Caitlin tried to stifle a laugh, which came out in a snort.
“Do you need a handkerchief?” Glorianna asked with a politeness that would have cowed even Aunt Brighid.
“No,” Caitlin said meekly.
Peg looked at Glorianna—and smiled. “You’re a strong one, aren’t you?”
“I understand how strong—and how fragile—the world can be,” Glorianna replied.
“Didn’t get your name.”
“Glorianna Belladonna.”
Another hush. Uneasy shuffling of feet.
“There’s a pair of Sentinel Stones beyond the village,” Peg said. “Some of our young go journeying. Some are meant for other places. Some return to Darling’s Harbor. So we’ve heard of Belladonna.”
Glorianna said nothing, but there was now a chill in her green eyes that made Caitlin wish Michael would step up and do something, say something.
Peg looked worried. “We’ve also heard stories that the Destroyer of Light has awakened.”
“Where I come from, we call It the Eater of the World,” Glorianna said. “And, yes, It is loose in the world—and has already touched Elandar.”
Peg nodded. “Then it’s glad I am to have seen the Warrior of Light with my own two eyes. And we’re grateful that you were the one who brought the Seer back to us.” She sniffed once, then squared her shoulders. “Now then…”
“Captain Kenneday!” Colin called out, raising a hand.
“You’ll not be doing business now!” Peg scolded.
“And what better time to be doing it?” Colin demanded.
Peg opened her mouth—and finally huffed out a breath. “Very well, then. You talk to the captain. Kayne! You’ve got younger legs anyway. You show them a bit of the village on the way to the Seer’s house.”
“There’s a house?” Caitlin asked. Something made her glance at Glorianna and Lee—and she realized they had already known about these accommodations.
“Sure there’s a house,” Peg said. “Old one burned a few years back. Just as well, I suppose. Meaning no disrespect, since she would have been kin to you, but the last one to tend the garden lived in the house from time to time. I was just a girl then, but I remember my mother talking to friends and saying how they had scrubbed that house from top to bottom and still couldn’t get rid of the sour smell. It was like that woman’s disposition had seeped into the wood and stone. The one that stands now has been tended but not lived in. We’ve been waiting, you see. We always knew one of Darling’s girls would find her way home for good.”
“That was her name?” Caitlin asked, startled.
“Sure it was her name,” Peg said. “Darling by name, darling by nature. She was the Seer who first made the garden in order to tend her little bits of the world. Then she fell in love, but her man wasn’t easy living here, so she went with him to live in his home village and added the place to the bits she tended. But she never quite came home again, even though we knew she still looked out for us. Her daughters and their line never quite came home either. Until now.”
Kayne stepped up to be properly introduced, and Caitlin heard Glorianna make the rest of the introductions. Heard Peg invite Brighid to ride with her in the pony cart. But those were just sounds rippling over the surface. There was a bell tolling in her head, and the sound rang out as “Raven’s Hill, Raven’s Hill, Raven’s Hill.”
As the others got sorted out, she tugged on Glorianna’s arm, and a look from Glorianna Belladonna was all it took for everyone else to give them some private space.
“Raven’s Hill is in the garden?” Caitlin asked, keeping her voice low.
Sadness filled Glorianna’s eyes, and the weight of that sadness dragged on Caitlin’s heart.
“It’s there,” Glorianna said reluctantly.
She waited, and then realized Glorianna wasn’t going to say anything else unless asked. “Where?”
Glorianna hesitated. “Under the compost heap.”
She thought about how Raven’s Hill had felt these past few years—and blinked away the tears suddenly stinging her eyes. “Can I fix it?”
“No.”
Some things can’t be mended, Caitlin Marie.
“Why did you choose that spot to dump the debris from the rest of the garden?” Glorianna asked.
“It felt…bad,” Caitlin said. “Trashy. Weedy. And…the other parts of the garden were weedy and overgrown, but I could still see some of what they had been. That spot…”
“Not your fault then, Caitlin,” Glorianna said. “It’s only a guess, but if too much of the nature of Landscapers had been forgotten by Darling’s descendants, then one of them didn’t resonate with Raven’s Hill and should have let it go. Dumping garbage over the part of the garden that provided the access to the village was a cruel thing to do because it fed the Dark currents and never allowed Raven’s Hill to be the place it was meant to be.” She sighed and brushed her hair away from her face. “Maybe a need that had no other way of expressing itself acted through you. Whatever the reason, and even though it wasn’t done prudently, you did what should have been done a long time ago; you severed your family’s connection to Raven’s Hill and the village’s connection to your garden.”
“But it won’t have a Landscaper anymore,” Caitlin said. “So won’t more bad things happen?”
“It doesn’t have a Landscaper at the moment,” Glorianna said. Then she smiled and added softly, “But it does have an anchor. Another will has been pushing against yours all these years, resisting the village’s slow change into a dark landscape.”
A whistle made them look over to the spot where Michael, Lee, and Kayne waited. Lee cocked his head and raised a hand in an are you coming? gesture.
“Enough,” Glorianna said, lifting a hand to acknowledge that they were coming. “For now, let’s find out what is here. We’ll deal with what was on another day.”
Kayne wasn’t much of a guide, Michael thought as they followed the lane that led to a house on a rise. For one thing, the man didn’t know how to pace himself to a woman’s walking speed. He’d push on ahead, leaving Caitlin and Glorianna trailing behind, and outside of tossing information any fool could figure out for himself by reading the shop signs, hadn’t said anything useful about the village.
When Michael started lagging behind again to give the women time to catch up, Kayne looked back and sighed.
“So,” Kayne said. “Should we dance around this or take the straight road?”
“Meaning what?” Michael asked. But Lee chuckled, indicating that he understood the question.
“Michael is Caitlin’s brother,” Lee said. “I’m Glorianna’s brother. I’m not courting Caitlin.”
“I’m noticing there’s a step missing,” Kayne said with a gleeful sparkle in his eyes.
“That’s because Glorianna and the Magician here are dancing around the question,” Lee replied.
“Ah,” Kayne said, looking back at the women. But it was clear—to Michael, anyway—that Kayne wasn’t looking at Glorianna.
“Caitlin Marie is only eighteen,” Michael said darkly.
“A blooming age for a women,” Kayne replied, smiling.
“Could be worse,” Lee said in a singsong voice. “Could be Teaser.”
Wondering why he had ever wanted friends, Michael stopped walking and stubbornly waited for Glorianna and Caitlin to catch up while Lee and Kayne went on ahead.
“Problem?” Glorianna asked.
“Men are a pain in the ass,” he grumbled.
She smiled and patted his cheek. “Women have known that forever, but we love you anyway.”
Caitlin sputtered and laughed. “Why don’t I—” She shook her head and took off. She was laughing too much to run well, but she caught up to Lee and Kayne.
“He’s practically licking his lips over her,” Michael complained. “She can’t be living here on her own when the first man who meets her gets that look in his eyes.”
“And what look might that be?” Glorianna asked sweetly.
“You know the one. And if Aunt Brighid is going to be going her way and I’m going…” Deciding that was best left unsaid since he didn’t know where he was going, he added, “You know what I’m saying.”