Page 70 of When the Woods Go Silent

Still, I hesitate at the door. Ruby isn’t home, and I don’t want to leave Rose alone here, not with a gobbelin and a dreamwalker loose. Not to mention Ronan. If he’s still in Clearwater, he might have sensed the burst of magic and come back to investigate. And it’s against our new laws to bring humans to Haret without their consent, so I can’t bring her with me. Rose has to stay here.

But... I can protect her from some of these things, at least for the night. Opening up the source to my earth magic in my chest, in the place that humans call a soul, I imagine the night-blooming lunador flowers of Aralia’s forests that can be used tocause deep, dreamless sleep. If she isn’t dreaming, she won’t be dreamwalking.

The petals of the opalescent flower form in my palm as the magic seeps from my skin, time speeding up for the blossom as it grows ripe and unfurls to reveal its cluster of midnight blue seeds. I pluck them from the flower’s center and set the large, waxy bloom onto Rose’s nightstand, where it pulses with the magic of creation.

I wonder what it would feel like to show Rose my magic - I’ve never let a human see what I can do, and part of me aches to see the wonder in her green and brown eyes. Then again, maybe she would look at me with terror, scrambling to get away like she did earlier.

With the heel of my hand, I crush the glossy lunador seeds on her table until the shells crack open and silvery powder coats the table. I brush the powder carefully into a glass of water she has nearby, watching as the sleeping powder dissolves. Gently, I slip my hand under Rose’s neck and lift her head, tipping the cup to her lips.

It will only take a few drops.

As the potion soaks her full lips, her breathing deepens and calms even more. She’ll be safe from the dreamwalker now, and hopefully the gobbelin has moved on to easier prey. I dump the rest of the water down her sink and rinse the glass, pausing again to watch her from the doorway.

The pearly white lunador waits on her nightstand, and I know I should destroy it. But for some reason, I decide to leave it there, as though a piece of me will still be here to watch over her while I’m gone. Even if her mind tries to forget tonight, I don’t want her to forget me.

And even if the petals in my pocket don’t prove that Rose is a changeling with magic of her own, I’m filled with hope that maybe she’ll be able to lead me to the answer I’ve been hunting.

It’s the memory of my brothers’ promise that cements my decision. Just one year, they had vowed. One year serving the crown. Three long years of service have passed, war is on our doorstep, and I can’t ignore even the slimmest possibility that Rose could be the key we’ve all been waiting for.

If there’s any chance at all that she’s the lost fae changeling, then she would have magic strong enough to stabilize the fae kingdom and rid us of the gobbelin threats forever. I have to take the chance.

She sleeps like an innocent now, all creamy skin and fiery hair spread across her pillow. There’s no trace of worry or fear on her face. When she wakes, will she be curious about the magic that could change both of our worlds forever?

Or will she drive herself mad trying to explain away what she saw tonight?

Praying to the Goddess that I can make it back here before she opens her eyes again, I close her curtains tightly and spread an invisibility glamor over her sleeping form. It won’t hold long once I’m gone, but I’ll return soon.

The bookshop’s locks and silly alarms wouldn’t hold against a gobbelin, but the glamor might keep her safe long enough for me to unravel a few more of Clearwater’s secrets.

THE WOODS

The building of books glows softly with the raindrop sheen of fresh magic, and the air is scented with flower petals that we did not grow.

The man slips away, racing faster than we can follow, and so we turn our vines to the girl again.

Stretching and growing, winding through gaps and cracks in the old building, we reach our thinnest fingers into the rooms. Seeking. Tasting. Across bones of ourselves, flattened and wornsmooth with human feet and human hands. Up and over, up and over, until we find the room where the girl sleeps.

The suction feet of our young vines crawl across the remains of our ancestors and find her, tapping against her warm skin to taste for the magic that should swirl in the heat of her blood.

The taste isn’t quite right, though. The magic is there, but not here. An echo across a valley. A ripple in a pond. A feather floating to the ground, long after the bird has flown away. What magic happened here is gone, or perhaps hidden by something stronger than us.

Our vines coil next to her, braiding into her ringlets of bright red and curling like armor across her wrists. Magic or not, the girl tastes of shadows and hidden things. Of dormant buds beneath the frozen ground, waiting for spring to coax them alive.

She tastes of a future we would like to share, and of secrets that we are only just now remembering.

And so she sleeps, while we dream.

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