Total pages in book: 182
Estimated words: 171176 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 856(@200wpm)___ 685(@250wpm)___ 571(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 171176 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 856(@200wpm)___ 685(@250wpm)___ 571(@300wpm)
My heart thundered, and I knew my grin was crazed, but I couldn’t help it. I trampled through the plants—fuck, Everlass grew everywhere—and then slowed as I came up on the flower in question. Its swell of light hit a crescendo, the pink so beautiful within the hues of blue in my vision, the image soft and serene.
Weston stepped in behind me, trying to be careful where he placed his feet, and reached for my arm. I evaded his grasp easily, moving around the Moonfire Lily.
“You can’t be walking through here,” he told me, trying to follow. “You’ll ruin the plants.”
“Seriously, the Everlass is like a weed. It’s commonplace here. It’ll choke the whole forest at this rate. This flower, though. Do you know what this is?” I pointed down at it. “This enhanced my product like nothing else ever has. Just one petal boosted the effectiveness. Just one! It must be useful in other ways, but it’s always been so hard to find.” My mind was racing. “I wonder if that’s why it is called the Moonfire Lily—it keeps the pink in our vision even when everything else is blues and greens.” I just about squealed with excitement. “It’ll be so much easier to find this way.”
“You need to stop trampling the Everlass. The dragons do not take kindly to people mucking up their plants.”
“No, what we need to do is . . .” I grimaced as I looked around. “We really should take it with us. By the roots, I mean. I want to rehome it. I don’t want to leave it here and have the dragons come through and squash it or pick it thinking it is invading their weeds.”
I bent down to look more closely as it went dark. It didn’t have anything over the top of it and grew in what looked like a pathway between the Everlass. It was easy to get to.
“I just need a shovel. I can hold it in the cart if we don’t have a bucket.” I glanced up at Weston and saw that he was watching me with a blank expression. Warmth slid through the bond, though. Humor. “What?”
He shook his head. “You do remember that you’re a captive, right?”
“Yes, but seriously, your queen is going to want this plant. There is hardly anything written in books about it. It’s a ghost, this flower. And look, here it is, growing right among the dragon weed!”
Now his expression was bewildered. “Who cares about Granny’s drugs? You’re going to get yourself killed with that mouth. You cannot keep calling it that.” He shook his head, turning to his pack and calling out, “Bring a shovel and a bucket. We’re taking a plant as a prize.”
We waited for Dante to climb down from his horse and bring us the items found by the pack member digging through the carts.
“I took the petals from your work shed,” Weston told me, carefully removing me to a “safe area” just outside of the Everlass. “You’ll have those, if they’re still good.”
I gasped. “You did? Why? To analyze?”
“Mostly, yes, but also because they were pretty. I’m not sure if they’re still good at this point.”
I shrugged. “I don’t know. I’ve never let it sit this long. But this way we’ll have an actual plant. Assuming the rehoming goes okay and I can get it to grow.”
“If anyone can, it will be the palace garden keepers. I’ve seen your flowers. You should turn it over to them.”
It didn’t show on his face, but I could feel his humor. I narrowed my eyes at him and laughed when he hooked his hand on my hip to drag me closer.
“Okay, it’s true, I’m not very good at growing things. This one doesn’t like growing in the open, either. I half wonder if other plants should be put around it so that it’s happy.”
“I have no idea. All that stuff is over my head. You can mention it to the queen.”
“I’m a captive, remember? I doubt she’ll want to talk about plants with me.”
“On the contrary. That’ll be one of the main things she’ll want to talk about.”
Chapter 9
Aurelia
We rolled down the road through the trees and toward the palace entrance after full night had fallen. Dante and Sixten were able to get the Moonfire Lily carefully loaded into a bucket, staring at it in amazement for a long moment before tucking it away. They’d never seen anything like it, even though they had to have come across it once or twice in their lives. They probably just hadn’t noticed. It was easy to ignore.
A large and imposing castle came into view as Weston’s horse exited the wood and entered the palace grounds. It was lit up from the inside and stretched an impossible distance to either side. Wrapped around it were lawns so well maintained that their lushness was evident even at night. Spires reached into the sky and huge dragons circled, one opening its maw and spitting fire into the darkness. Arches curved over a great entrance with wide stairs leading down.