windblown and breathless with laughter.
He brought them out onto the garden path, which was just a trail of footprints in the snow at the moment. Lio gestured ahead of them at the stone fence that surrounded the tidy yard. “Here we are.”
Cassia took in her first glimpse of House Komnena with the expression of a polite guest, but the Union revealed her ravenous curiosity. Lio suppressed a smile. Her gaze traveled over the paddock cleared of snow and carpeted in tundra scrub. She looked beyond to the terrace framed in buttresses, the stained glass door, and the soaring white marble structure.
Finally, her attention returned to the paddock and came to rest on the modest barn. Lio supposed its low thatched roof and stone-and-mortar walls did make a strange contrast to the main house. But practicality and comfort were what Zoe and her goats needed, and she preferred the cozy barn to the vaulted halls. Lio suspected Cassia would also feel more at ease somewhere informal. This was definitely the best place for his sister and his Grace to have their first encounter.
When he and Cassia neared the fence, Lio indulged the urge to grab her around the waist. She let out a squeak of surprise. As he levitated them over without opening the gate, she clung to him in quite a satisfying way.
On the opposite side of the fence, Knight backed away, then took a running leap. Not to be outdone, he cleared the fence with room to spare. Lio set Cassia down so she could make over the hound’s feat.
“Queen Soteira can heal anyone, even liegehounds,” she said.
Lio dared pet the dog again. “Do you think Knight would mind waiting here for a moment?”
“Knight is the soul of patience, aren’t you, darling? And you were born with your own enchanted cloak to resist the cold.” She ruffled his fur and gave him a stay command.
As Lio approached the barn with Cassia, his mother came out and exchanged a conspiratorial smile with him.
“If you need anything, I’ll be in my study, right through that door.” She gestured to the terrace and the stained glass door to her favorite room, then strolled inside.
Cassia turned to Lio. “I cannot endure the mystery any longer, and I cannot begin to guess. You must tell me why we are beginning our evening with your family in the barn.”
Lio couldn’t keep the grin off his face. “There is someone here I want you to meet, and she will tell you this is the best part of our home. Come inside.”
He tugged her hand, and she followed him through the low doorway without having to duck as he did. The scents of fodder and goat enveloped them. He heard skinny knees shuffle in the hay behind the wall of one stall, then two footsteps.
Zoe peered around the edge of the wall, hovering in the door of the stall, her eyes wide and her mouth tight. She stared at her hero, her aura bursting with so much eagerness Lio feared her little body would begin trembling. He sent her a wave of reassurance through the Blood Union.
“Zoe,” he said, “Cassia has come to meet you.”
Zoe gave no words in reply, only a little gasp.
“Cassia.” Lio squeezed her hand. “I would like you to meet Zosime Komnena. She is one of the children you saved and now, I am so proud to say, my little sister.”
Zoe’s aura glowed at his words, and the light of her spirit hazed into the bloom of Cassia’s surprise. Cassia’s heart filled to the brim, fraught and longing, and Lio wondered if she, not Zoe, would be the one who broke from the power of her own emotions.
Indeed, it was Zoe who found her voice first. “You’re the Brave Gardener.”
Betony
It was a rare sunny day that made it warm and nice to work in Soli’s garden. Cassia got up from kneeling by the flowerbed and dusted the grass off her skinned knees. With her skirts tucked into her belt, no stains would get on the outside, and Nurse wouldn’t scold her for getting dirty.
Cassia heard the door to Soli’s rooms swing open, and she turned to see her sister coming down the steps into the garden. Now that Soli had come out to check on her, nervousness overtook Cassia. It was the first time Solia had let Cassia decide what to plant and put all the flowers in herself, with only a little supervision. She hoped her sister would like how it had turned out.
Soli smiled and came to see Cassia’s work. But Cassia clutched her spade in front of her tightly and stood between her sister and the flower bed.
Soli knelt down on Cassia’s eye level, and her beautiful velvet gown dragged in the grass and dirt. “Oh, Pup, this is beautiful! Show me what you’ve planted.”
Cassia beamed at her sister and turned around to look with her at the flowers. Soli put an arm around Cassia and held her close as Cassia pointed out the different blooms.
“These are del
phinium, one of the prettiest blue flowers there is. Here are goldenrods. And those there are white daisies.”
Solia gave her a kiss on the cheek. “My garden never looked so beautiful.”
“You’re the Brave Gardener,” said Lio’s little sister.
