The Lost Garden: The Complete Series

by D. K. Holmberg

  Terran frowned. “Isn’t that reason enough?”

  Eris looked around the garden as she sighed. “You’re probably right. I wish I just knew more. About being a keeper. About what happened to the other keepers. About the Svanth.” She shook her head, suppressing her annoyance. “And now Lira is too busy keeping my mother alive to teach.”

  “I’m not sure finding another keeper would help. From what my father said, the keepers could be…picky…about who they taught.”

  That wasn’t what Eris remembered from her dream within the heart of the Svanth, but how long ago had that been? Hundreds of years ago? Even a thousand? How useful were the lessons woven within the roots after all this time? Some were valuable, especially those that gave her the history of the Svanth Forest, but the lessons about the keepers? Eris didn’t know what to make of those stories, especially since the keepers were essentially no more.

  Even if she were to find another, what made her think they would help against the magi? The keepers knew what the magi intended but chose to hide rather than oppose them.

  Was Lira that much different?

  But what could Eris do? She couldn’t go to the border with Saffra and face the Conclave on her own. The first time she’d had the might of the Svanth with her, but she’d been lucky. Luck wouldn’t hold again.

  She had no choice but to learn. It was why she’d come, after all. Compared to how Lira managed what she had within the garden, the way she arranged the flowers to increase the potential and power, Eris was little more than a novice. Worse, she recognized the effect of what Lira did but had no idea how she managed what she did.

  Even here, surrounded by family, Eris felt isolated. It almost made her want to retreat back to the Svanth again, trace the roots until she found answers.

  “Thank you for coming with me, Terran,” she said.

  He smiled and touched her arm. For a moment, it was like they were back within the forest, only the two of them.

  Then he laughed and smiled. “As long as you don’t torment me like you did with Prince Jacen, I’ll say you’re welcome.”

  “I’m going to have to tell my father.”

  The color drained from his face.

  Eris laughed. “About who I am. What I am. He should know.”

  And her sisters, though Eris didn’t know how she’d bring that up to them. Especially Jasi. After all the time Jasi had spent teasing her about her failings at Lira’s lessons, Eris should want to show her sister what had become of her. That she wasn’t a failure. But Eris didn’t feel a particular need to throw that at Jasi. Jasi had been through enough. Maybe then Eris wouldn’t feel so alone.

  “Let me know when you do. I think I’ll need to be anywhere else.”

  Eris smiled, swallowing back the uncertainty growing within her. As soon as she told her family, everything would be different, fully and finally. She should be happy about it—how long had she wanted to do and be anything other than what she’d been while living in Eliara?—but the anxious feeling wouldn’t leave her.

  Terran watched her, as if knowing her thoughts. He said nothing, instead pulling her toward him and wrapping his arms around her. She stiffened at first before finally relaxing and letting him hold her.

  Chapter 35

  The halls of the palace were different. More than simply the seasonal change in the tapestries hanging on the walls; at least those had a certain air of familiarity about them. Perhaps the air tasted different, the flowers blooming within the garden now focusing on her mother. Or maybe the faces of the servants had changed. Or even the simple fact that Eris’ prolonged absence made everything new again. She found herself pausing at each sconce and tapestry, looking at each closed door with a frown, wondering why she felt as she did.

  It wasn’t until she turned toward the hall leading to her room that she recognized what seemed different. The palace was no longer home to her.

  She stopped at her door and nearly knocked before grabbing the handle. She swallowed as she pushed it open, more uncertain about this than the decision to return to the city.

  A lantern burned in the room.

  Eris nearly stepped back. Months living with the awareness the forest granted left her feeling exposed without it.

  “Jacen said you’d returned.”

  Eris froze in place. “Jasi,” she whispered.

