The Enchanted Greenhouse(84)

But would all of their new arrivals see it that way?

“It’s not just us and the plants anymore,” Terlu said.

“We could pretend it is,” Yarrow said. “With a bit of effort, I believe we can completely ignore my family and act as if they don’t exist.”

Terlu laughed.

He didn’t laugh with her.

“Oh, wait—you’re serious. That’s neither healthy nor practical, but even if we did … there could still be imperial investigators out there, searching for lawbreakers, maybe even searching specifically for me. We don’t know what’s changed with the revolution. It could be worse, not better.”

Yarrow took her hands. “I wouldn’t let them take you.”

“You couldn’t stop them.”

“Then we’d be statues together.” He’d moved closer, only inches away. “They’d have to make a double pedestal for both of us, because I won’t let go.”

Her throat felt thick, and her eyes heated and blurred. That was … well, terrible, but also beautiful and sweet and perfect. She blinked hard, trying not to cry.

Spotting something outside, Yarrow suddenly released her hands, crossed to the door, and opened it. Emeral waltzed in, his tail held high and his wings folded on his back.

Terlu wiped her eyes and got herself back under control. “You’ll need to communicate with your relatives at some point in some way,” she said, sidestepping the issue of spellcasting and statues altogether for the moment, “at least to tell them what needs to be done in the greenhouses.” Otherwise they’d invent tasks for themselves, and Yarrow might like that even less. It would be better if he coordinated his efforts with theirs.

“They’ll know what to do.” Yarrow poured water in a bowl for Emeral and fed him a piece of fish. The winged cat accepted the gifts with a pleased murp noise.

“But it’s your greenhouse.”

“It’s Laiken’s greenhouse.”

“He’s gone, and you’ve been the one caring for them,” Terlu said. “I think that makes them yours. By love and by law.” She wasn’t certain if the law for abandoned property had changed now that there had been a change in government, but she knew that Yarrow’s longevity here gave him clear claim to it. He’d put blood, sweat, and tears into this island.

“Not yet. Later, I’ll talk to them. Some of them. As needed.”

She studied his face, his clenched jaw, the furrows in his forehead. He’s afraid. “I said ‘in some way.’ You don’t have to talk to them directly, if you don’t want to. I can talk to them for you whenever you need me to. If you want to tell them anything about the greenhouses or the cottages or the island, I can be your go-between.”

He looked over at her, eyes wide. “You’d do that?”

“Of course.” He said he’ll be a statue with me. “You don’t have to face them until you’re ready.” Did he think she was going to force a reunion, now that he’d made it so clear he didn’t want one? Granted, she had been insistent about sending the letter—and really, now that the initial shock had passed, even he had to admit that the letter had been a grand, if unexpectedly complicated, success. So many gardeners! But she wasn’t going to push him any more than she already had, not now that she understood at least a tiny bit more how he felt.

“You keep surprising me, Terlu Perna.”

She hoped that was a good thing. Brightly, she said, “I think it’s going to work out fine.” Maybe the laws against magic use had changed. Maybe the gardeners would embrace her use of spells. Maybe all her worries were just a reaction to the trauma she’d experienced and not grounded in the current reality. Maybe the fall of the empire meant the fall of the imperial investigators and the pardoning of all former criminals. Maybe everything would be okay.

Yarrow let out a sound that was almost a laugh.

“What?”

“You don’t let anything dim your light,” Yarrow said. “You were sentenced to a fate worse than death—don’t tell me it wasn’t. You lost everything. Unfairly punished. You’re terrified it will happen again. And yet you still open your arms to everyone. How?”

“I…” She’d never been asked that or ever even considered the question. “What’s the alternative?” As she asked the question, she realized he had chosen the alternative. He hadn’t gone with his family. He’d chosen to stay behind, by himself, to devote the rest of his life to what everyone else considered a lost cause. “I suppose I choose to think it will all be okay because then at least, even if I can’t control what happens, I can control how I feel about it.”

“You just choose.”

Terlu thought about it. “Yes.”

He shook his head. “I’m not made like that.”

“That’s okay too.”

“Huh.”

Both of them fell silent. He moved to the kitchen counter and began to slice a squash and then a tomato. She watched him create the precise, thin slices for a moment, and then she turned her attention to building up the fire. When she finished, she located a broom and swept the floor.

“You’re not talking,” Yarrow said.

“I thought you might need some silence.”