“What are you doing?” he roared.
“Digging,” Gray snapped. “Theran, you take the other shovel. Cassie’s already done enough.”
“There’s something buried under the tree,” Cassidy said, seeing Theran’s eyes blaze with fury as he looked at the crumbling tree that had been his family’s symbol. “Something is alive down there.”
His face was wiped clean of everything but his fury. Then he seemed to absorb the words. “Alive?”
She nodded.
Gray hadn’t stopped digging. Now Theran threw himself into it.
Cassidy looked toward the terrace and sighed when she saw Shira, Ranon, Powell, and a few others, including several servants, heading toward her to find out what was happening now.
More often than not these days, she felt like a one-woman drama society. It seemed like she never did anything without an audience.
“Can’t they use Craft to move the dirt?” Shira asked.
Gray and Theran both stopped digging and looked at her.
Cassidy stared at the hole for a moment, then closed her eyes. Blood to blood. But this didn’t start when she sliced her finger just now. This started when she had worked her hands bloody trying to run from the pain caused by Theran’s words.
Her blood had smeared on rocks, had mixed with the soil.
A Queen’s power connecting with the land.
If they tried to do this without sweat, without toil, they would find nothing worth having.
“We can’t use Craft,” she said.
Theran and Gray went back to digging. The ground kept crumbling, so they had to widen the hole. Ranon got the wheelbarrow and another shovel in order to shift the dirt. Other members of the court joined them, along with servants and men from the stables.
But it was Theran and Gray who dug.
And it was Theran and Gray who found the old locked chest and dragged it out of the hole.
One blow of a shovel broke the lock. Theran opened the chest, then sat back on his heels, his face filled with disappointment.
Cassidy picked up one of the pieces and felt the preservation spells begin to break.
“Why would anyone go to this much trouble to preserve some pieces of fruit?” Theran said.
Because they’ll grow, Cassidy thought.
“Those are honey pears,” Gray said, one hand hovering over the other pieces in the chest.
“Not like any I’ve seen,” Shira said. “There are a few orchards left on the Shalador reserves, but the trees are dying off, and the fruit is small and hard.”
What grows from these will have the taste of memories.
The preservation spell suddenly broke, and the fruit in her hand felt pulpy, already decaying.
“We have to plant these now,” Cassidy said. “Give them soil, give them care, and new orchards will come from what’s in this chest.”
“Mother Night,” Gray said as he picked up a handful of soil. “This is perfect.”
Cassidy looked at Gray. “Hurry. I don’t think there’s much time to get them into soil once the preservation spells break.”
“Pots,” Gray said. “We’ll start them in pots so we can put them on the terrace, where they’ll be more protected.” He sprang to his feet. “There are pots in the shed.”
The pear she held turned to lifeless mush.
Theran stared at it for a moment, then swore and raced to catch up to Gray, followed by Ranon and Shira.
They each ran back hugging a pot.
Cassidy stripped off her gloves and dropped the shields around her hands. She needed a connection to the soil and the pears, without barriers.
“Gray, you and Cassidy should do the planting,” Theran said. “You both seem to have a feel for this.”
What was in his voice? Cassidy wondered. Annoyance? Bitterness? It would take years for these trees to grow and bear fruit, but wasn’t a living symbol better than a dead one?
She didn’t ask. Didn’t really care. What mattered was not wasting what someone had gone to great lengths to preserve.
Gray filled pots with soil as Cassidy held each pear at the right depth, releasing the fruits gently one by one until there was only one left in the chest that hadn’t turned to mush.
“One more,” she said.
“No more pots,” Theran said.
“There has to be something.”
“We got twelve planted.”
But there’s still one left.
She ran to the shed, probably pissing him off because she didn’t take his word for it, but she couldn’t care about that.
Something, she thought as she searched under the potting bench and then the rest of the shed. Anything.
The jumble of broken tools in the back left corner looked like it had been rummaged through already, but she pushed things aside for another look.
And found a pot with some bad chips around the rim.
Old, she thought as she shifted it to get a better look. And smaller than the others because it was divided into two sections, but still big enough.
As she picked it up, she felt something give way at the bottom of the pot.