  She pushed the door open all the way and stepped into the room. It was nearly as she’d left it. A massive cabinet lined one wall. How many dresses did she have inside? Certainly more than she needed. A copper basin tucked against the opposite wall. Two plush chairs faced each other, angled toward a door along the far wall. Behind the door would be her wide bed, topped by the canopy that now seemed like so much unnecessary pomp. No flowers or other plants. That would have to change if she were to remain in Eliara.

  Jasi rose from one of the chairs. “Where have you been?”

  It wasn’t so much a question as an accusation, and one filled with hurt.

  “Lira didn’t tell you where I’ve been?” she asked.

  Jasi frowned and shook her head. “Lira hasn’t said anything to me. Only to Mother. And now she’s too sick to say anything.” She leaned on the arms of the chair. “You left me and didn’t even bother to find out what happened.”

  Eris turned to her cabinet and pulled it open—changing into a fresh dress might feel better, especially after traveling all day—but all she saw were clothes that no longer felt like her. And more than a change of dress, first she needed a bath. After washing in the cold Svanth streams, hot water and scented salts would be a welcome change.

  She sighed and pushed the cabinet closed. “I ensured you survived. I was the one who risked death.”

  Jasi made a choking sound. “Survived? I made it back to the Kingsroad and came across soldiers. Had it not been for Lira finding me—”

  Eris frowned at her, cutting her off. “What? You wouldn’t have managed to convince them you were the princess? I find that hard to believe. The first thing you do with me is remind me how you are firstborn.”

  Jasi pursed her lips in a familiar expression that was strangely comforting. Eris hesitated, the question she’d wondered about since she was first abducted resurfacing.

  “What happened with Jacen? Lira said you came across him?”

  Jasi’s face softened. “Jacen? You were with him, weren’t you?”

  Eris nodded.

  “Then you know how he was taken—”

  “We both were, Jasi.”

  She blinked and nodded once. “You both were taken. Only they brought you to the forest, tied to a horse, otherwise unharmed.”

  “What did they do to Jacen?”

  Jasi shook her head. “He won’t speak of it. When I found him, he was a bloodied mess. His face purple and swollen, like some grotesque darthshade. His nose was broken, and he couldn’t walk…” She swallowed, as if imagining what Jacen had endured.

  “I didn’t know.” Jacen had mentioned the stabbing but none of the rest. Eris imagined he tried to keep the horror of what he’d gone through from her, but Jasi had witnessed it firsthand.

  Jasi sniffed. “Of course you didn’t. Father’s men saved him. Said they found him near the Varden border. Had they not been sent on patrol, there’s no telling what might have happened to him.” She took a deep breath. “He’s been different since he came back, Eris. Focused. Driven.”

  Eris thought of the Jacen she’d once known. Happy and carefree, flirtatious with highborn and common girls alike. When she’d seen him near the palace, she almost hadn’t recognized him. Mostly his eyes. They held age and anguish that had never been there before, but she saw other things that worried her. The anger he carried worried her most.

  “So tell me, Eris, where have you been? Mother says you’ve been away on business for Lira, but I know how far you progressed in your lessons. Lira wouldn’t trust you with some task and not tell me. But I can’t understand why Mother would protect you. Now she’s too weak to do a
nything. And with what Father is working against…”

  “What happened with Petra?”

  She still didn’t know how Jasi felt about her failed betrothal.

  Or weren’t they married? They had gone through the ceremony before Errasn and the Sacred Mother, weren’t they married now?

  Jasi’s face darkened. “Petra. If I ever see him again—”

  “You think he knew what the Conclave had planned?” Unlike Jacen, Eris suspected Jasi knew more about Petra.

  “How could he not? Shortly after the Conclave abducted us, Saffra attacked on the southern border.”

  Eris frowned. Jasi knew the truth of the attack, of how Petra betrayed her. As least she didn’t have to keep that knowledge from Jasi. But after defeating the magi near the Svanth, the Conclave would not have wanted to push forward again so quickly, would they?

