The Grove

TEN

Her fingers stilled. Saleria contemplated her choices. “Hmm. Playing with you, or getting a foot and leg massage. Playing with you . . .” Her fingers rippled briefly over his barely covered loins, testing the length and shape of him. The soft, deep sound that escaped his throat strayed somewhere between the ranges of a sigh and a groan. “Or a foot massage . . .

“Foot massage,” she chose, and pulled her hands free.

Another soft groan escaped him, part disappointment and part acceptance at her choice. It morphed into a deep breath as she unlaced and shimmied out of her trousers. The fabric hit the floor, and he sighed, studying the limbs revealed. “Oh, milady, I cannot fault your choice after all. Days and months and years of walking the Grove has left you with magnificent legs.”

She blushed with pleasure at the compliment, stepping out of her trousers, then stilled, frowning softly. “Wait a moment . . . didn’t you call that thettis-vine hybrid ‘magnificent,’ too?”

I am heartily glad Teral is not here to see that come back to bite me on the foot, Aradin decided. He gave her a slow smile, and a quick-witted reply. “I am quite certain that you will be just as deadly to me as any hybrid vine, the moment you wrap those lovely legs around my body.”

She gave him a blank look, not knowing what he meant.

“. . . Forgive me. I forgot for a moment how far I am from home.” Aradin held up his thumb and forefinger together a scant distance apart. “Darkhanans refer to sexual bliss as the ‘little death,’ because we believe it’s a tiny little taste of the bliss found in the Afterlife. I am therefore hoping that your legs, when wrapped around me, will be very deadly indeed.”

Caught off guard by his explanation, she laughed. Sagging from her mirth, Saleria backed up into the bed, then sat down. Her heart skipped a beat when Aradin stepped up to her, knelt, and took one of her feet in his hands. This time she was thinking of sexual bliss, and this time the sensations were stronger. Nerve endings on her feet somehow connected themselves up through her legs to her loins, up into her belly . . . even up to her breasts. It helped that he studied them, caught in their corset, making Saleria hyper-aware of his gaze, his touch, and her need.

With unsteady fingers, she plucked at the lacings holding the vest in place. His breath caught, his lips parting in anticipation. Loosening the garment, she pulled the laces free, then peeled it away. His fingers stopped somewhere near her heel while he stared. Wriggling her toes, she prodded him into kneading again. Sort of. Shifting her leg to the side, he kept his left hand working on her right foot, but leaned forward between her legs.

His tongue tasted the tip of one breast. Shivering, Saleria struggled to remember to breathe. Warm lips closed around her nipple, and a gentle suckling tugged little sparks all the way down through her body to her toes. Another swirl of his tongue accompanied the slow, rubbing thrust of his fingers between her toes. She gasped, but before she could clutch at his head for more, he pulled back, releasing her breast with a soft pop. Instead, she braced her hands behind her on the bed, waiting to see what he would do next.

Sitting back on his heels before her, Aradin focused on her right foot again, rubbing and kneading from toes to heel, from ankle to calf. An experimental tickle behind her knee proved Teral wrong; she twitched her muscles a little, as anyone would, but didn’t squirm excessively. Stroking to soothe it, he picked up her left foot and began massaging it. When she licked her lips, he leaned forward, right hand working her foot, mouth moistening her other breast. This time, she cupped her fingers through his soft, sun-streaked hair. A soft moan escaped her, enjoying the play of tongue around nipple and fingertips between toes.

She had lost track of his left hand. It came into play soon enough, teasing her inner thighs. Two fingers slipped under the cuff of her undertrousers, teasing their way up to the curls sheltering her mound. Her legs twitched wider apart, almost pulling her foot out of his grasp. That removed his mouth from her breast. Aradin sat back to focus on her foot, bringing both hands back into play against her sole. Again, he stroked and rubbed from toes to heel, ankle to knee, but then he stopped.

She looked at him, licking lips gone dry from soft panting breaths. “. . . Yes?”

“If you want me to massage your thighs, and points farther up,” he murmured, “you’re going to have to remove a certain . . . impediment.”

What? For a moment, her mind was blank. Oh—undertrousers. Right. Tugged impatiently at the strings . . . got them knotted. Frustrated, Saleria growled and struggled with them. Catching her hands, Aradin moved them to her sides, then plucked at the knot himself. At least he had the patience for it, though his show of restraint made her marvel. Particularly when he sat back and tackled his own drawstrings, because she could see his arousal straining at the fabric of his own undergarment. A moment later, the cloth dropped, pooling at his feet. Bared, his manhood bobbed a little above its curl-dusted sack, but otherwise pointed upward in cheerful salute, clearly happy to be so close to her.

The tapping of his thumbs against her hips distracted her from that intriguing view. With a bit of wriggling, she helped him remove her undertrousers. He finished it by lifting her ankles up into the air as he pulled off the garment, then kept them there, leaving her tipped onto her back on the soft, feather-stuffed bed. This time, his fingers were joined by his lips, tickling her with little kisses on each instep, and the flick of his tongue on her toes.

