Meg Evans

This is the sixth story in a series. Click here to read all parts from the beginning.

The icy wilderness beyond the oversized door looked eerily empty. It wasn’t altogether devoid of life; a few scrawny conifers clung to the rocky slopes on either side of a frozen lake, but I saw no animals or birds. Sunlight brightened the scene but gave little warmth.

I didn’t see any sign of dragons, either, which was one advantage of suddenly finding myself in a bitterly cold wasteland. Dragons, like all reptiles, preferred warm climates. Still, if I froze to death here, it wouldn’t matter that nothing was trying to eat me.

Going back the way I came wasn’t in the cards, though; not with dragons and sea serpents in the way, and of course I had no clue how to reopen the portal to my own world even if I could reach it. Lacking any other choice but to go forward, I let the big door swing shut behind me, but not until after I checked to make sure the knob would turn from this side. No sense locking myself out when I had no idea what I’d find here.

I took off the hood of my fire suit to get a better view of the landscape without the visor. Looking up, I saw no flickering magical portals anywhere, which didn’t surprise me. After all, nothing was ever that easy. I did see two blood-red moons that hung near the horizon, both large enough to give the unsettling impression that they might fall out of the sky at any moment. The sun was low enough that it didn’t look like I could walk far without losing the daylight.

The cold wind in my face was strangely constant, without lulls or gusts. It smelled of ice and rock, with maybe a trace of woodsy scent from the trees, but that was more likely my imagination. Putting my hood back on so I wouldn’t lose too much body heat, I decided to start walking to my right, toward the setting sun. If I didn’t find shelter in that direction soon, then I’d have to turn around and come back here. The hard stone of the passageway inside the door wouldn’t be the most comfortable place to sleep, but it definitely beat freezing in the open air.

I picked my way carefully along the rocky shore, feeling very thankful for my sturdy shoes. A clump of conifers nearby offered a windbreak and more level ground, so I headed toward it. There were no paths, which suggested that no predators were likely to be lurking, but I kept a close watch anyway.

After a while, the trees grew more densely. Calling them a forest would still have been a stretch, but they could at least pass muster for a respectable woods, of the sort that lakeshore cabins back home in Tennessee might’ve had. The sun was just about to sink below them, which would have been my cue to turn around, when I saw the bright glow of a lantern through the trees.

All parts of this story are consolidated on one page here.

A narrow stone hallway curved in a long arc toward a dark and featureless end. Torches lined the walls at regular intervals, but they had not been lit. After one glance, Ina set them ablaze with a casual thought. Puffs of dust rose from the stones under her bare feet, and she scowled.

“Yes, I would give it up.” Echoing from the dry, close stones, Ina’s voice sounded overly harsh and brittle to her ears, answering a question she had not been asked. “To go home to my family—and why shouldn’t I want to go home? I never asked to become a witch, or to be given any magical powers, and it’s only fair that I should have the freedom to walk away if I so choose.”

Somewhere far behind her, Ina heard the raven’s harsh caw.

The outline of a door came clear at the end of the hallway, gleaming in the reflected torchlight. It had no knob, but it swung open easily as Mother Ocean extended a hand toward it. Cool air blew into the passage, making the torches cast wavering shadows.

Ina followed the older woman into what looked like a disused courtyard, overgrown with vegetation, in the dim light just before dawn. The glare from the hallway left her without much night vision, and she irritably commanded the torches to go dark again. They obeyed, with sullen flickers of reluctance.

“Only two weeks remain before we celebrate Midsummer’s Eve again.” Turning her soft, lined face toward the coming sunrise, Mother Ocean spoke as calmly as if her words were only another daily lesson. “Then you will have been here fully a year, and your training will be complete. All memories of your previous life will be restored then, if you so choose. That is our custom.”

“Why should I care about your custom, when I never chose to follow it!” Ina was shouting now, far beyond caring whether her voice was loud enough to disturb anyone’s morning meditations.

Indistinct winged shapes passed by in the faint light, swooping to glide through an arched doorway ahead. High-pitched squeaks came from the other side of the wall. Ina flinched instinctively before realizing that they were only bats, flying home to roost for the day.