It was a frigid night in Orthros, and Cassia was in a warm barn lit with mellow spell lights. Lio’s little sister stood before her.
Zoe shuffled her bare feet in the hay while two goat kids peered out from behind her legs. Her loose cotton tunic stopped at her knobby knees. Around her neck hung one of the betony charms Cassia had made for the Eriphite orphans. The child clutched a potted betony seedling in her hands, a leafy sprig that had yet to bloom.
Cassia recognized the look on the Hesperine suckling’s face as if a mirror of crystalline Orthros glass reflected her own childhood back at her. That look of adoration was for her?
In the rush and desperation of providing the children an escape from Tenebra, Cassia had thought only of the reward of knowing they were safe. She had not expected the reward of knowing them. She had never even imagined receiving the honor of Zoe’s expression in this moment.
She knelt down on the Hesperine suckling’s eye level, letting her beautiful velvet gown drag on the floor of the goat barn. She thought of what she would want to hear if she were standing in Zoe’s place, the kind of things she had always longed for her beloved Soli to say to her. “I am so happy to meet you. Lio kept you a great secret all the way here. I could hardly wait to find out where he was taking me. The secret was you! You are the most wonderful surprise I have ever had.”
Zoe’s mouth eased into an almost-smile. “He kept you a secret too. He told me so many stories about all the good things the Brave Gardener does in Tenebra, but he wouldn’t tell me your real name. Until Autumn Equinox, when I found out you were coming to Orthros.”
“Zoe has been so excited to finally meet you,” said Lio.
“Please accept my welcome gift.” Zoe held out the seedling. “Lio says you had to leave all your plants in Tenebra. So I wanted to help you start your garden over.”
“This is for me?” Cassia wrapped her hands around Zoe’s and the pot. “You have my gratitude. I will treasure this.”
A happy blush colored the suckling’s pallid cheeks.
Lio went to Zoe’s side and sat down on the floor of the barn. “Stories about the Brave Gardener are your favorites, aren’t they, Zoe?”
“I’m sure Lio is a wonderful storyteller,” Cassia replied.
Zoe nodded. “He makes pictures to go with the stories. You look just like the illusions he casts of you.”
Cassia pushed her windblown hair back from her face, suddenly aware of the sweat at her nape from hiking in a warm cloak. She glanced at Lio, and he gave her an unapologetic grin.
“Lio is so kind to say such nice things about me. In fact, your brother is the kindest person I know.”
“Yes, he is.” Zoe turned her look of worship upon Lio.
Cassia smiled. Well, she and Zoe had a very strong starting point in common. They both adored Lio.
Zoe slid nearer to her brother, and Cassia recognized the gesture as a tentative demand for attention. Lio drew Zoe close with one arm. She shuffled her feet and blushed again, then whispered something in his ear, hiding her mouth with her hand.
He smiled at her, brushing a thumb across her pink cheek. “Of course that would be all right.”
Zoe cast a hesitant glance at Cassia.
“Why would Cassia mind?” Lio met Cassia’s gaze with a soft smile. “She is my share. Thanks to her, I can help Mama and Papa provide for you.”
Cassia let the meaning of his words sink in. “It’s perfectly all right, Zoe. In fact, I’m so happy I can help.”
For the first time, Zoe’s smile peeked out. She was awaiting the arrival of a front tooth, but she had two perfect baby fangs. Cassia had never seen anything so adorable.
Lio hugged his little sister close and held his wrist out to her. “When you’re a busy suckling, it’s difficult to wait for dinner. Especially when you’ve had an important night and just met someone you’re so very excited to see.”
Zoe took his wrist in both hands. As she ducked her head, her long brown hair fell forward, half-concealing her face, but not her mouth. The child bit into Lio’s wrist. Her black-and-white goat nibbled his big toe.
Zoe drank with guileless eagerness, just as a human child might guzzle a cup of fresh milk. Lio gave no sign her teeth pained him. Did Hesperines’ natural healing make feeding their children painless? What did it feel like to suckle a baby Hesperine?
Lio’s gaze came to Cassia’s. They shared a long look while Zoe’s head was bowed. In his eyes, there was unmistakable love for his sister and an invitation to Cassia to share in it.
A laugh wanted to bubble out of Cassia’s throat, or perhaps tears, she wasn’t sure which. She had never seen Lio hold a child.
