Page 12 of Legacy of Roses

Rosalie grinned back, apparently unoffended now that her earlier irritation had passed.

“It’s all that extra energy I need to have to make up for you. Imagine if we both did nothing but nap all day!”

“I don’t nap all day!” Daphne protested, but she was smiling.

For the second time, Dimitri fell into step on the other side of Rosalie, this time heading back toward his home instead of away. The lightness of Glandore buoyed his steps, but it was more than that. There was a warmness in his core that came from the company. Walking beside Rosalie and Daphne—feeling the familiarity of it—made him feel as if he had friends. As if he wasn’t alone after all.

He hadn’t realized how much his solitary journey had weighed him down—a sensation that had only grown when he found the manor abandoned. But now here he was, on only his second day, and he wasn’t walking home alone.

He allowed himself to imagine for a moment that they were truly coming back with him. That the three of them would walk into the manor house together and sit down to the midday meal, laughing around the table and exchanging stories. He could show them the library and the books he’d found, and they could tell him which ones to read next. Perhaps Rosalie would?—

He cut off his thoughts. He would be walking into a cold, lifeless manor alone, and such imaginings would only make the reality harder. He was greedy for more of Rosalie—he wanted to know her story and what fueled the fire inside her—but she wanted him to leave—to move to the capital or anywhere that wasn’t near her.

Rosalie and Daphne stopped abruptly, simultaneous gasps dropping from both their lips. Instead of following their gazes, he watched them, amused by their reactions. He had been equally astonished when he had stepped out of the manor that morning and seen the changes that had appeared overnight. He still didn’t understand what it had to do with his birthright, but there was no denying the startling transformation. On hisfirst day, the garden had gone from overgrown and derelict to lush and glowing. But now it looked sculpted, as if it had been growing for years under the loving care of a team of gardeners. And as well as blooming flowers, the trees now bore ripe fruit, despite how little that made sense. It was easy to see why Glandore was the agricultural heart of six kingdoms.

“I’ve heard stories of how the manor used to look before I was born,” Rosalie said, “but it wasn’t anything like this! Look at that fruit!” She stared open-mouthed.

Daphne turned to Dimitri. “Here’s your proof.”

“Maybe,” Rosalie said slowly, drawing out the word. She glanced toward her friend. “It’s not just because he’s a young man—any young man?”

Daphne shook her head firmly. “Yesterday might have been. But this?” She made a sweeping gesture toward the grounds. “In one day? I’ve only ever seen the Legacy use so much power once before.”

She gave Rosalie a significant look, and Rosalie’s mouth tightened, the same mixture of sadness and anger filling her eyes that he had seen before. What had the Legacy done to her?

“I’m not sure I follow,” he said, wanting to distract her. “How does this admittedly impressive and bizarre garden prove my bloodline?”

“I thought you said you read all about Glandore’s history and Legacy last night?” Rosalie exclaimed. “Surely you can’t have missed the part about the poor prince who ended up alone in a castle? It’s the center of the story! And all the descriptions I’ve read make his garden sound just like this.”

Dimitri frowned. Perhaps he shouldn’t have skipped the long descriptions of the gardens. He did remember the castle, though.

“This isn’t a castle,” he said. “It’s a manor house. And the young man in question may have been a prince, but wasn’t he also a Beast at that stage?”

Rosalie waved her arms impatiently, as if brushing aside all his objections.

“Of course it’s not going to fitexactly. If the Legacy was guaranteed to follow the original story exactly, we wouldn’t have a problem. Not only would it be easy to avoid, but we’d at least be guaranteed a happy ending after all those troubles!”

Dimitri looked from Rosalie to Daphne. “Are we not? All the stories I read seemed to work out all right—more or less.”

“That’s because you were reading the original histories,” Rosalie said. “You can’t have had time for much else. But the Legacy isn’t nearly as reliable. It has created plenty of tragedies in the generations since.”

“The Legacy is happy to mimic elements from the story wherever it can,” Daphne said. “No matter how disparate those elements might be. They don’t have to be part of the greater narrative. Like the roses.”

“Is it really true that every flower seed planted in Glandore grows into a rose?” Dimitri asked.

“Have you seen any other flowers since you crossed the border?” Rosalie watched him, clearly already knowing the answer. “And have you seen anyone pick a rose that wasn’t from their own garden?”

He rubbed the back of his neck. “I wasn’t paying much attention, to be honest. But I haven’t seen any other flowers around here. And I certainly haven’t seen anyone picking any.” He grimaced as he considered his own entrancement with the roses on his first day. He had felt the pull since, but it was easy to resist now he knew the dangers of plucking one.

“You won’t see other flowers anywhere in Glandore,” Daphne said, her voice turning wistful. “In Oakden we had roses, but so many other beautiful flowers besides.”

“At least the trees have flowers,” Rosalie said, a note of loyalty creeping into her voice despite her apparent aversion to Glandore’s Legacy. “It’s only flowers that grow in the ground that are affected.”

“Except you don’t have cherry blossoms around here,” Daphne said on a sigh.

“That, at least, is not the Legacy’s fault,” Rosalie said in a spirit of fairness. “But the relevant point is that just because the Legacy works one element of the original story into your life, it doesn’t mean you’ll get all the other elements too. Sometimes that’s useful—we use its power to grow our crops. They grow far faster and better here than other places. But we try to avoid it wreaking havoc in our lives.”

“So you’re saying that the Legacy is transforming the garden because I’m a young man of royal blood living alone in a castle-like building?” Dimitri asked, apprehension rising inside him. “Are you saying it’s going to turn me into a Beast?”

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