Lumina Opalknight's Arc

Chapter 11 of 11

Dawn light touched the willow. The healed had gone home, but Roslin stayed. Her mother rested on the moss, cured and breathing easy. The child watched the dimming plants and would not leave. "Let me help," she said. "You saved my mother. I want to work." Lumina looked at the rows of fading petals. Each plant held only a few glows left. The seedlings near the willow's roots were the youngest and most fragile. One rough touch could tear a stem. "There's nothing safe for you to do," she said. "These plants break easy. You've never tended them." Roslin's ruby wings drooped. She knelt by a plant anyway and reached for a leaf. "I'll be gentle. I helped my mother garden at home." "Stop." Lumina caught her wrist before she touched a bud. "That one's still closed. Press it wrong and it dies." The child pulled back, stung. Her eyes filled. Kofer hopped between them. "She's not asking to touch the plants," the rabbit said. "She's asking not to feel useless." Heavy steps crossed the moss. Atticus came from the tree line, sober, a spade over his shoulder. The reformed troll had built the sled that carried the sick up the mountain. He set the spade down and studied Roslin's wet face. "Crying in a garden. That won't grow anything." "I want a task," Roslin said. "She won't give me one." Atticus grunted. He looked at the depleting plants, then at Lumina. "The seeds Morvenna sold you. Half still sleep in the crate. They need waking, or the garden dies with these." He pointed his thick finger at the fragile blooms. "The child can't tend live petals. But dew-soil? Anyone can carry water." Lumina understood. The blooming plants were too delicate for untrained hands. But the work behind them was not. "Roslin," she said. "Come here." She led the child to the crate of dormant seeds and the beds of empty soil. She showed her how to test the soil for wetness, how to fetch dew in a cupped leaf before the sun burned it off. "You don't touch the flowers," Lumina said. "You feed the ground they grow in. That's the harder job." Roslin wiped her eyes and knelt at the soil. She pressed her palm flat, testing dampness the way Lumina had shown her. "It's dry here," she said. "Then water it." Lumina handed her a leaf-cup. The child ran for the dew and poured it slow. By full morning, Roslin had wet every bed. The dormant seeds sat ready in dark, damp soil. Atticus nodded once and shouldered his spade. "Now they'll take," he said. Lumina looked at the prepared beds. The old plants still faded. But the ground for the next garden lay ready, and she had a pair of small hands to keep it fed. "Come back tonight," she told Roslin. "We wake the seeds together."