Saleria giggled, bit her lip, and squirmed. It wasn’t that her feet were particularly ticklish, because they weren’t, but the sensations did sear down through her legs, stirring her nerves all the way to her belly. With her legs held upright, her heels resting on one of his palms, she didn’t see the goal of his other hand until it was too late. In a bold but light touch, Aradin stroked one finger through her netherfolds, stimulating her flesh.

Head thumping into the bedding, she gasped and arched her back. He did it a second time, lingering so that he could gently rub against that little nubbin of flesh. Saleria stiffened again, hands clutching at the bed. A third time made her cry out, a soft sound half-strangled because she was still half-mindful of the others elsewhere in the house.

Aradin teased her until she was squirming in his grip, until he had to rest her calves against his shoulders. Bringing his finger up to his mouth, he took a few moments to taste her dew. His own flesh, hard with longing, strained toward her body. Between her heady flavor and the feel of those glorious, magnificent legs, he was more than ready for her. Not knowing how flexible she was, he moved slowly, closing the gap between their loins while he kissed first one foot, then the other.

She didn’t protest, and he didn’t sense any great resistance until the tip of his manhood prodded her inner thighs. Then she sucked in a breath and blinked at him . . . then smiled and widened her legs. Quickly shifting his arms, Aradin hooked his elbows under her knees for support, stooped a little more, and slid his shaft along her folds. Warmth met his flesh, warmth and wetness. Head tipping back, he rocked against her flesh, enjoying the sensations of crisp curls, slick dew, and welcoming female.

Saleria shivered as much from the blissful expression on his face as from the deft stimulation of her body by his manhood. Her fingers released the bedcovers. Shifting them to her breasts, she cupped the curves, enjoying the way their flesh rubbed together. But when he didn’t move on, she raised her brows. “Um . . . you do know that’s supposed to slip inside me like a dagger in a sheath, right?”

Aradin grinned and lowered his gaze. “Yes, I do know,” he teased back. “I even know which ‘sheath’ to use. But I’d rather liken it to exploring and enjoying the garden outside a fine house. I’ll knock on the door and enter your home when I’m good and ready.”

His analogy made her laugh at the absurdity of it—though he was a Hortimancer—and that was when the tip of him slipped into her “doorway” and prodded on his next slow stroke. Breath catching, she strained for more contact, but the Darkhanan merely grinned and teased her. She tried reaching for him with her hands, but he was out of range; next, she tried curling her legs, but couldn’t tug him more than an inch closer.

Her stern look was accompanied by a flexing of her calves, not quite thumping him in the back. “Get inside, Aradin, before I decide you aren’t allowed in!”

“Yes, milady,” he complied, grinning. He pressed in deeper than the mere inch he had teased. “But it’s such a lovely garden outside. I shall have to remember to explore it in more detail, later.”

He felt so good, pressing inside, slowly filling her, that she could only manage a distracted mutter. “You do that. Later . . .”

She felt so good, enveloping his straining flesh, Aradin wanted to make a quip about what a lovely “home” she had, but it was difficult to think when he could feel each of his heartbeats pulsing against her slick, hot walls. So all he replied as he leaned in, as he pressed in, was a soft-murmured, “Yes, later . . .”

Guiding her legs around his hips, he braced first one arm, then the other, on the soft-stuffed bed. A few more inches allowed their mouths to meet, her lips parting beneath his. Her fingers stroked through his hair, holding his head close before sliding down to cup his shoulders. Resting there for a moment, fully embedded in her body, groin to groin, Aradin wanted to tell her that he loved her. Darkhanan wisdom, however, advocated that such things be considered outside the heat of passion and desire as well as within the moment, that they be examined, and spoken only when one was in a calm frame of mind. Only then would it be considered true.

He thought it might be, but filled his lips with the taste of her chin, her throat, of the sweat beginning to sheen even her collarbone. Filled his senses with the smell of her, of faint hints of soap, flowers, feminine musk, and sweat. Filled his mind with the softness of her breasts, the heat of her sheath, and the flex of her muscles as she wrapped her arms around him and brought his mouth back to her own.

Saleria enjoyed that, particularly combined with the slow, deep thrusts of his body into hers. She enjoyed it enough that she stroked her fingers through his soft locks, then tugged on the fine strands, wanting more. That made him grunt and hold still. She tugged again and whispered, “Faster. Please.”

He was trying to go slowly for her sake. Trying to keep ahold of his passion for her. But when she tugged again, tipping his head to the side and nipping at the muscles of his throat, Aradin complied. The first few thrusts he gave her were deeper, stronger, but not faster. Not in this position. Pausing a moment, he pushed upright, caught and lifted her legs up to his shoulders again, then bucked into her, hot and fast. Her startled cry made him pause, but the whimpering moan that followed let him know it was alright. It also warned him she might get loud.

“Silunudormo,” he muttered, and kissed her left foot. She shivered, so he licked her instep, holding himself still. That made her twitch, so he did more of it, until she was squirming and breathing hard, and then he flexed his hips, thrusting into her with rapid strokes.

Unwound by the dual attack, Saleria cried out. Hands once again digging into the bedding, clutching at the blankets, she tried to hold on while his hips slapped into hers in a strange sort of sexual applause. An odd urge to giggle rose at that stray thought, but was then whisked away under the lightning strokes of pleasure connecting her groin to the toes he suckled. Her climax began with her right foot, and ended somewhere well after he grabbed the left and laved it with his tongue, too.