  “You haven’t answered me, Eris. Where did you go? Desia thinks you ran off with some boy. She said she saw you with one of the gardeners before you left, and after you’d gone, he disappeared as well. I told her you wouldn’t do something so foolish as that.”

  “I did run off with one of the gardeners. His name is Terran, and he came back with me.” Eris said it more out of spite than anything else, expecting Jasi’s response after the way Jacen had responded.

  Jasi’s face flushed a deep red. “You what? Is that why you’ve returned? You think to get father’s permission to wed a gardener?”

  Eris sighed. She’d had enough of hiding who she was. It was time Jasi took her seriously as more than her sister. She grabbed Jasi’s arm and pulled her from her room. Jasi fought for a moment, but the months working within the forest had given Eris a different kind of strength, and she managed to drag Jasi down the hall. As they proceeded, Eris summoned more strength from the arrangements staggered about the hall, barely registering how the petals curled slightly as she passed.

  It wasn’t until they stopped at the wide, sweeping steps leading out of the palace and into the garden that Jasi managed to jerk herself free. “What do you think you’re doing?”

  “Just come with me.”

  Jasi shook her head. “I think you need to go see Father. Beg him to take you back in. You might still be able to wed some quiet northern lord and help…”

  Eris didn’t wait for her to finish. She grabbed Jasi again by the sleeve and pulled her down the steps.

  Jasi followed, sputtering all the way.

  When they reached the garden, Eris dragged her down the main path through wide flowerbeds, noting Jasi’s perisal briefly. One of the gardeners saw her storming through the garden and turned away, eyes going wide. He scurried off, likely to find Master Nels.

  “Eris!”

  Now that they were in the garden, Jasi finally managed to find her voice. Eris let go of her arm as they neared the start of the shade flowers underneath the wall.

  “What are you doing?”

  “You want to know where I’ve been the last few months. I’m going to show you.”

  “Show me? I don’t understand!”

  “I can see that. Now watch.”

  Eris slipped off her soft slippers, the same ones she’d been wearing when they’d been abducted, the only shoes she had during her time in the forest. They had served her well, keeping her feet covered but easily coming off so she could more easily connect with the earth. Jasi gasped softly as she did, almost as horrified that Eris would remove her shoes as she’d been when Eris said she’d run off with Terran.

  Eris ignored her. Sinking her feet into the earth, she delved into the roots.

  Life sprang up around her. Eris traced the deep roots—those of the elms at the center of the forest—the most easily. From there, she connected with fainter lines, those of twisting grasses growing throughout the garden between the paths and the beds. These touched on everything else, merging with every other flower in the garden, twisting and twirling together in a way that connected her to everything else around her.

  With a command, Eris instructed the flowers to turn toward her.

  Were she in sunlight, she might have had more hesitation about whether the flowers would listen and respond, but she had chosen shade flowers intentionally. Her flower—the teary star—was a shade flower, like so many others within the forest. She had a greater connection to them, rivaling only that which she shared with the trees. And flowers responded so differently than the trees. With the flowers, she could demand they obey.

  The flowers all looked toward her, waiting.

  Jasi gasped again. “Did you see that?”

  With a ripple of energy, Eris pulled on the wind, sending a gust fluttering around Jasi’s dress. The last time she’d asked that of the flowers was when she’d confronted the magi. Like then, the wind responded, spilling over with her borrowed energy, swirling as she directed. Were she to demand, the wind would spiral with more force. That was how she’d managed to defeat the magi.

  “Eris…”

  She turned to her sister and met her eyes.

  “I think a storm is coming.”

  Eris looked to the crystal blue sky. No storm brewed on the horizon. “This is what I have been doing. I told you Lira was a flower mage. In that, I was wrong. She is a keeper of flowers, a woman who commands great energies from them.”

  Eris let the wind die, not wanting to borrow too much from the energy of the garden. Connected as she was, she felt the way Lira drew it toward her mother, the way it spiraled inward, slowly building, the focus holding the illness at bay. If that energy were to disappear…Eris didn’t know what would happen to her mother, but she could guess.