“One final task remains to you.” Mother Ocean still faced straight ahead, with her gaze uplifted. “I cannot speak more of it now, but you will know it when the time comes. Act wisely, remember what you have learned, and trust your best instincts. Allow the strength of fire and earth to flow through you—always, always tempered with kindness.”

Ina shivered in her bare feet and nightdress, feeling very far from wise and strong. The bats had gone silent as the sun rose over the horizon, brightening the courtyard without yet giving much warmth.

“Do you see it all? I mean, everything in the future?”

Mother Ocean turned toward her now, with a gentle smile. “No, Ina, I see only the points of awareness on which I choose to focus my attention—just as you did, months ago, when I instructed you to close your eyes and watch the ships entering the bay.”

Pondering that response, Ina reached with her mind toward the colony of bats on the other side of the wall. She felt their slow breathing as they drifted off to sleep, comfortable and secure in the warmth of their kin. Somewhere, only a little farther away, roses grew beside a garden bench, their fragrant blooms swaying in a gentle breeze. They were in shadow now, with the morning sun behind the house. Within the walls, she would find her kin, just as the bats had done…

“Not much longer, Ina, dear heart. You will see them again.”

The image faded, never having quite come clear.

She still could feel the bats, their heartbeats slow and relaxed. In part, she envied them for being able to sleep so easily, without wondering if they would wake up again as themselves. Even if—when—she found her way home, Ina knew her life would never again be that simple.

Click here to continue to Part 16.

All parts of this story are consolidated on one page here.

Hamburgers sizzled on the backyard grill. The roses hadn’t yet overgrown the garden bench this year, but they were on the verge of reasserting their claim. For now, her daughter sat comfortably on the bench, with the Goldendoodle puppy in her lap. In a far corner, the bright green leaves of a Japanese maple cascaded over mossy stones like a galaxy of tiny stars.

“Mom, I’m feeling so blessed to be here with you and Dad today. Traveling abroad last month was fun, and I’m very glad to have had the chance, but there’s nothing like coming home. Happy birthday, Mom!”

She was just about to answer when the beautiful sunlit garden suddenly went dim. The breath she had just taken swirled dizzily through her, and she struggled to stay upright.

“Mom? Mom!”

The panicked shout sounded very far away as she fell.

Her own voice crying out was the next thing she heard. “No!”

Ina woke abruptly, her heart thudding. It wasn’t totally dark in the dormitory—a faint gleam under the door told her that the hallway torches had been lit, which meant that it was not long before dawn. Soon Petra’s raven would caw, telling the women it was time to rise for their morning meditations.

Two beds over, Firefly stirred. “You’re all right, Ina. Whatever you were dreaming, it wasn’t real.”

“No.” The word came raggedly, in a half-sob. “No, I’m not all right. And it was real—it was!”

She had thrown her feet over the edge of the bed and made her way to the door, still in her nightdress, before she gave a moment’s thought to what she was doing. The stone floor of the hallway felt cold under her bare feet, but she wasn’t about to go back for her slippers. Without a conscious plan, she made her way through the familiar passages toward the meditation room.

Candles burned softly in wall sconces, their herbal scent filling the room. Mother Ocean sat cross-legged on a cushion beside the wall, with two other women close by. Although Ina’s bare feet made no sound as she crossed the smooth floor, Mother Ocean’s eyes opened with no apparent surprise, as if Ina’s arrival had long been anticipated.

The meditators always observed strict silence, but Ina had a strong feeling that wouldn’t be the only rule she was about to break.

“You tore me away from a loving family and home.” After nearly a year, the words finally came to her, certain and precise like a string of hard, polished stones. “Why?”

Mother Ocean got to her feet, slowly, with one wrinkled hand on the wall for balance. She did not dispute the accusation as she looked up to meet Ina’s gaze.

“Walk with me, Ina.”

Click here to continue to Part 15.

All parts of this story are consolidated on one page here.