His began somewhere in the midst of hers. Glad he had cast a soundproofing charm on the room, Aradin let himself go, pounding hard, pouring into her in waves of release. He almost lost his footing as he sagged, but found the strength to stand and brace himself against the edge of the bed. With her lying before him, body flushed with passion, all he wanted to do was collapse next to her. But that would leave them with their legs off the bed. And if he moved her right away, well, there was the bane of all post-bliss lovers to deal with . . . not to mention his favorite dessert.

Sagging to his knees, he parted her thighs, inhaled their combined musk, and started lapping. Her breath hitched and her hands quickly moved to his head, clutching at his hair.

“Wh-what are you doing?” Saleria asked, startled. She had never known a lover to want a taste after lovemaking, only before.

Several possible answers ran through his mind. That he was cleaning her personally rather than finding a toweling cloth. That he wanted a post-copulative snack. That he couldn’t get enough of her. But he smiled when the right answer came to him, and paused just long enough to give it to her.

“You had me so hot and sweaty with all that exercise deep in your house,” he murmured, “I just had to step back outside to admire your garden up close while I cooled down.”

Her laughter was about as loud and hearty as her final cries of passion had been. And as lusty, when he resumed his tasting of their combined desire. He knew they had to get some sleep soon . . . but not just yet.

She drooled in her sleep. Not a lot, just a little, and possibly it wasn’t a common every-night thing, but Aradin watched the damp spot on her pillow for a full minute before deciding he not only did not mind, he thought it was cute. A touch of mortal normalcy in an otherwise dedicated, holy life. Not that such things were easy to see in the dim gray light of predawn, but Aradin was used to peering into the Dark. Mortal night held few secrets by comparison.

As much as part of him longed to lie there all day and just watch her sleep, the rest of the Witch wanted to be up and about, to seize the dawn and thus the day. Not wanting to disturb her slumber, he eased from the bed, then realized he had no clean clothes yet. Not because Teral hadn’t returned—his Guide had slipped into his Doorway at some point while the younger man slept—but because he hadn’t flipped the edges of his Witchcloak over his clothes.

(Noticed that, did you?) Teral offered dryly.

(Hush, you,) Aradin returned without rancor. He folded the cloak over the pile of clothing and waited. (I—we—had a glorious time last night, and I am in far too good a mood, post-bliss, to be teased.)

(Well, we have only one change of clean clothes left. All of mine and most of yours are dirty. Since I’m not sure if that housekeeper of hers would be willing to scrub our things gently, we should visit the laundering shop you spotted on our way into the town. And I am glad the two of you had a good time,) his Guide finished. (So . . . did I win the bet?)

(Feet, not knees. Not ticklish, but sexually responsive all the same,) Aradin informed him. The dimly lit lump of tan fabric shifted. At a mental nod from his Guide, he unfolded the cloak and started pulling on his clothes for the day . . . formal court clothes, crafted from fine silk and velvet in the Darkhanan style, with silver buttons and ribbon trim in flattering shades of green and brown. (You weren’t kidding about this being our last clean outfit, were you?)

(No, I wasn’t. I apologize for losing track of how many clean clothes were left,) Teral added.

(It’s partly my own fault, too,) the younger Witch said. Both men looked through Aradin’s eyes as Saleria mumbled and shifted on the bed, snuggling into the warm spot Aradin had left. She didn’t wake, just relaxed into a deeper level of sleep. (But can you fault me for the source of my distraction?)

Teral chuckled. (Considering she’s the source of my own as well, plus we’ve all three been distracted by the situation with the Grove . . . no, I cannot fault you. Oh—speaking of situations, Orana Niel are on their way. They will reach the site of the Convocation within the week. How long it’ll take to get things moving after that point . . . only the Threefold God of Fortuna knows.)

(Then we’d better get working on the task of taming the Grove as hard and fast as possible.) Donning his Witchcloak over his formal clothes, Aradin slipped out of her bedchamber and made his way downstairs. He found Nannan in the kitchen, adding more wood chips to the hearth fire under the soapstone cooking slab to ensure a good bed of coals. This time, at least, she heard him coming.

The look she slanted him was still a little grudging, but not as bad as before. “Good morning, milord.”

“Good morning, milady Nannan.” He parted the folds of his Witchcloak, showing her his court finery. “I seem to be out of regular clothing. Would you have time and the willingness to do my laundry today?”

“Laundry is done once a week in this household, since I don’t have any fancy spells for helping with the cleaning, and you’ve missed it by two days. Lavender down on the end of Baking Street, near the southwest corner of Groveham, does laundry every day,” Nannan informed him. “She’s not a strong mage like Her Holiness is, but she has enough to aid in the scrubbing and drying. If you want something clean to wear tomorrow, you’ll need to visit her today, or just re-wear whatever you’ve got—I’d think that, mucking around in a garden, you’d be willing to re-wear whatever was dirty.”

