Chapter 21

The next fewhours passed in a blur. There was much to do, but there were many hands to do it. Shari napped on Arthur's couch, under Cody's supervision from the rocking chair across the living room, the crackling fire lulling her quickly to sleep. Codrin took Daphne in his truck to RescueLove to collect milk from the goats, and Arthur drove Flora and me back to Flora's house to retrieve the moonflower vine and any cleansed crystals.

Then it was a race back to Cedar Haven. Flora and I examined the moonflowers, selecting the three deemed most viable, and I sat down with the vine in my lap to accelerate its growth very, very carefully. And cautiously. I was no longer restricted by the parasite ring, and I didn't want to send up a magical signal flare by tapping into my full potential. Though, the fate of the town and its people were riding on this, so I had to take the risk and hope for the best. If I proceeded very carefully and used a slow but steady output, much like as if I was layering a spell, I should be able to go unnoticed to any scrying for me.

Flora removed the two remaining moonflowers and made another goat milk infusion, handing it off to Daphne to sprinkle literally everywhere. It would start the cleansing and healing process on the outer fringes of the blight where it was weakest. Shari woke and wanted to help, using a sprig of white sage to flick the droplets all over Arthur's beehive, making sure to coat every inch and every bee.

As they worked, Codrin drove the four of us back to his ranch and as close to the glen as the truck could manage. My concentration remained solely on the moonflower vine, the pollinated pods swelling as they created kernel-sized seeds. Like he had with the bees, Arthur gripped my arm and guided me through the short walk through the woods to the glen, murmuring encouragement or warnings about approaching obstacles.

Codrin had brought rakes, and he and Arthur set to clearing away the debris from the heart tree, careful not to touch the red tendrils of the infection. Moonflowers didn't like competition, and we were determined to give them their best chance. Taking a stick, Flora traced an intricate dara knot design in the soil, mimicking the same pattern as that of the pendants embedded in the tree.

"The seeds are mature," I announced breathlessly, finally snapping out of my trance. "Ready?"

"We'll have to move fast," Flora answered. "Arthur, c'mere. See these holes I made? When I say ‘go,' drop one of these crystals in each hole, okay? Just the little ones. Understand?" She poured out a sack into his cupped palms, the marble-sized crystals now no bigger than peas by comparison.

"I can help," Codrin offered.

"You've done enough," Flora snapped. "Besides, you might be sick yourself and I'm not having you contaminate this. If there's leftover milk infusion after the Cedar Haven treatment, you can have it. In the meantime…" She waved him back with a flap of her hands.

"It's time," I prompted, having encouraged the kernels to sprout in my hands. Their two-leaf stems hunched in the cold air, already protesting their new environment.

"Arthur… go!" Flora cried.

With superhuman speed, Arthur raced around the dara knot, dropping crystals into the shallow holes. Quartz, hematite, amethyst, tiger's-eye, they all sparkled with light before the diseased earth swallowed them. But they got to work instantly, providing a small pocket of cleansed earth for the moonflower spout to grow in. I followed as quick as I could, quickly and gently nesting a kernel in each depression, Flora moving up right behind me to fuel them with her green magic.

When the last sprout was placed, I faced the heart tree and lent my green magic to the nearby seedlings. My power infused them, allowed them to overcome their less-than-ideal environment, and guided them to grow along the pattern Flora had traced on the ground. Roots along the growing vines wormed into the ground, elongated buds formed, and white flowers began to bloom. When my half of the dara knot interwove with Flora's, the exhausted gnome panted out, "You got this?"

I only nodded, concentrating on my work. Taking over the growth of her half, I continued to interweave the vines as the flowers bloomed, layering and layering upon the dara knot. From the corner of my eye, I watched Flora scurry around the perimeter, placing the larger crystals at regular intervals. They would bolster the vines and store energy for the flowers to use whenever the new moon occurred.

When she was done, I saw her stagger. Arthur was quick to scoop her up.

Though the flowers and vines were fully mature and thriving, I didn't stop. I poured the rest of what was stored in my healed core into the ground, burning out the infection and granting those roots access to fertile soil.

My core drained, I staggered too. Arthur was quick to catch me, just as he had Flora, holding me against him with one arm around my waist. On the other side of his chest, Flora winked at me from where she rested in the crook of his elbow, her head pillowed against the swell of his flannel-clad pectoral. "Nice, right?" she whispered.

Arthur cleared his throat, his shifter ears hearing everything.

"Is it… done?" Codrin asked hopefully, stepping forward to join us.

"Let's take a looky-loo," Flora said, indicating she wanted put down by tapping Arthur's chest.

The lumberjack complied, though his other arm remained firmly around my waist.

"You're much stronger than I thought you were," he murmured to me as Flora and Codrin approached the moonflowers.

Swallowing, I risked an upwards glance and found his bearded jaw clenched. In fact, his whole body was tense, thrumming with apprehension, and amber flashed in his eyes.

"Promise me you'll be careful," he demanded. "Power always attracts… attention."

The force of his words elicited a quick, "I promise!" and before I could question if that was the very reason why he had come to Redbud, to escape such attention, Flora was calling us over. While Arthur's arm released my waist, his hand found mine, and I didn't protest. In fact, my fingers interlaced with his, relishing the touch and the relief that this ordeal was over.

Gathered in a loose semi-circle, the four of us examined the black tree in the middle of the glen. The red heart inside the trunk was still glowing, but the tree was no longer encircled by tendrils of red shadow, nor were there any red tendrils digging into the earth at its base. Even the air had warmed, our breath no longer turning to frosty clouds.