The old stone classroom felt hot and stifling on this sunny May morning, although it had been built into the earth of the hillside and had three spacious windows just above ground level. The still air almost had Ina dozing off where she sat, trying her best to look interested during another of Petra’s interminable lectures on the ethics of witchcraft. Leaves outside the nearest window swayed slightly in the faintest of breezes. A common yellow butterfly rested on the tip of a branch, fanning its wings. Ina would have liked a fan, too…

“Pay attention!” Petra thundered, pounding the podium.

Ina flinched, wondering if she had gotten herself in trouble for letting the butterfly distract her. After a moment, however, it became clear that the exhortation was simply part of the lecture and was not directed to anyone in particular.

“We must always be vigilant—always!—lest we stray from the path of service. We face many choices every day. Some are trivial, some consequential—but in all of them, we must ask ourselves: Are we serving with love or reacting in fear? If we are honest, the answer can be found quickly. The greater challenge is to recognize the need to make a decision soon enough to ask the question.”

Petra paused to wipe her face with a plain homespun handkerchief before she brought the morning’s lecture to its long-awaited conclusion.

“Very soon, your apprenticeship year will come to an end. Then, you will go forth into the world as journeywomen. You must cultivate the habit of asking, in all that you do: Love or fear? Remember, at any time, you may suddenly be put to the test.”

With class dismissed (mercifully, in Ina’s view), it was time for lunch, followed by midday chores. After eating her bread and cheese, Ina walked with Daphne and Phoenix to pick up empty baskets from the storehouse beside the kitchen. They would be gathering dandelion greens and wild strawberries, both of which grew in abundance at the Wild Forest’s edge.

A light wind had started blowing, and the shade under the trees felt comfortable as the girls walked along the path. After a while they came to a meadow dotted brightly with dandelions, which Phoenix began to gather. Ina and Daphne continued walking toward the strawberry patch, not far ahead.

“Do you think Petra meant it seriously when she told us that we’d be put to the test?” That unwelcome idea had just come into Ina’s mind, although she couldn’t have said why. She elaborated on it further as she and Daphne walked around a gentle curve in the path. “And what happens if we fail whatever has been planned for us? Do we get sent away as unworthy?”

Daphne took a few steps into a clearing to the right, where she set down her basket next to a large clump of ripe strawberries. “No, of course not. You’re being much too dramatic, Ina. She meant only what we knew already: unexpected events often happen, and we must be prepared to make decisions wisely.”

When Daphne knelt down and started humming, Ina’s first thought was that she had been dismissed. Almost at once it became clear, however, that the melodic sound had nothing to do with Ina and was directed toward the strawberry plants. The leaves closest to Daphne’s hand lifted up, swinging their plump berries into her palm and gently releasing them. The pitch of the humming changed, as if to express thanks. Daphne put her berries into the basket and moved on to the next plant.

Lacking any such ability to converse with vegetation, Ina started picking berries the old-fashioned way. Pinching the stems between her fingers, she found herself wondering whether harvesting a crop hurt the plant. As she picked the next strawberry, she could almost imagine that she heard the broken stem shouting in agitation.

No, she had in fact heard a shout, not far away—soon followed by another one. The voices came from the path where she and Daphne had been walking earlier. The sound of running feet came from that direction, also. A wild-eyed Phoenix came tearing around the curve at full speed, breathing hard, with her long skirts bunched up in both hands to allow more freedom to run.

The voices were distinct now, very close by.

“The witch went that way! She’s heading for the river!”

A rock came whizzing along the path, narrowly missing Phoenix, and a crowd of villagers burst into view. Ina and Daphne, holding their baskets, crouched behind a stand of low shrubs. Phoenix ran past them, taking a steep descent toward the river at what looked like a very unsafe speed.

“There she is! Kill her now!”

Nellie, the farmwife who had given Ina shelter after her arrival in the Wild Forest, charged to the front of the mob while brandishing a large stick.

Putting a foot wrong on the narrow, stony path, Phoenix stumbled and fell headlong toward the river. She landed with a muffled shriek, and even at this distance Ina could see the unnatural angle of her left leg. Howling in triumph, the villagers rushed forward, waving their sticks—and then there was a gleam of metal as one of them held up a hunting knife.