“Much like Saleria’s Order, my own insists on being clean and neat as frequently as possible,” Aradin said. “Do you know when this Lavender opens her shop?”

“She’ll be open for customers at sixth hour, which is almost an hour after dawn this time of year,” Nannan gauged. “If you want to be helpful, you can grab a broom and sweep the floors or something, since I doubt you could cook.”

“I do know how to cook, though I am not familiar with how to prepare the local foods.” A thought crossed his mind. “Saleria has mentioned she prefers sleeping in. Since I have been accepted into her service by both her Gods and mine, why don’t we let her sleep in? I’ll grab one of the staves and make the rounds of the walls, and you can take your time preparing breakfast for all of us.”

She frowned at that, but sighed after a moment. “Fine. Though if I hadn’t seen the holy symbols myself on the page Daranen showed me last night, I’d not have allowed it. And I’ll blame you for it,” she added, poking him in the chest, “if the Grove goes wild while it’s in your care instead of hers.”

Rubbing the bruise she had left, Aradin raised one brow at her. “I should think all four Patron Deities would make you wait in line if I should fail to tend the Grove, milady . . . though They might just appoint you Their taskmistress for my punishment. I assure you that if I have any say in the matter, the Grove will be tended well, its dangers contained, and its inhabitants carefully restored to its long-lost glory.”

Nannan eyed him a long moment, then flipped her hand at the hallway. “Go on. Out the back door with you. If you get eaten by a carnivorous flower, though, it’ll be what you deserve for not being smart and fast enough to avoid being devoured.”

“. . . And a glorious good morning to you, too, milady,” Aradin replied, bowing himself out of the kitchen.

(A wise man knows when to retreat, hm?) Teral teased.

(Quite. I have no idea what I’ve done to get on her bad side,) Aradin sighed.

(I suspect she instinctively knows you’re a huge distraction for her employer. She fears change and the familiar order of her daily routines being upset,) the elder Witch observed. (She fears, too, I think, being supplanted in Saleria’s affections. A woman does not need a mother figure nearly as much when she has a husband to be her life-partner.)

(That could be,) the younger Witch allowed, opening the back door to the Grove. He closed it behind him and paused for a moment, inhaling the cool, damp air of pre-morning. (Or maybe it’s just because she didn’t pick me out for the household. She does seem to like being in charge.)

Teral chuckled. (That could be. Depending on when Daranen gets the morning’s correspondence sorted, we may be able to visit the laundress right after breakfast. Then the three of us could work on fixing the Grove for the rest of the morning in a solid block of time.)

(If not . . . then we’ll just take a break midway to stretch our legs into town.) Opening the shed door, he grasped one of the staves, found the triggering rune to light up the cutting spell, and readied himself for the hike. (Now help me concentrate. Given the past few mornings’ weirdness, I don’t know what we’ll be facing, and I’d rather not have to pay for repairwork to my court clothes.)

(I’m still in yesterday’s clothes,) Teral reminded him. (And they’re relatively clean; I wouldn’t mind wearing them today for a bit more. Would you rather risk them than your velvets?)

Aradin paused a moment, then shrugged, leaned the staff against the shed, and slipped into the folds of their Witchcloak. (Take the body then, until it’s time to head into town.)

Saleria woke slowly, gradually. The scent of egg-dipped toast perfumed the air. Along with hints of spiced meat minced with fruit, it lured her out of one of the best slumbers of her adult life. Inhaling deeply, she stretched and tensed every muscle, then let them all relax on a deep sigh. She almost drifted back to sleep, too, save for the nagging feeling that something was wrong.

It was too bright in her bedroom. Too bright . . . Daylight! Jinga’s Sweet Ass! Bolting upright, heart pounding, she looked at her windows, where the pink linen curtains couldn’t keep out the bright morning sunshine glowing through their thin weave. I’m late for the Grove!

She twisted to get out of the bed . . . and felt her muscles protest. Sore with exertion, she blinked, remembered, and blushed. Last night . . . oh wow. Three times for me, twice for him . . . Oh wow . . . Cheeks hot with her blush, she tried to piece together why she was still in her bed after the sun had risen . . . and realized what must have happened. He must have told Nannan . . . Uh, not to wake me, not that we . . . He must be doing the morning rounds—oh, did I tell him not to touch the collection crystal to the fissure? I don’t think I did!

Climbing out of the covers, she hurried over to the windows. Pushing back one of the curtains, she squinted and raised an arm to block out the glow of the sun. Not that she could see him, of course, but while her eyes were narrowed, she looked for the Grove’s flow of magics. It was a relief to see everything looked normal from here. Such things were always easier to see when one squinted, though she didn’t know why. Even her teachers at the temple had just said that was the way magic worked.

Then again, they’re more or less the same group of people who said there is only ever one Keeper of the Grove at a time. Well, that’s just fine, Saleria decided. Whatever happens, I’ll still be the Keeper and the Guardian. But I am definitely hiring more people to work under me. As soon as I can figure out how to work that into my budget.

One person’s needs, her stipend could cover. She wasn’t really using much of the money she earned as the Keeper right now, though she would eventually need it when she had to retire. Possibly, it could cover a second person, though that would cut into her retirement funds. But I could easily use five or six mages with gardening experience, if not outright Hortimancers . . .