This was what Hesperines were like with their children. This was what Lio was like with children. Zoe had years and years of this boundless kindness and affection to look forward to. She had this tender, powerful person who would never cease to protect and care for her. Cassia saw before her the future that awaited any child who dwelt in this house.
The invitation in Lio’s gaze intensified into something more. An offer. A promise.
Cassia did not look away.
When Zoe lifted her head, she smacked a hand over her mouth. Lio chuckled and handed her one of his supply of handkerchiefs. With another, he wiped off his wrist, while she turned away and scrubbed at her mouth. When she faced them again, she hid the handkerchief in a wad in her hand and slipped it to her brother.
He slid it back in his pocket. “It takes practice.”
Could Cassia reassure Zoe she need not be self-conscious in front of the Brave Gardener? Or at least distract the child from her embarrassment? Cassia found more words inside her that she knew were the right ones. “Are these your goats?”
Zoe’s attention turned to her pets, and she nodded. “When Mama said I could have a familiar, I realized goats are my favorite animal. But you can’t keep a goat by itself, because they’re herd animals naturally. They must have friends of their own kind. So Mama agreed it was all right for me to have two familiars.”
“The Eriphites have always been herders,” Lio explained. “Zoe is a natural with goats.”
“These are High Rift Dwarf goats from the Empire,” Zoe explained. “They do well in the cold, and they don’t grow very big.”
Cassia smiled. “I can see you know a lot about goats.”
“Whenever I get my affinity, I hope it’s goat magic,” the child said.
“What are their names?” Cassia asked.
Zoe picked up the black-and-white goat and said solemnly, “This is Midnight Moonbeam.” She tucked the brown-and-white goat under her other arm. “This is her sister, Rainbow Aurora.”
Cassia did battle with her smile anew. “Those are very beautiful names and perfect for Hesperine familiars.”
“Lio says you like dogs.” Zoe looked behind Cassia. “But I don’t see the Brave Gardener’s Shadow. Isn’t Knight with you?”
“I see you have heard tales about my faithful liegehound. They are all true, I assure you. He is out in the paddock.”
Zoe hugged her goats closer. Aurora bleated amiably, while Moonbeam squirmed to get down. “Does Knight get along with goats?”
“Knight is very obedient, and when I tell him he must protect someone, he does as I say. He will get along with your goats.”
“Then could I meet him too?”
Cassia looked to Lio.
“Yes,” he answered, “however, you must remember what you have learned about magic. Some good things are dangerous because they are powerful, and we must be responsible when we interact with them. Knight is like magic. You must promise to be careful around him as I taught you when we were getting ready for tonight. If I ask you to go back inside the barn, you must
do so right away.”
Zoe nodded. “I promise.”
Pushing Knight’s limits with Lio was one thing, but with a child? Cassia willed her heart not to pound, for Zoe would surely hear it, and that would not reassure her. If the child noticed Cassia’s racing pulse, however, Zoe gave no sign. Perhaps she took Cassia’s misgivings for excitement. But Lio wouldn’t.
Lio said carefully, meeting Cassia’s gaze, “Zoe already knows how to step. We’re very proud of her.”
At that, Cassia nodded. “It sounds like you’re a fast learner, Zoe.”
“Thank you. I hope my magic comes in fast. Lio says it’s different for every suckling, but I can’t wait.”
“I have no doubt your affinity will have to do with animals,” he reassured her.
“Let me get Knight ready to meet you.” Cassia set her betony seedling safely on a feed bin.
She returned to her hound in the paddock and let Knight sniff her, hoping he would pick up on the scent of goats and Zoe.
“Ckuundat, Knight. You are about to meet someone very special. A new kaetlii.”
At the word that meant someone to protect, Knight went still and paid utmost attention.
“That’s right.” She put a hand under his chin and lifted his head, looking into his eyes. “Ckuundat. You must treat her and her animals the same way you treat me, do you understand? Barda!”
He adopted guard stance.
“Oedann! Good dog. Let’s greet her with our very best behavior. Het baat!”
Knight went into a down stay at Cassia’s feet.
She called toward the barn. “Knight is ready.”
Zoe came out of the barn carrying her goats, and Lio accompanied her with his hands on her shoulders. She had covered her head with a mantle of beautiful silk much finer than her cotton play robe, but Cassia noticed the embroidered design on it was a pattern of dancing goats. Zoe glanced eagerly in Knight’s direction, but not into his eyes.