Overcome by fury, Ina half-rose from her hiding place behind the bushes. Fiery anger pulsed within her. Like a lightning bolt, it was ready to strike. It would char those ignorant villagers to ashes…

“Na, na, na. Ooh, na, na, na.”

Daphne crooned softly beside her, swaying with arms clasped together as if cradling a baby. One elbow brushed Ina’s hand—ever so slightly, but it was enough to ground the roiling power within her nonetheless. A tiny crackle ran along Daphne’s sleeve and dissipated.

Tendrils of moss reached up from the river, wrapping Phoenix in a tight grasp and turning the bright orange fabric of her dress to the same muddy green as the bank where she had fallen. Branches reached down from nearby trees. Ina thought she saw a flicker of motion as the branches lifted Phoenix from the ground, passing her from one tree to another. By the time the villagers reached the riverbank, there was nothing more to be seen.

“She was here! Right here!” Nellie shrieked in frustration, beating the bushes with her stick. A startled rabbit leaped away, and a few small birds took wing.

“She must have used her magic to disappear.” The man who held the hunting knife sheathed it again. “We’ll never find her now.”

Nellie flung her stick at the nearest tree. It bounced into the river, landing with a solid splash.

“I hate those witches worse than anything! They lurk in the forest, working their evil spells and stealing children. Next time I see one sneaking around, I’m going to make sure it’s the last thing she does!”

With shouts of agreement, the villagers began walking back the way they had come. Ina and Daphne stayed motionless behind the bushes until the forest fell silent again.

As they stepped onto the path leading toward the river, a huddled shape came into view under the low branches of a spruce tree. The murky outline slowly regained its original bright colors as the moss that had hidden Phoenix released its grasp.

Ina stopped suddenly, all at once feeling unable to take another step.

“I failed.”

“Whatever do you mean by that?” Daphne glanced back over her shoulder.

“The love or fear test that Petra told us about. I wanted to set those villagers on fire and kill them all. If you hadn’t stopped me, I would have done it.”

“I did nothing, Ina. Your thoughts and choices were your own. I had no way of knowing what was in your mind. When you withheld your power, it was because you made the right decision—without any help from me. Condemning yourself for a stray thought makes no sense, and I don’t want to hear another word of it. Now, let’s go and help Phoenix to get home.”

After delivering this rebuke in an even tone, Daphne turned away and started making her way carefully down the stony slope. Just past her, on the riverbank, the birds that had flown up in alarm only a few minutes earlier were settling back into the bushes. They chirped calmly, as if nothing worth remembering had disturbed their peace.

Ina didn’t find it as easy to forgive herself.

Click here to continue to Part 14.

This is the fifth story in a series. Click here to read all parts from the beginning.

I wouldn’t have thought the sky could get any darker and gloomier above the dirt road that was, apparently, Main Street in downtown Dragonopolis. I was wrong, of course. Maybe not literally wrong, but everything around me looked darker through the visor of my fire suit than it had upon my arrival.

Now that I wasn’t running for my life or hurrying to get my fire suit in place before any dragons could swoop down and roast me, I had time to look more closely at my surroundings. They didn’t seem to offer much in the way of escape routes, unfortunately. Behind me was the lake or bay I’d come from, with its hungry sea serpents. Sheer cliffs full of dragon caves rose up on both sides of the road, which led only to a tunnel entering the mountain. Light gleamed faintly from deep within the tunnel as it curved to the left.

Other than the tunnel, nothing else broke the stark expanse of the cliffs at ground level. Well, unless I wanted to count a few dragon dens barely low enough to be reached by a climber more intrepid than myself. As a professional dragon-control specialist, I had climbed up to a nest on occasion to retrieve hatchlings after capturing their mother, but it hadn’t been my idea of fun.

A wisp of smoke curled up from the nearest of the low caves, off to my right. I heard a scrabbling of little paws, and then a fledgling dragon emerged from the den, eyeing me with curiosity. Spreading golden wings, it glided down to the road, only a few steps from me.

The fledgling wasn’t a threat—its head didn’t quite reach my knees. I was a lot more concerned about avoiding a close encounter with its mother, who surely had to be nearby. No more smoke came from the den, so perhaps she had gone in search of food.