Blessed Kata, I actually have the time to think in the morning? Saleria blinked and turned away from the window. I do! I have time to think . . . Waking up isn’t quite so tedious or awful if I’m allowed to sleep in, is it? She owed Aradin Teral for this kindness, though she wasn’t quite sure how she could repay it. Heh, I owe him for whatever he managed to do to Nannan to get her to agree to let me sleep in . . .

From the smells wafting through the cracks around her door, breakfast wasn’t far off. Donning her unused night tunic, she wrapped her dressing robe around it and headed downstairs just in time to meet Nannan at the bottom of the steps.

“There you are,” her housekeeper said. “I was just about to wake you, since Daranen has already come down for breakfast.” She frowned at Saleria. “I’m not sure it was wise, but I agreed to let you sleep in while that man took your morning walk around the Grove wall. I hope I haven’t made a grievous mistake.”

Saleria smiled; her mood was too good for anything less, given her leisurely start to the day. “I’m sure he’ll be just fine. I think—”

The back door at the far end of the hall opened. Saleria gave up what she had meant to say, instead hurrying down the last few steps so she could see what condition her new partner was in. To her surprise, the man stepping into the house had the tall, broad-shouldered, dark-haired visage of Teral, not the slightly shorter, leaner, blond Aradin. She smiled at him all the same.

“Good morning, Teral. And good morning to your Host, too,” she added politely, guessing that either Aradin was somewhere inside the older man, watching and listening, or that he would return shortly. Oddly enough, the scent of mint wafted into the hall, mixing with the spiced fruit sausage and the egg-toast Nannan had made. “How did the morning round go?”

“Some sort of horned, rabbity thing with willow leaves instead of fur,” he recited, counting off on his fingers, “a swarm of bees acting rather agitated in what turned out to be a patch of rage-inducing bleeding hearts, a new species of ambulatory orchid-beetles, and a rather aggressively friendly cross between a fern and a mint plant. Either that, or it was attempting to copulate with me. For our sanity’s sake,” the older Witch muttered, “Aradin and I have agreed to think of it as just being aggressively friendly, and not amatory.”

“Did you drain the northern locus? I forgot to tell you, don’t touch the crystal to the rift,” Saleria added, moving down the hall toward the entrance to the dining hall. The closer she got to him, the stronger the scent of mint became. The stains were subtle, but she thought she could see hints of green along the beige outer layer of his overrobe. “Do you need Nannan to wash your Witchcloak?”

“Yes, I drained it carefully; no, we’ve agreed to go see the laundress in town, since we have far too much laundry at the moment to burden your kind housekeeper with it; and no, you didn’t tell either of us, but Aradin did watch you do it, advised me on the care you took, and thus we avoided it adroitly. The Witchcloak is supposed to be self-cleaning, but sometimes it does require a little scrubbing. We’ll have the laundress look at it, too. If you’ll excuse me, miladies,” Teral added politely, lifting callused hands that showed a few signs of scratch marks, “I also tangled with some sort of rose hybrid while clearing the outer path, and will need to wash up before breakfast.”

Giving both women a slight bow, he turned to the right, not the left, and ducked into the downstairs refreshing room. Behind Saleria, Nannan sighed. Curious, she turned and lifted her brows at her housekeeper.

“He’s so handsome . . . but it’s so weird, that he’s technically dead,” Nannan confessed. She flipped a hand and shook her head. “I’m not sure I could stand getting involved with him, when he’s also . . .”

“Also what? Also Aradin? Also dead? Also not . . .” She cut herself off before she could say, Also not interested in you? It would not have been kind, however true, as far as she knew. Saleria shook it off. “You know, you can look at him all you like, and become friends with him—with Teral—but try to understand that in doing so, you must accept and become friends with Aradin, too . . . because wherever Teral goes, whatever Teral does or sees, Aradin is right there watching it all. I suggest you start trying to be friends with both sides of the Darkhanan, since he is going to be here for quite some time, praise Kata and Jinga . . . and Darkhan and Dark Ana.”

“I do realize that, now,” Nannan grumbled. “I’m not happy, but I realize it.” She fluttered her hands at Saleria. “Off to breakfast with you before your scribe eats it all—I’ll bring you some freshly grilled egg-toast, if nothing else.”

“Thank you, Nannan,” Saleria told her, heading for the dining room.

Aradin had forgotten about his note to himself from the previous night. It was a good thing he had written it down, too. Expanding the crystal tablet until it was the size of a large chalkboard—almost as big as the bed they had slept in together—he showed Saleria what his samplings of the aether and the plants of the Grove had revealed to him yesterday. With the additional samples taken during his morning walk, three patterns emerged clearly, one per locus tree.

“As you can see here, the energies build up and ripple around the triangle—you always drain the north locus tree, the east one, and the south one in that order, right? So the energy always has a dip in it that is traveling sunwise around the garden . . . and that means the energy always has a peak as well, just before you drain one of its contributors,” he explained.