  She did not release the flowers. They still turned toward her. This took very little energy, and she wondered if they would do it even if she didn’t command them. Hadn’t Terran said something about how the flowers turned toward her being a sign that she was a keeper?

  “She made you a flower mage?” Jasi seemed more offended than surprised.

  “Made me?” Eris shook her head. “You understand little of it—”

  “Little? I’ve been Lira’s student longer than you! And while you’ve been gone, she continues our lessons. I can work messages into the flowers and can read those she’s written.”

  Those were lessons Eris tried learning from reading the roots within the forest. The first keeper had written instructions for her there, a way to read the messages keepers wrote in the flowers. The lessons weren’t detailed—Eris had the impression the first keeper didn’t know as much about flowers as what Eris had seen from Lira—but enough to grasp the basics.

  “That is but a part of it. A small part, and one that truly means little.” Eris could see the utility in hiding messages others couldn’t read, but how often would she need to be able to do so? And who would she communicate with? Lira? Her sisters? They were all here with her.

  Jasi was shaking her head. “That’s not what Lira says. She tells me the writing of words is difficult. That few can manage to master the art. I have a talent.” The last carried with it the same pride Jasi always managed when speaking about her lessons.

  “You asked why I had been gone from the palace. I wanted to show you…” Show her what? Demonstrate that Jasi would never be a keeper? Doing so would only anger her more. Eris sighed. “I wanted you to know what I am.” Eris met Jasi’s deep blue gaze and forced away the thought that Jasi was so much more like their mother than Eris would ever be. Thoughts like that were dangerous, even now that she didn’t—shouldn’t—care. “Mother knows. That’s why she never questioned Lira when I didn’t return. I think Father even begins to understand, though not in the same way as Mother. I think Mother was Lira’s first student.”

  She hadn’t considered that before, but after saying it, the idea made sense, at least more sense than the alternatives. Why wouldn’t Lira teach their mother? Having the queen understand the value of the keepers would provide protection. Enough to keep the magi influence lessened as they sought to gain power in Errasn.

&nbs
p; “But why you?” Jasi asked.

  “Lira didn’t choose me, if that’s why you ask. This is something I was born into.”

  “We are born the same!”

  Eris pulled her feet out of the dirt and slipped her shoes back on. She touched Jasi’s golden hair and pointed to her own black curls. “Are we? You don’t see the differences the Sacred Mother gives us? Am I so similar to you that you mistake me as a reflection?”

  “No…but—”

  “Then why should we not have different abilities? I will never have your gift of duty, of simply knowing and accepting what must be done for Errasn. That, I think, was why I fought against my place for so long. Now I know what I am to do. I am a keeper.”

  Jasi’s face changed, the outrage turning into uncertainty. “And Mother knows this?”

  Eris nodded.

  Jasi’s jaw clenched briefly as she looked around the garden, her gaze touching on the shade flowers and her mouth twisting disdainfully. Her back straightened as she turned back to look at Eris, face becoming more regal. It was an expression Eris would never obtain.

  “Then can you help her?”

  Eris blinked, surprised at the sudden turn. “I…” She hesitated, uncertain how to answer her sister. “I am still learning. My ability is different from Lira’s. She uses flowers and this garden. My garden is different—the Svanth Forest—but I’m too far from it to use it to help her.”

  Jasi nodded, as if she understood. “If there’s anything you can do, promise me, Eris, that you’ll help her. I don’t know what will happen to Father when she’s gone. Already he is different than he was before she became ill. Less confident, always deferring to Tholen, where he commanded him before. Now that Jacen has more experience, he’s been leading the armies.”

  Eris looked toward the tall elms marking the center of the garden and sighed. “I’ll do what I can.” Truly, she had no idea if she could even do anything to help, and anything she did manage would only delay her attacking the magi.

  Jasi nodded again, as if something had been decided.