Beating wings and a screech from behind me confirmed that guess. Mama Dragon, gripping an ugly snout-faced fish in her talons, went into a steep dive. I took a quick step toward the far edge of the road as she landed with a thud and a cloud of dust, halfway between me and Junior. Then she hissed at me, almost like a goose protecting a gosling—not that a goose would’ve breathed fire or been the size of a large cow. I was lucky she hadn’t decided to squash me.

I kept on walking toward the tunnel, slowly enough that I wouldn’t look like fleeing prey, and without taking my eyes off Mama. She watched me just as closely for a minute or so before turning to chatter angrily at her offspring. I was pretty sure this couldn’t be anything but a lecture on staying away from strangers.

After a few more steps, I started breathing a little easier. Mama and Junior went back into their den to chow down on the fish. The tunnel was closer now, and there was enough illumination to show me that no dragons lurked inside the entrance. Of course, there was no way of knowing what else might be in there, but I reminded myself that I didn’t exactly have a long list of choices.

Especially when I heard more wings beating above me. Dragons came out of their caves on both sides of the canyon, all of them flying in my direction. Turning around, I took a quick count—at least two dozen of them. Bad odds if they chose to attack; my fire suit wouldn’t last long against their sharp teeth and talons.

Staring up at the nearest dragon, I hissed as loudly as I could, trying to imitate the sound of a protective nesting mother. The dragon didn’t turn away, but it landed on the dirt road—followed by the others—and paused for a few seconds before advancing slowly toward me.

I hissed some more, bringing the dragons to a standstill again, and backed a few paces toward the tunnel. That went on for several minutes—hissing and backing, hissing and backing—until the rocky walls of the tunnel’s entrance rose around me. A quick glance over my shoulder revealed that the tunnel appeared to be empty of life.

An icy wind blew toward me along the tunnel. I backed up a few more steps, until it became clear that the dragons weren’t following, and proceeded to walk normally around the bend. The tunnel ended in an ordinary-looking door with a round metal knob. Or rather, the door would’ve been ordinary if it hadn’t been about three times the size of a human-built door. It obviously hadn’t been built by dragons either, given the fact that they didn’t have hands with opposable thumbs. Sunlight—but no warmth—came from a window set into the top of the door, which was far above my head.

I reached up and put both of my hands on the knob. It turned easily, and the door swung outward to reveal a very different landscape.

This is the fourth story in a series. Click here to read all parts from the beginning.

I was just about to turn away from the dead-looking lake when I noticed a small ripple forming along the horizon. Tiny wisps of fog started to rise from it. At first, they were so faint that I wondered if I might have imagined them. A few seconds later, though, I heard a whumpp sound, and a thick vapor boiled up to form a looming cloud in what had been, until then, an unbroken gray sky.

Just below the cloud, a wave started rolling toward the shore where I stood. It moved at a steady pace, like the tide coming in at the beach. Rising higher, it finally crested and began to curl as if breaking over unseen rocks. I might’ve been looking at ordinary surf—except that, as it came closer, the outlines of scaly blue-green heads became visible all along the wave’s crest.

I found myself wondering, in a strange moment of detached curiosity, whether sea serpents could breathe fire like their dragon cousins. But obviously, the situation called for being more concerned with self-preservation, and I wasn’t about to stick around long enough to find out what they could do.

Tossing my now-dry fire suit over my right shoulder, I took off running across the stone, trying (without much success) not to think about the fact that it was really a troll’s head. I listened the whole time for the sound of that wave hitting the shore, but the unnatural silence persisted. All I could hear was the sound of my own shoes slapping against granite.

After I crossed the stone and came out onto a road made of hard-packed earth (or at least, something that looked and felt like it), I slowed down just enough to take a quick glance behind me. Although I expected to see a few of those scaly heads reaching my way, I was wrong. Once again, there was no sign of life or motion anywhere near the lake. It had gone back to flat, dead-looking water. Both the wave and the cloud had totally vanished.