“Just one problem with that. The direction you’re gesturing is counter-sunwise,” Saleria said, tapping the sketched map of the Grove with its three giant trees coming together in the Bower at the center, and line-sketches for the paths and other major terrain features. “The sun actually travels the other way across the northern part of the sky. You tell me it moves sunwise, and I think it’ll move like this, not that.”

Aradin frowned at her as she demonstrated, frowned at the tablet map, then squinted up at the sky. He sighed roughly. “Well, forgive me for being born north of the Sun’s Belt, where the sun travels across the south half of the sky. Clocks were invented in ancient Aiar, and they all go around the same way wherever you are in the world, so we’ll call it clockwise, yes?”

“Thank you,” she allowed. “That’ll be far less confusing for me to remember. So this wave of magical energy traveling clockwise through the Grove, that’s what’s causing the mutations?”

“Some of it, yes. Some of it comes from the sap saturating the ground. Now, the good news is, I think we can tap into the magical sap, transmute and cleanse it alchemically, and burn it off. It does require the construction of Permanent magics, but we can at least get started with some temporary usage—you always have prayer petitions for rain or drought or such, right?”

“Yes, but those come in cycles that are unpredictable,” she told him. Saleria gestured at the mossy spot where she usually prayed, in the center of the Bower. “If we build a Permanent magic, it will constantly be raining in the deserts of northern Katan, and dry as dust along the southwestern hills.”

“You’re thinking of a Katani faucet, which is plugged by a cork. Unplug it, and you cannot control the flow of water through the pipe,” Aradin said. “I’m thinking of a spell-controlled lever that opens and shuts from a trickle to a gush and back, depending upon the incoming need. We could use spells to control which regions get what they need in what quantity needed, based on the number of petitions for that area. That’s a long-term plan of course, but for now . . . maybe just build a radiant crystal to bless the land of Katan with good health? Teral tells me that’s a common use of Fountain energies, and it’s quite clear the Grove’s foliage is quite healthy and abundant. Warped, but abundant.”

“Well, I certainly don’t want to go warping the farmlands around Groveham, let alone the rest of the nation,” Saleria stated, hands going to her hips. She flipped one at the tablet map. “If I wanted that, I’d not renew the wards on the Grove walls each night. How can we stop that effect from happening?”

“That’s where my note to myself comes in,” he told her. “See, the Bower acts as a focusing effect for the untamed energies of the Fountain-rifts in each locus tree. You call yourself the Guardian of the Grove . . . but according to what Teral remembers of what his Guide Alaya said about her Guide’s Guide, who served the Witch Guardian, you’re not actually in control of any of the rifts, because you’re not attuned to them. You access all the energy from here in the Bower, and only collect it at each locus tree.”

Saleria blinked a couple times, distracted by trying to figure out the relationship string he used. She figured it out after a few seconds by placing Teral as Aradin’s “father” and Teral’s own Guide when he was a living Host as Aradin’s “grandmother” . . . which placed the Guide’s Guide as Aradin’s great-great-grandparent. Then the rest of what he had said caught up with her. “I’m . . . what? Not in control?”

“You’re not attuned. You cannot tap into it directly,” Aradin explained to her. “The Bower is attuned to all three rifts, and you are attuned to the Bower, but not to any of the rifts. Unfortunately, while the magic from any one locus tree rift could be handled by a reasonably strong mage such as one of the three of us, all three at once would be too strong for any single mage I personally know of, and would be a challenge even for our greatest Witch pairing.”

“So what’s the point?” Saleria asked him. “If I am attuned to the Bower, why should I worry about the locus rifts?”

“Control. Direct control of the energies, and their overflow spill. See, all these limbs and tree roots converge to form the Bower, yes? But they’re not the whole of each locus tree. These branches and roots are end-points that build up in energies,” Aradin showed her, tapping the crystal map, which started lighting up at key points around the Grove. “Much of it flows back toward the trunk and either spills into the hollow where the rift is, requiring it to be collected, or it gets siphoned into the Bower, where it collects and condenses as sap.

“But some of it pushes through the bark and the leaves, causing local eddies in the overall wave of energy. Possibly through some damage to the tree, leaking magic as a wound would leak blood, or leaking sap, or both sap and magic, since it does get converted.”

“I see—that is where the mutations take place, in the convergence of the greater wave and the little eddies. A drop of magic-imbued sap lands on a foraging insect, which eats a plant soaked in ground-sap, and the next thing you know, we have a crossover between a buttercup flower and a stag beetle, yes?” she asked.

Aradin nodded. “Add in the wave being at its crest, or perhaps at its trough in certain circumstances, and you have just enough energy to push a mutation. Particularly if the affected target gets hit more than once over the span of a week or so. But we can take control of these energies—if we take control of the rifts.”

“‘We’?” Saleria asked, lifting her brows. She wished she could arch just one to convey her skepticism, but that was the best she could do. “Aren’t you geased by your oathbinding not to take over the energies of the Grove?”

“Teral and I did not swear that in our oath,” Aradin reminded her. “We are oathbound not to steal the energies of the Grove, but doing so with your permission as Keeper is not stealing them.”

He had her there. Choosing to be amused by his law-sayer’s cleverness rather than annoyed, she shook it off. “Right, then. I always wondered why I couldn’t do much more than I’ve already been doing—and not just because of my busy schedule. I’ve sometimes had a little free time to experiment, but I never made any progress on improving things.”