Damn. If it was broken at the bottom, it wouldn’t be of any use.
She set it on the potting bench to get a better look at it. Then she just stared.
The small piece that broke off revealed a compartment under the pot—and the corner of a yellowed piece of paper that had been placed inside.
Time was running out. She had to get this pot to Gray before the pear decayed. But even though she was certain she would feel foolish about wasting time when she saw what it was, she took those moments needed to pinch the corner of the paper and use Craft to pass the paper through the pot.
The paper had been folded to fit the compartment and bore the Grayhaven seal. And on the front, in faded ink, was written, “For the Queen.”
Cassidy looked at that corner of the shed and struggled to breathe.
Spells releasing. Realigning. A jumble of old tools that never seemed to get straightened out. Had this been there all along, waiting?
For the Queen.
“Mother Night,” Cassidy whispered.
Then she heard voices shouting. She vanished the paper, grabbed the pot, and ran back to where the others waited.
No time, she thought. Or just enough.
“Found this,” she said, dropping to her knees next to Gray. As he started filling one-half of the pot with soil, she cradled the last honey pear before it sank into the mush of the ones that hadn’t survived.
This is the one that will stay at Grayhaven, she thought as she held it gently while Gray added soil. Maybe the others will be planted in an orchard here on the estate, but this one will grow near the house.
When the last honey pear was safely planted, she sat back, tired and aching, and certain she looked like she’d been rolling in the dirt. Of course,Theran and Gray looked just as dirty.
“Well,” she said,“should we put these pots on the terrace and then get on with our day?”
“They all need water,” Gray said. “We’ll put them on the terrace, and then give them a good soaking.” He grinned at all the people around him. “Looks like we found the treasure after all.”
“Where did you get that?” Theran said. He turned pale as he pointed to the bottom of the pot, where the broken piece revealed the compartment.
“It was in that jumble of old stuff,” Cassidy replied.
He shook his head. “I looked there. I didn’t find anything.”
You weren’t supposed to find it.
“It’s a wishing pot,” Theran said. “I remember that from the stories. The pots came from Jared’s family. The compartment held written messages, wishes.”
“Did you find a message?” Gray asked her, his eyes gleaming with excitement.
A message preserved for centuries. Hidden for centuries. A message for the Queen.
She shook her head. After she read the message, she would decide whether to share it with the others.
Gray helped her to her feet, and the twinges in various muscles changed her mind from taking a fast shower to taking a long, hot bath. The court could wait. The paperwork could wait.
As she reached for the old pot, Theran said, “I’ll take that one.”
Several people gave him wary looks, since his voice sounded sharp, but she looked at his eyes and ignored the voice.
That old pot matters to him. Its history. Its connection. Until the first two leaves break the soil, the pears won’t be valued. But the pot matters to him.
She stepped back and smiled. “Of course.”
Theran took the old pot and walked back to the house. One by one the other men picked up a pot and followed him.
“Do you think there’s anything left in there?” Shira asked as she looked into the chest and made a face.
“Not likely,” Cassidy replied. “The men can turn it over later just to be sure, but I think we found what we were meant to find.”
Shira gave her a long, odd look. “Theran’s part of the family wasn’t the only part that had stories handed down.”
Black Widow.
This wasn’t idle conversation, but she had the feeling Shira wasn’t willing to share her thoughts right now.
“I’d better get cleaned up, and get this cleaned up before Gray starts fretting.” She held up her hand.
Still giving Cassidy an odd look, Shira nodded. “And you’ll come by the healing room so I can take a look at that slice in your finger. Since you must have used Craft to keep it bleeding while you planted those pears, I imagine the wound is clean, but we shouldn’t get careless about such things. Not now.”
“What’s different about now?” Cassidy asked.
Shira smiled gently. “I think you’re right. Maybe we have found what we were meant to find.”
CHAPTER 20
TERREILLE
Welcome, Sister.
Because you found this message, you have set the spells in motion that eventually will reveal a treasure that will help the people of Dena Nehele restore their land. There are no clues, as such. There is no map to lead you to a specific spot as there is in stories. But there are rules. Break the rules, and you break the spells, and what we have hidden remains hidden.