The sulfurous smell of dragons was much stronger here. Steep cliffs loomed on either side. Ahead, the road narrowed, leading to a dark tunnel cut into the mountain. Cave openings at regular intervals—much too regular to have formed naturally—suggested this might be the home of a primitive cliff-dwelling tribe. No paths led up to the caves, however, and some of them were on sheer rock faces that didn’t look anywhere near being climbable.

I’d already started putting on my fire suit in response to the obvious conclusion before my conscious mind caught up to it: Those cliff dwellers were very unlikely to be human.

This is the third story in a series. Click here to read all parts from the beginning.

To all appearances, the Transylvanian forest had returned to normal immediately after the dragon’s departure. Birds chirped peacefully, branches stirred in a gentle summer breeze, and the sound of water steadily flowing nearby would’ve been soothing if I hadn’t known the road was flooded ahead. And if the flickering square of sky that the Romanian woman had called a sorcerers’ portal hadn’t still been parked, ominously, right above my head.

I looked around for the woman, but she was long gone already. For just a moment, I caught a glimpse of her bright dress and shawl through the trees, moving a lot faster than I’d have thought possible for an old lady with a walking stick. That set off my mental alarm bells, but I had no time to act. Only a fraction of a second later, I heard a shout from Shay, who was standing a few paces away.

“Chris, watch out!”

A huge shadow fell over me. Of course, my first thought was that the dragon had swooped back down through the portal and that I was about to be roasted, since I’d taken off the headgear of my fire suit. But no, the shadow was mostly round, not dragon-shaped.

The shape reaching toward me resolved into a giant hand, apparently connected to an arm on the other side of the portal. Its dull grayish-brown surface looked like stone rather than flesh. Before I could run away or do anything halfway sensible, the hand grabbed me firmly and lifted me through the portal into the sky.

Except that it wasn’t sky on the other side—it was water. And it was clear enough to see that I was just above the rocky bottom of a lake or bay. For an instant, the green forest flickered beneath me, and then it winked out as the portal closed. There was nothing besides rock under me now.

The hand raised me smoothly through the water and then deposited me, gasping for air, on what looked like the top of a granite boulder forming part of the lakeshore. When I looked down, though, I realized it wasn’t a boulder. The outline of a stone troll was clearly visible in the water, and the hand that had captured me was now resting on the bottom of the lake. I was standing on the troll’s head, under a dark and gloomy sky, with jagged mountains behind me and cliff dwellings cut into the rock.

And it was HOT. Wouldn’t you think a lakeshore with low, heavy clouds would have a cool breeze? Well, maybe that would’ve been true back home in Tennessee; but this sweltering, stagnant air felt like it came straight out of the gates of hell. It even smelled faintly of sulfur, which meant that there had to be dragons not far away.

I didn’t see any dragons close by, though, which was about all that had gone right today. My fire suit, with the headgear unfastened, was now full of icky lake water. Taking the suit off to shake it out, I kept careful watch for dragons or other potential perils. There didn’t seem to be anything alive nearby, except a few clumps of straggly brownish grass pushing up through cracks in the rock. When I looked more closely, I realized that the cracks were wrinkles in the skin of the troll’s head and that there were ridges running through the granite like veins. The grass was hair growing out of the troll’s mostly bald dome.

My fire suit already was almost dry in the unnaturally hot air, as were the rumpled business-casual shirt and pants I’d been wearing underneath it. That didn’t leave me feeling much better. I stomped savagely on the nearest clump of grass and then yanked it up by the roots. Although I would’ve liked to say this was a brave, calculated plan to provoke the troll into throwing me back where I’d come from, it was nothing of the sort. I just hadn’t thought about the much more likely possibility of the troll smacking me like a bug.

What actually happened, of course, was nothing at all. The troll never moved. Smelly ichor dripped from the twisted roots of the grass clump I was holding, and in disgust, I threw it as far as I could into the lake. There wasn’t even a ripple in the still water when it sank. Everything around me, including the troll’s massive figure in the water, looked and felt dead.

I only hoped that I wasn’t about to end up stone troll dead, too.

All parts of this story are consolidated on one page here.