“Yes . . . The drawback to the Bower’s design is that it is easy to attune to, easy enough that even a medium-powered mage could tap into some of its energies,” Aradin warned her. “If I’ve configured these power flow spells right, the lower-strength the mage and the less energy they tap into, the more of the concentrated sap will be produced. The stronger the mage, the more energy is used, the less the sap flows.

“If you can attune to at least one of the rifts, that will reduce the sap-flow. If I can attune as well, that will reduce it significantly, since between your prayers here in the Bower and our efforts to restore the Grove, we should be able to use up most of what the three rifts produce . . . and if Teral can attune separately to the third one, then we will be able to not only control the excess energies, we will be able to burn off the sap saturating the ground, restore the Grove section by section, and craft Permanent magics to continue to harvest and use up the energies spilling into the aether.”

Saleria considered his words. She wasn’t so sure about the Permanent magics, since that was not an area of expertise for her; she had never been interested in Artifact construction, and not very good at it. Barely good enough to pass the required basic classes, in fact. As she pondered the problem, her gaze fell upon his workbenches, narrow tables hauled in from the town and set up between two of the no-longer-moss-covered altars near the southeast corner. The middle table was bare, but the left held a collection of beakers, flasks, and other implements of the Alchemist’s trade, and cutting and pruning tools on the right table.

Between her and those tables were three pools, each with a vine or two hanging low enough to cross her vision with their verdant, sap-oozing tendrils. The combination reminded her of something he had said. “I think . . . I think it would be more useful to use the saps as they actually are. To use them to make concentrated potions. I barely passed my Artifact construction classes, but I wasn’t bad at alchemy. I’m rusty, and probably nowhere up to your level of expertise, but I could make a good assistant. I do like the idea of using unwarped energies to encourage the health and vitality of the surrounding land, but as you yourself said, force-feeding a plant too much magic isn’t healthy for it, so we’ll need to do other things with all these excess energies as well.

“So we should bottle the various saps and experiment to find ways to make use of them . . . and sell them so that I can pay you a decent salary for all your hard work, plus hire a handful more of other Hortimancers and Alchemists—oathbind them to work for the Keeper and the best interest of the Grove and Katan, or something, but that shouldn’t be too difficult to arrange,” she dismissed. “I’ve heard any number of excuses over the last three years about why I couldn’t get a second helper, and the budget has been one of the biggest ones.

“If we make the Grove pay for itself, they’ll have no fiscal objections to make. And with that petition request of yours, approved and prayed over by me, and signed by both sets of Gods, they’ll have no other ground to stand upon for any of the other changes I’ll want to make.” Staring off at the worktable, she nodded firmly at the thought. “That’s what we’ll do. That’s what feels right.”

“Then that’s what we’ll do,” Aradin agreed. “You’re in charge.”

“Even if you and Teral manage to each attune to a rift, outpowering me two-to-one?” Saleria asked.

“You’re still in charge,” he reassured her. “It’s your Grove. We’ll make recommendations, but the ultimate decision is yours.” He watched her brow slowly furrow into a frown. “What’s wrong?”

She sighed, striving to explain it. “I’m not sure, but . . . I guess I’m not used to the whole not having to fight for control over what I want to do with the Grove. I think that’s why I sort of fell asleep, as it were. Fell into the dull-witted acceptance of my traditional routine.” Rubbing at her brow, she tried to shake it off. Honesty prompted her to add, “I’m rather grateful you woke me up to my own rights, even if it’s going to cause both of us a lot of work—speaking of work, I need to get to work on those prayers. Did you want to keep working on this, and see if we can attune me to at least one of the rifts? Or were you going to go handle your laundry first?”

“I’d rather go handle my laundry. We should also consult with the other Guardians via your new mirror,” Aradin added. “Teral says he got the impression from the memories passed down to him that it helps to have a clue on what to do before you try. To be frank, the Grove will still be here tomorrow, but both of us would like clean changes of clothing to greet the new day.”

“Take a bath while you’re at it,” Saleria teased lightly, tapping him on his chest. “Teral worked up a bit of a sweat from the look of him this morning. I’ll be fine on my own while you’re gone . . . and I can cut you the slack, my new, official apprentice, because you let me sleep in this morning.”

Stepping close to him, she looped one arm up behind his neck, tugged his head down into range, and kissed him in thanks. It wasn’t their first kiss of the day; they had done so earlier while picking up their staves at the back shed. But it was a nice way to part company. Aradin enjoyed it for a few moments, then hugged her and stepped back.

“Not much more of that, or I might be tempted to profane the Sacred Grove with the sight of our naked hides rolling around on all this moss,” he muttered.

“It’s a marriage Grove; I sincerely doubt They’d mind. The real problem is that we do have work to get done, and only so many hours of daylight in which to do it,” Saleria returned dryly, but let him go. Plans or no plans, there were still plenty of prayer petitions to attend to today.

“. . .Anything should happen to her, of course, but if something should, then I would be the next Keeper. It’s only logical.”

