Bloodleaf (Bloodleaf 1)

Tell him that I’ll be happy.

“She said that she’ll be happy.”

And I want him to be happy.

“She wants you to be happy, too.” I held the small, bundled baby out to him and said slowly, “She had to make a choice to save the baby. And she . . . she was at peace with the choice.”

I approached him with the baby and laid her in his arms. Kate followed, misty eyes inscrutable as she watched him gingerly cradle her.

I remembered what Kate told me outside the fabric shop. “Her name is Ella,” I said.

“That was my mother’s name,” he said, wiping his eyes. “I always thought Kate didn’t like it. She looks like Kate, doesn’t she?” he said, and then he smiled.

“She does,” I said. “She’s part of you both.”

“Arielle Katherine. I’ll probably be terrible at this. I didn’t expect be doing this alone. But I promise, I will love you every day of your life. I swear it, I swear it. I will give you the love she wanted to give and can’t.”

Kate let go of my hand and went to them, placing an airy kiss on Nathaniel’s lips and then another on Arielle’s downy hair. Then she faded away. But though she was gone, her light lingered.

Zan came to stand beside me and laced his fingers into mine. The frost of Kate’s touch melted at his. I looked down at our entwined hands and then up to his face. He said, almost inaudibly, “I heard you call for me. We got here as soon as we could.” He closed his eyes. “I never should have left. I am so sorry. I am so very sorry.”

I nodded mutely and we went back to watching Nathaniel gaze at his newborn daughter, clinging to her like he was a drowning sailor and she was his rope back to life.

* * *

We gathered again at dusk on the foggy shore of the fjord to say one last goodbye to Kate. She lay on a raft Nathaniel had made of willow and rowan, with lavender at her feet and a laurel on her brow. There were few words said between us, and no one made a solemn address—?none of us had it in us. What could we say that would make this better?

Nathaniel raised the torch to the funeral pyre, his other hand clutching their baby tight to his chest. Zan helped him push the raft from the shore, and we watched it float away with her, sending up sparks like red stars until it disappeared into the mist.

27

The next night Zan stood in front of my door, vacillating between knocking and walking away. He seemed to have chosen the latter only to

turn and find me on the path behind him. After explaining everything that happened with Kate, Zan had gone to see what could be done to bring Dedrick Corvalis to justice, leaving me to spend the day helping Nathaniel change and dress Ella, then feed her with my spelled milk and rock her until they both fell asleep. I slowed to a stop.

“I probably shouldn’t be here,” he stated. “I know I shouldn’t bother you. But it’s been a very hard day and I didn’t know where else I could go.” He looked up at me through his dark hair. “This is where I always used to come when I needed someplace quiet. To think, and to draw.”

I said, “Don’t let me stop you.” I went to the door and opened it, stepping aside to let him in.

It was awkward and quiet at first, as he settled into the chair with his paper and charcoal and I stoked up the fire and filled the kettle for tea. But the uneasiness abated quickly, and we were soon well absorbed in our endeavors—?him, sketching; me, raptly watching him sketch.

We both jumped when the teakettle began to sing.

I poured two cups, keeping one for myself and setting the other on the table beside him. “Can I see?” I asked.

He nodded and sat back in his chair. I shyly leaned over his shoulder to peer at his work and immediately felt my breath catch.

It was a picture of Kate laughing, pulled from some bright place in his memory. A clear and vivid portrait, full of life and color—?a feat, considering it was rendered in black and white.

When I was able to find my voice, I said, “I know the custom here is to burn the dead, and that we gave her a proper sendoff . . . but there’s a part of me that thinks that she”—?I flushed, swallowing the hard lump in my throat—?“that she deserves something more. Something to mark her passage. To remember her by.” I forced a tinny laugh. “It’s the Renaltan in me, I guess. In Renalt, a headstone is almost like a trophy for virtue. The bigger, the better.” I tapped the side of my teacup. “She deserves a monument. You know what I mean?”

“I do.” Zan regarded me for a long minute before standing. “Are you up for a walk?”

* * *

I followed him past the culvert tunnel and into the trees beyond. The terrain was rocky and rising sharply and our trail virtually indiscernible under the fog that had settled low and thick. Zan moved confidently forward, however, easily winding his way through the forest of evergreens turned brown. Looking up at the trees, he broke the silence. “You know, if it wasn’t for all this”—?he waved at the skeletal canopy—?“I’d actually want the wall to come down.”

“You want to leave Achlev open? So just anybody can come and go as they please?”