Breath, in. Heartbeat, slow and regular. Bringing joy into the heart. Infinite joy. Breath, out. Sending love to all. Love to the self sitting on this cushion, to the women gathered in this room, to people everywhere, to the world. Itchy shoulder, noted; gently releasing it from awareness. Breath, in…

A bell rang twice to signal the end of the meditation session. Ina opened her eyes, surprised; hadn’t she just sat down a few minutes ago? But no, daylight was streaming into the room now, and the session had started before dawn, as always.

Stacking her cushion on the shelf with the others, Ina walked through the broad stone corridor that led to the dining hall. She filled her breakfast plate with rye bread, cheese, and an apple from the serving platters on a long table beside the wall.

Ina’s usual instructor, Luz, who was wearing the striped apron of those on kitchen duty, set out another pot of porridge. There were no servants here, and never had been, according to Petra’s historical accounts—which went back hundreds of years. Everyone took turns doing the chores, with no distinctions made for status or seniority. Just yesterday, Ina had seen Mother Ocean down on her knees with a plain kerchief over her silver hair, scrubbing a latrine.

Taking a step toward the round dining tables in the center of the room, Ina saw the flash of a smile beneath Rowan’s brightly colored hat. Rowan was the chief healer, and Ina didn’t often have lessons with her; but, somewhat to Ina’s surprise, Rowan gestured for Ina to take a seat across the table.

“This morning, Ina, you’ll be going out with me,” Rowan said, handing an empty porridge bowl to an apron-clad Daphne. “I’ll show you how to find healing plants. They often grow in places you wouldn’t expect. Nature is wonderfully inventive! And although our library has many books of herb lore, nothing can take the place of hands-on knowledge.”

Ina finished her breakfast quickly and put on a light cloak over her winter dress before joining Rowan outside. Only a few days after the spring equinox, the sun was already high in the sky. Yesterday’s dusting of snow had melted almost entirely, leaving a muddy forest floor with hints of green here and there.

Rowan took the familiar path that led uphill beside the river. She carried a sack over her shoulder, made of a green fabric embroidered with a design of red berries. Every few minutes she stopped to put something in the sack with a few words of explanation to Ina, such as that willow bark was often used for relieving pain and that it was best harvested in the spring, after the sap started to run.

After a while, Ina’s attention began to wander. What was the point of gathering herbs, she thought, if healing could be done just as easily by magic? Why not use magic all the time—just as Ina herself did when she lit candles, now that she knew how.

She kept the question to herself at first, as she didn’t expect Rowan would want to hear it. After all, it sounded like a complaint, and Ina knew she’d likely be told that she ought to be grateful for the chance to get outdoors and enjoy the fresh air. Such as it was; the breeze felt pleasant enough, but Rowan had just gone tromping into yet another icky bog full of skunk cabbage, some of which she’d already put into the sack while cheerfully expounding on the plant’s many medicinal uses.

“What do we need herbs for, anyway?” Ina finally couldn’t help herself. “I know you can heal people just by laying hands on them, Rowan—I’ve seen you do it.”

Lifting her gaze from the murky puddle she’d been examining, Rowan calmly responded with another question. “Why did we need to eat breakfast this morning, when instead we might have used magic to draw our energy from the sun as plants do?”

Ina was still pondering her answer when Rowan, with a smile, returned to the path. Ina soon followed her up to a hilltop that was at once familiar and very different from when Ina had first seen it months ago.

The wreckage of the old oak tree still lay on the stony ground, cleaved neatly in half by the lightning bolt that Ina had unwittingly brought down. Around it, winter-brown grass was giving way to bright spring growth. Rowan approached the dead wood and pointed out a fungus growing on one side.

“This has valuable healing properties,” she told Ina, “and it grows only on the largest dead oaks—those that had lived hundreds of years. So you see, this tree’s death was not wasted; Nature made good use of it, as part of the harmony of being.”

Ina took a deep breath of air that, all at once, felt wonderfully fresh and full of life. “That’s why we gather herbs and eat breakfast, too, isn’t it? Because we’re part of the harmony.”

Rowan’s smile grew much broader. “Exactly.”

Click here to continue to Part 13.