Aradin stopped in his tracks. He had gathered his spell-cleaned and –dried laundry, paid the bill, tucked the packet back into the Dark for Teral to deal with, and started back toward Saleria’s home, content with his errand and eager to get back to work. But those words were rather out of place, given what he knew of the Keeper’s life.

Twisting, he searched through the plaza for the source of the voice, knowing it had to be nearby. No one was within several lengths of him, however, puzzling the Darkhanan. At least until the same voice, a light tenor, chuckled and replied to an unheard question.

“Well, of course they’d choose me. You have to admit the Prelate is getting on in years, and tending the Grove is very much a young man’s job.”

It came from the tavern, or rather, from an open window in the tavern wall just a few paces away. Aradin could hear the clinking of glasses and cutlery, the murmurs of half a dozen conversations, and a feminine voice fawning over the speaker. Her words weren’t nearly as important as that speaker’s, though.

(That sounds like vain boasting to me,) Teral stated. (Or possibly a potential troublemaker.)

(Then we should check it out,) Aradin decided. He tried to peer inside discreetly. The sun wasn’t quite at the best angle, but he got a glimpse of a young man with golden hair several shades lighter than his own. At just that moment, the other male lifted a water glass to his lips and looked out the window. Their eyes met.

(We’ve been spotted. Confront, or leave?) Teral asked him.

Aradin decided quickly. (Confront.) Stepping up to the opening, he folded his arms on the sill, grateful the tavern owner had chosen to swing back the windowpanes to take advantage of the warm yet comfortable weather. “I don’t believe we’ve met.”

Swallowing, the younger man set down his drink with a charming smile. “Well, you do have the look of a stranger to Groveham, milord.” He gestured gracefully toward himself. “I am Shanno of the family Lorwethen, Deacon to the Cathedral of Groveham. And you are . . . ?”

“Aradin Teral, Witch-Envoy of the Darkhanan nation . . . and current guest of Her Holiness, the Keeper of the Grove. I couldn’t help but overhear your claim that you are next in line as a potential Keeper,” he added. Elbows braced on the windowsill, fingers laced together, he eyed the younger man. “It’s strange, but not once has she mentioned this idea to me.”

His comment received a smirk. “Well, she’d hardly mention internal religious structure to an outlander,” Shanno dismissed, chuckling a little. “I’m not surprised you didn’t know.”

“Considering we have been discussing religious structure, and the Keeper’s job in particular, I’m certain she would have mentioned it,” Aradin stated. (I can’t tell if he’s just arrogant or an actual troublemaker. What’s your opinion of the little snot?)

(That he’s an arrogant little snot,) Teral agreed as both of them watched the deacon’s smug expression falter. (But not a deliberate troublemaker, I think. I’d guess he’s just trying to inflate his status in the eyes of the two lovely ladies to either side.)

Aradin honestly hadn’t noticed the ladies, one a brunette, the other a dark blonde. They were lovely enough, he supposed, but he’d rather have looked at Saleria. Out loud, he stated, “Whether or not your claim is true, there are two things that should be considered carefully. If it is true, and it is such a secret, then would Her Holiness honestly care to have it discussed by someone supposedly trustworthy enough to hold the position, and discussed so openly and casually that a virtual stranger could overhear it out here on the street?

“And if it isn’t true . . . have you paused to consider what trouble such false rumors could cause the Keeper, whom I presume you respect?” he asked. “The higher a priest’s rank, the more discretion is expected of him. The higher a priest wishes to rise in rank, the same must be expected from him. With that in mind, perhaps you should find something else with which to impress these lovely young ladies—I’m sure you have many excellent qualities,” Aradin added diplomatically. “You are, after all, a fellow priest, and that alone should be recommendation enough for your good character, yes?”

He aimed a smile at the blonde and the brunette on either side of the deacon. They smiled back at him, trading amused, flattered looks with each other. The deacon, Shanno, gave Aradin a look somewhere between hard and sullen. It shifted to thoughtful after a moment.

“Funny,” he said, eyeing Aradin, “but I hadn’t heard of anyone staying with the Keeper.”

“Well, I’ve just been assigned to Groveham, which means I’ll be here for a long while . . . so I suppose you’ll have plenty of time to get to know me,” Aradin offered, giving all three of them a smile. “If you’ll excuse me, milord, miladies, I need to get back to helping the Keeper now that my errands are done. Have a good day.”

(Not too badly done,) Teral observed. (You no doubt tweaked his pride, but you gave him a few options to save face along the way.)

(Well, I have had a few years’ practice with diplomacy,) Aradin thought back. (He probably bears some watching, though; a young man with ambitions like that—and I’m certain Saleria would have mentioned him being next in line—is someone who might put the wrong foot forward at the least opportune time.)

(Possibly yes, possibly no. We’ll wait and see how he takes your set-down,) Teral offered. (With luck, he’s a good young man who’ll gain a little wisdom from it.)

Aradin chuckled, turning right to head down a side street that connected to the avenue ending in the Keeper’s house. (Optimist.)

(Mage,) Teral corrected. (Our thoughts literally shape the world, so why not think happy ones?)

(Optimist,) Aradin concluded, teasing his Guide.