Linny Marsh's Arc

Chapter 21 of 22

Linny dreamed of the grove. The warm stone was under her hand. The light around it was not flat. It moved the way real light moves, sliding across bark, catching on frost. She had a brush she did not remember picking up. The paint on it was the exact color she had been trying to mix for a year. The barefoot girl stood on the other side of the stone. Her green dress did not stir in the wind. She looked at Linny the way you look at someone who has come back from far away. "Stay strong," the girl said. "You protected this place." Linny's throat would not work. She tried to lift the brush. Her hand was too heavy. "One day you'll come back," the girl said. "Not today." The grove began to thin. The stone cooled under Linny's palm. She reached for the girl and closed her fingers on nothing. She woke. A low ceiling of dark beams. A round window with sun in it. The smell of dried herbs, and something sweeter under that, like warm milk. She was under a quilt. Her wrists were bandaged. Her hands hurt, which meant they were hers again. A woman sat on a stool by the bed. Silver hair over a purple hood. Her eyes were too bright for the rest of her face. She was grinding something in a small bowl and did not look up. "You're awake," the woman said. "Good. Drink." She held out a cup. Linny took it. The tea was bitter and hot. She drank all of it. "Where," Linny said. "My cottage. In the woods." "How." "Someone called me. I came." Linny tried to sit up. The room tilted. The witch set a hand on her shoulder and put her back down without effort. "Not yet. Your veins were open. I closed them." "The tall ones." "Gone from you. Not gone." A door opened at the other end of the room. A young man came in with an armful of split wood. Dark hair. Green eyes that caught the light wrong. His ears came to points. He stopped when he saw her looking. "She's up," he said to the witch. "She is." He set the wood down by the stove. He did not come closer. He watched Linny the way a person watches an animal they have been asked to keep alive. "My sister," Linny said. "Waiting," he said. "At dawn we go." Linny closed her eyes. The grove was already fading behind them, the stone, the girl in the green dress. She held what she could of it. A color. A promise. A door that had not been shut, only closed for now. She opened her eyes. "I'm ready to walk," she said. "No," the witch said. "But you will."