Solstice Wood Read online

  “Madison.”

  “Yes, my darling, my dear.”

  “Oh, never mind,” I said helplessly. If he fell in love with the mountains and Lynn Hall, time would figure that one out, too. “I’ll see you at the airport.”

  Dorian was coming with me, out of curiosity and to keep me company. Neither of us would make the guild meeting; we would pick Madison up and have dinner afterward in the city, which was a respectable way of getting out of sitting around for several hours and poking holes in a cloth with a needle. I drove over to pick Dorian up, found her and Owen both in the nursery. It was Saturday, and there were still customers, buying late-blooming mums, and bulbs, and whatever produce had ripened in the nursery’s vegetable garden.

  Dorian combed her hair with her fingers, took off her apron, and passed it to her father. “If Leith comes by after work, tell him I’ll be home before midnight,” she said, and kissed her father’s cheek.

  “Be careful,” he told us, his eyes losing their absent look for a second. “Watch out for deer.”

  “Always. Do you want us to pick up anything for you?”

  He shook his head. He’d always been somber, but there had been a dark energy about him that I missed. Gram had noticed it, too: he had lost interest in his life. Losing Liam and then his fay love, almost at the same time, had taken the heart out of him, she guessed.

  “Are you sure?” Dorian asked, fretting over him. He patted her shoulder.

  “I’ll make myself some supper, play a little music… You have fun.”

  The greenhouse door opened; another customer entered, stopped immediately, as they all did, to stare at the great cascades of fuchsias in their hanging pots, trailing blossoms to the ground in one last, magnificent display before winter killed them.

  But this customer wasn’t looking at the fuchsias. She was gazing at Owen, who was pulling out the green beans and cherry tomatoes Dorian had picked and then forgotten in her apron pockets.

  Dorian passed her with a smile, not noticing anything. But I couldn’t move, watching, wondering, recognizing something in her, though she looked like one of us, any of us, in her thin silk shirt and long, faded skirt. Her feet were bare, I noticed; she limped a little, taking a tentative step toward Owen. Her face had once been beautiful; now, aged a bit maybe in her translation into human, she still looked striking, with her slanted eyes as dark as autumn berries, and her hair, long and petal-smooth, streaked buttercup and ivory.

  Owen saw her.

  He closed his eyes. I saw him take one long breath and loose it, before he began to smile, and I went out quickly, turning the open sign around as I closed the door softly behind me.

  A year and a day, they had together, maybe, before she turned back into fairy. Or maybe a decade and a day. Who knew? But he would have forever the gift she gave him: she had found her way back.

  And so had I.