and allowed my affinity its release, happy to have escaped Lady Penwyth’s plans for me to spend another afternoon with her daughter. I drifted my hand over weedy stalks of vervain, smiling as I remembered that wise women use it as a witch’s repellant.
The vervain hummed in pleasure. It told me when it first sprouted in this soil, and how long its seeds had been dropping . . . many human lifetimes.
Unwillingly my hand was pulled toward the pitted rock half-hidden by ferns and bittersweet stems--the giant’s wedding ring. The squat stone with its hollowed middle was easily the most complicated thing I had ever read, brimming with all four elements. As my center flew toward it, I felt water and fire clash in a smoky flambeau while stone battled the air that would erode it.
I also felt the remnants of its maker’s ambition clinging to its grains. Despite its age, it was still a powerful object.
I wrenched my hand away. As I was wiping it on the grass to dispel the tingle, I was startled by birds’ wings snapping close overhead. I narrowed my eyes against the sun to see what sort of bird threw such a large shadow.
And out of the corner of my eye I saw Roger Penwyth.
He was sitting under a mature chestnut tree on a moss-veined rock. His tragic features with their fine-boned edge reminded me of a hunted stag, destroyed wildness, compelling in its fatal fall.
“How long have you been there?” I asked, scrambling to my feet. It wasn’t often that someone could take me unaware.
“Some little while now,” he said.
“Is there something you wish of me?”
“No.”
Roger leaned against the bole of the tree, watching me sleepily through gold lashes. His dress was yet again in a state of decay. A gaping hole rent the elbow of his coat; his waistcoat, richly embroidered in a web of red vines, was ill-buttoned; and his stock had come undone, exposing his throat.
I looked away from his unbound neck to a sweat-stained tricorn lying at the entrance of the wrought iron gate.
I made my way to the orphaned hat and picked it up. Roger murmured his thanks as I brought it to him, nodding down to the leather bag at his feet to indicate where I should put it. A pulse thrummed in the purple smudges bruising the base of his preternatural eyes. Briefly I wondered if he had been up all night, perhaps visiting his mistress, Tamzin Fulby.
Turning toward a hopelessly lethal snarl of dead raspberry vines strangling browned roses, I hoped that he believed me to be gardening innocuously.
“You need not stay,” I told him as I pushed the vines back. “I am quite happy to be alone.”
“But I am not.”
My head whipped around. He shifted uncomfortably, eyes lowered as if he were only now hearing his words and piecing together how they must sound. It was proof that he was more socially inept than even I was, making his rudeness a little more forgivable, but an insistent call from within the raspberry vines distracted me before I had a chance to voice my annoyance.
Here I am.
Without stopping to think, I eagerly pushed back a ruin of thorns and curled leaves.
My breath caught. I had revealed a lavender-colored rose.
“Bring me that, if you please,” came Roger’s curt command.
“I’m not sure I should.” The rose’s deep scent crept into my senses until I felt slightly giddy. I had always loved roses.
“There will be more, if you cut it correctly.”
A laugh was born in my throat over the notion that the dour Roger Penwyth should teach an earth-affinitied witch about growing roses, but it died when I saw that he had sprawled atop the stone in bone-deep exhaustion. His whipcord legs, burdened with silver spurs, were flung out at an angle. A shaking fist pinned a sketchpad to his knee.
“Are you quite well?” I asked. “You do not perhaps have a fever?”
“No fever. I am a trifle . . . done in. I’ve been walking the towans since . . . last night I think.”
It was afternoon now.
“I’ve had some news,” he
The vervain hummed in pleasure. It told me when it first sprouted in this soil, and how long its seeds had been dropping . . . many human lifetimes.
Unwillingly my hand was pulled toward the pitted rock half-hidden by ferns and bittersweet stems--the giant’s wedding ring. The squat stone with its hollowed middle was easily the most complicated thing I had ever read, brimming with all four elements. As my center flew toward it, I felt water and fire clash in a smoky flambeau while stone battled the air that would erode it.
I also felt the remnants of its maker’s ambition clinging to its grains. Despite its age, it was still a powerful object.
I wrenched my hand away. As I was wiping it on the grass to dispel the tingle, I was startled by birds’ wings snapping close overhead. I narrowed my eyes against the sun to see what sort of bird threw such a large shadow.
And out of the corner of my eye I saw Roger Penwyth.
He was sitting under a mature chestnut tree on a moss-veined rock. His tragic features with their fine-boned edge reminded me of a hunted stag, destroyed wildness, compelling in its fatal fall.
“How long have you been there?” I asked, scrambling to my feet. It wasn’t often that someone could take me unaware.
“Some little while now,” he said.
“Is there something you wish of me?”
“No.”
Roger leaned against the bole of the tree, watching me sleepily through gold lashes. His dress was yet again in a state of decay. A gaping hole rent the elbow of his coat; his waistcoat, richly embroidered in a web of red vines, was ill-buttoned; and his stock had come undone, exposing his throat.
I looked away from his unbound neck to a sweat-stained tricorn lying at the entrance of the wrought iron gate.
I made my way to the orphaned hat and picked it up. Roger murmured his thanks as I brought it to him, nodding down to the leather bag at his feet to indicate where I should put it. A pulse thrummed in the purple smudges bruising the base of his preternatural eyes. Briefly I wondered if he had been up all night, perhaps visiting his mistress, Tamzin Fulby.
Turning toward a hopelessly lethal snarl of dead raspberry vines strangling browned roses, I hoped that he believed me to be gardening innocuously.
“You need not stay,” I told him as I pushed the vines back. “I am quite happy to be alone.”
“But I am not.”
My head whipped around. He shifted uncomfortably, eyes lowered as if he were only now hearing his words and piecing together how they must sound. It was proof that he was more socially inept than even I was, making his rudeness a little more forgivable, but an insistent call from within the raspberry vines distracted me before I had a chance to voice my annoyance.
Here I am.
Without stopping to think, I eagerly pushed back a ruin of thorns and curled leaves.
My breath caught. I had revealed a lavender-colored rose.
“Bring me that, if you please,” came Roger’s curt command.
“I’m not sure I should.” The rose’s deep scent crept into my senses until I felt slightly giddy. I had always loved roses.
“There will be more, if you cut it correctly.”
A laugh was born in my throat over the notion that the dour Roger Penwyth should teach an earth-affinitied witch about growing roses, but it died when I saw that he had sprawled atop the stone in bone-deep exhaustion. His whipcord legs, burdened with silver spurs, were flung out at an angle. A shaking fist pinned a sketchpad to his knee.
“Are you quite well?” I asked. “You do not perhaps have a fever?”
“No fever. I am a trifle . . . done in. I’ve been walking the towans since . . . last night I think.”
It was afternoon now.
“I’ve had some news,” he
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