"I'd say that it's at least working," Flora said. I definitely agreed, though the garden gnome was the moonflower expert. "It might take some time for the whole of the infection to clear out, but—" Flora scuffed away at the dirt with her boot. It came back loamy and dark brown, not slimy and black. The moonflower dara knot wasn't just containing the poisonous half-heart, it was burned through the blight infesting the forest. "It already looks promising."

"Flora, I— What you did—" the rancher rambled. "And you, too, Misty Fields. That was… incredible."

"Don't mention it," I said, meaning every word.

"I don't know how I can ever repay you two."

"Don't you worry, because I certainly do. Those moonflowers cost a fortune, and I've got the bill right here." Flora pulled out the folded paper from her pocket and flicked it open with a predatory grin. "Let's chat."

* * *

The garden gnomewas an aggressive negotiator, but since Codrin Alder got to keep his life—ha-cha for extra moonflower-milk infusion—his livelihood, and his reputation, for we'd all agreed it was better not to tell Ms. Charlotte Harris and her Talk of the Town about how close Redbud had come to disease and destruction, the rancher agreed to all her terms.

In addition to repaying her the cost of the moonflowers, he granted her and all her associates, namely me, unfettered rights and access to the moonflowers in the glen. He'd cover the costs to whatever damages had happened to Cedar Haven, as well as supply us all with the meat of one cow. Each. The Crafting Circle ladies all agreed they'd split one, but I accepted the entire offer. The hobs would be thrilled, as would Sawyer. Cody wanted clarification that both he and Arthur would be getting separate cows because "the boy already eats me out of house and home." While it may have been desperation and maybe a little greed that had caused Codrin Alder to make a deal with Jakob Tabrass's master, he hadn't been a frivolous fellow.

"What a day, eh?" Flora said, planting her hands on her hips. "You, cider witch, were pretty amazing."

I winked. "You weren't too bad yourself."

"Feh, turns out all my magic could fit in your pinky finger. If you weren't wearing that ring all the time."

She wasn't wrong. My smile faded as I looked down at the parasite ring on my finger. I'd been free, for a little while, and I hadn't realized how much I'd missed having access to the whole of me. Hopefully I would be free of these fetters once and for all very soon.

"How's Shari?" I asked Daphne quietly. The quiet crafter was in her own little world, sitting in the Thunderbird with her hood up and listening to her latest audiobook.

Sucking her bottom lip between her teeth, Daphne thumped her shillelagh against the packed earth of the parking lot as if it would jostle loose a reply from her lips. After a moment, she answered, "She'll be okay. She will. But…" She shook her head.

"Who's up for Patty's?" Flora asked, trying to lighten the mood. "I'm certainly not going to cook, much less go to work, after this. Jumping hop-toads, might take off the entire week after this ordeal."

"I want grilled cheese with tomato bisque," Shari called from the car.

The two women looked expectantly at me. "I, uh…" The grimoire, my duty, was calling me. This little side quest was done, and I had to go.

Daphne's face fell, but Flora knew what I was about. "It's okay," the garden gnome said quickly. "We'll call in an order to pick up on the way back to my house. Your car's still there. And… you have my number now, yeah? Call anytime. If you need it."

I gave her a grateful smile. "I will."

When we turned to say our goodbyes to the Cedar Haven men, Arthur only had eyes for me. There was something off in his expression, then he lifted his cell phone to show me the screen. "This arrived this morning, but I ignored it until now. Misty, what is this?"

I squinted, reading, I want to rip that flannel shirt off your chest, hear the buttons spraying over my bedroom floor. You're something wild, something I shouldn't want, and yet I can't stop thinking about—

"Thistle thorns!" When I'd fumbled my cell phone into my pocket after Shari had startled me, I must've somehow sent that message. The poor reception at Flora's house had delayed its send—couldn't the cell phone spirits have delayed sending it until after I was already home?

"I-I didn't mean to send you that," I whispered.

"Didn't mean t—" His expression hardened. "Misty." My name on his tongue was no longer like a caress, but a stern reprimand.

"I was in the middle of panic attack, maybe even dying"—I'd yet to even come to grips with how narrowly I'd missed becoming a mindless raging forest spirit—"and writing to you, the imaginary you, helped calm me down."

"But these are real feelings," he said firmly. "You wouldn't have written them otherwise. Why can't we—"

"Because we can't!"

I was panting now, as if I'd run a race, tears pricking at the backs of my eyes. But I wouldn't cry. This was the fate I'd chosen. No attachments, no matter what that invisible tether between us said.

"Daph and I will, uh, see you in the car," Flora said lowly.

"I don't get you, Misty Fields." Arthur threw up his hands. "At the rodeo, you clung to me like I was a life raft, so obviously you know you're safe with me, that I care for you. Then you make me my favorite focaccia bread. You almost kissed me at the Lumberjack Trials! You initiated that, not me! We were holding hands less than thirty minutes ago. And now this text. Are you just stringing me along? Am I just some part-time flirtation?"

"I can't," I whispered. My hands gripped my elbows, hugging myself against his tirade. They may as well have been crossed spears in front of a doorway, baring his entrance.

His opened his mouth to protest, to demand a better reason, then tore a hand through his brown hair. "Fine."

He shoved his phone into his pocket and when his hand reemerged, there was a Celtic knot pendant strung on a silver chain gripped in his fist. The pendant was spinning, so I couldn't make out its design, but it reminded me vaguely of a shield.

Arthur pulled the chain over his neck and let the pendant rest in the cleft of his chest. I didn't sense anything, but something clearly shifted inside him. With one last defiant look, he shook his head and walked away up the path to his cottage.