Chapter 15 #2
Mouse and Thornwood trudged out into the garden. Although the rain lifted in the night, the mud remained, squelching under their feet. It pulled at Mouse’s heels. Mist settled low over the grounds and the garden like a blanket.
Thornwood balanced a sack across his shoulder. She could make out the outline of items jammed so tightly into the bag that the seams strained, barely holding together through what Mouse assumed was good craftsmanship and a fair amount of magic.
The old well rested at the bottom of a decorative pond, filled and refilled since the dark ages. Before Thistlemarsh was remodeled from a medieval castle to an Elizabethan hall, the well drew travelers from across England and Europe.
Faerie-blessed waters flowed from a spring in Thistlemarsh Wood to the well. Of course, after the Enlightenment movement arrived from the continent, such displays were deemed “unsophisticated” and un-Christian, so the well was filled. In its place was a fashionable, ornamental pool.
As often as she was in the garden, Mouse avoided the pond. Something about it made her skin crawl, although she never could pinpoint the source.
The water was glassy and green in the morning air. To the casual onlooker, the pool appeared much the same as any other in England. White water lilies adorned the surface like a crown of stars. Below, drifting orange fish danced among the stems.
A stone face peered out from between the flowers, cold gray eyes watching Mouse and Thornwood as they approached. Behind the statue’s head, a fishtail threaded in and out of the water. The tips of her split fin waved just above the surface.
“This mermaid statue has been here as long as the pond,” Mouse said. “At least, that’s what my uncle told us. But I still do not understand why the well might be a source of power. It’s not inside the house.”
“No, but it is on the grounds. I have not tried any proper magic in the gardens. Perhaps I would encounter the same issue that I do in the Hall.”
“Are you going to try?”
“It’s more complicated than that. After all, the grounds are your domain. We only dealt for the house. On top of that, it is more difficult to bend the will of living things to magic’s influence than it is to convince a chair to change its shape.”
“I did not realize that magic relied so much on persuasion.”
“Magic is a conversation. One asks the stone to rebuild the wall, and the stone listens for the price of your energy. It is all compromise.”
“You would do well in Parliament, then,” Mouse said.
Thornwood wrinkled his nose. “Hardly. After all, furniture can be reasoned with.”
She laughed, and he replied with a sly twist of his lips.
Thornwood cast his magic over the water, and the moment it touched the surface, the green orb popped like a bubble, sending ripples out in every direction.
Thornwood’s magic threw long shadows up the stone wall that crested around the back of the pond.
Waves raced through lines, illuminating them as they went.
When the orb’s light fizzled out at the water’s edge, a forest of gold vines rose above the surface.
They tangled at the top, reaching toward the house.
The light reached down through the water to the top of the well, which was crowded with gold as thick as a tree trunk.
“We can safely say there is magic down there,” Mouse said.
“The disadvantage here is that you cannot hold your breath as long as I can.”
“Is it true that Faeries cannot cross holy water?”
Thornwood scoffed. “What a ludicrous idea! Of course we can cross water, holy or otherwise.”
“It’s listed as a way to trick Faeries in many stories.”
“Undoubtedly an addition from the church,” Thornwood said with a roll of his eyes. “This was a Faerie-blessed well. Why would we bless something that we reviled?”
Mouse shrugged, and Thornwood grumbled as he shifted the pack off his back. He rummaged through it and pulled out a short sword. Mouse gasped.
“I thought we should come prepared this time in case the second dragon we meet is not as friendly as the first,” he said. He tossed the sword to Mouse. She stepped back with a shriek, and it clattered to the ground and out of its sheath.
Neither of them spoke for a moment.
“I see that sword work is not one of your strengths,” he said.
“I’ve never bloody held one, have I? Besides, you can’t just throw swords at people!”
Thornwood continued as though she had not spoken. “A dagger is probably more practical for you anyway.”
This time, when his arm emerged from the pack, it grasped a silver dagger, the hilt glimmering with a string of red stones.
He walked to her, laying the hilt in her hand and closing her fingers around it.
“Do not drop that.”
“I didn’t drop the first one on purpose!”
Ignoring her, Thornwood strapped the sword to his belt before drawing it. Then, with elegant strides, he flourished the sword, parrying an invisible enemy.
Mouse filed away the confirmation that silver did not affect Faeries, as iron might. She held the hilt of the dagger. “I hope you aren’t relying on me to do anything with this. I obviously have no skills in that department whatsoever.”
“Just imagine yourself going after a weed in the garden, and you’ll be fine.”
“I don’t usually fend off weeds with a dagger.”
“Yet, a shovel has a blade, and I’ve already seen that you are quite skilled with it. The only thing to worry about when it comes to sword work is getting the sharp end in the enemy. Everything else is affectation.”
Dubious, she held the weapon up to eye level. “I am fairly sure it is more complicated than that.”
“Not in this case,” he said. “We’d best get started before we lose our daylight.”
Thornwood unbuttoned his shirt, and Mouse coughed. He paused.
“Are you planning on going in dressed like that?” he asked drolly. “The water will weigh down your clothes, and you’ll drown.”
“You are so dramatic,” she said, but she shimmied out of her skirt and the jumper, leaving only her underclothes.
Thornwood had stripped down to his underthings, belt, and sword.
A surprising spray of freckles dotted his torso, and she noticed his muscles flex as he moved.
He tightened his sword belt across his hips, and she quickly looked away, cheeks hot.
During her time in France, Mouse had seen her fair share of men in various states of dress.
However, she’d never been this close to one outside of her nursing duties.
Not to mention, many of the men she had seen during the war were injured, leaving little time to notice much about them besides where the blood was coming from.
Not that Mouse was completely ignorant. A Canadian officer took her dancing one giddy night while she was on leave.
She let him kiss her, pressed up against her boardinghouse doorway.
He was a decent fellow, but one had to be unmarried to serve as a nurse and she felt it was unfair to lead him on when her plans revolved around Roger.
Thornwood shoved his clothes and Mouse’s into the bag and deposited it on the garden path to retrieve when they emerged from whatever challenge waited for them at the well.
They inched up to the bank.
“Ready?” Thornwood asked. She looked at him.
She recalled the whisper that drifted to her from beyond the mirrors and through the walls.
We must not buy their fruits… She shook away the words.
“Ready.”