Page 120 of The Knights of Gaia

“You’ve been goofing off with that foolish boy again,” she was scolding the teenage girl I’d seen outside.

The girl had since changed into a pair of work overalls. And tucked her tiny blonde pigtails under a big sun hat.

“He has a name, you know.” The girl pouted out her lips.

“Troubleis the only name you should know him by,” her mother replied. “I caught him stalking around outside the shop late last night. I had to chase him off with a shovel.”

A look of total horror consumed the girl’s face. “You didn’t hurt him, did you?”

“You should be worrying less about that boy and more about your family. Tell him to leave you be.”

“But I love him!”

“You are too foolish to even know what love is.” Her mother pushed a bucket of gardening tools into her hands. “You have chores. Get to them. Before you mess up somethingelse.”

The girl ran off deeper into the greenhouse, and her mother turned to face us.

“This is my wife, Sena,” Glen told me. “Sena, this Apprentice Knight is here to check on the floral arrangements for the Summit.”

Sena looked at me. “They will be ready on time.”

“So I’ve heard. But could I see the flowers?”

“Look behind you.”

I turned and stared down at the large flower bed behind me.

“Those are your flowers.”

“But it’s just a bunch of dirt!” I protested. “There aren’t any flowers at all!”

“They will be ready on time,” she said again, serenely folding her hands together.

“I’m finding that hard to believe.”

She let out a heavy sigh. At first, I thought the sigh was meant for me, but it wasn’t for me at all. It was for the flowers. They responded to her sigh. Green stalks burst out of the dirt, quickly growing into a large bush, laden with delicate white flowers.

“Wow,” I gasped.

“As I said, your flowers will be ready on time.”

I couldn’t take my eyes off the flowers she’d coaxed out of the ground with magic. “I believe you. That was pretty impressive.”

Sena dipped her chin.

“Then you’re satisfied?” Glen asked me.

“Yes.”

Though when I told Ms. Featherdale how these Nymphs could make flowers shoot out of the ground, she probably wouldn’t believe it.

Glen and Sena nodded and then headed back into the shop. I probably should have followed them, but their daughter called out to me.

“You’re Savannah Winters, the Apprentice Knight.” She was standing there in front of a vegetable patch, staring at me.

“You’ve heard of me?”

“We have a mutual friend,” she told me. “Violetta told me how you helped her find her little sister. That’s how I know you can help me.” She turned, took a few steps deeper into the greenhouse, then pivoted around to say, “Follow me.”

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