Susan's Summer (21 page)

Life at the Arsenals’ was relaxed and happy until I made the mistake of walking too close to the Marchell land. Of course, it had to be a day when Terry was out wandering in the fields. She was with two other girls, but they turned up their noses at me and wandered far enough away so that they didn’t have to speak to me. Terry, of course, decided to come over and talk to me, her face set in a nasty sneer.

“Been weeding again?” she asked. “I thought you were a strong enough Summer Fairy that you didn’t have to . . . work on your hands and knees?”

I gasped. There were lines of decorum and she had just leaped across one.

I looked down at my dirty hands and the knees that had spent the morning braced in dirt, all because I liked to pull weeds with my hands and not my Glamour. There was something satisfying about not taking a shortcut.

“Do we really have to do this?” I asked tiredly. I wasn’t interested in getting into an argument with her, not when it was such a beautiful day.

“Do this?” she spat out. “You tell me! You’re the one who came here—uninvited—and now spend all your time throwing yourself at me! I mean, really! Come on! Who do you think you are? Just because your stupid cousin got himself KILLED and your other stupid cousin, his STUPID brother, had a hand in it does NOT mean you can come here and act however you damn well please. It’s just pathetic. What does Logan think he’s going to do? Bring his brother BACK from the dead? Madness!”

Fury pounded in my ears as I stepped closer to the fuming Winter Fairy.

“Don’t ever talk to me about Holt again,” I said quietly. “If you do I swear I’ll bury you and use your skin as a sack to put dirt and weeds in.

“Terry, dear, whatever are you doing?”

My breath caught when I saw Rout and Cressa coming in our direction. The two other Winter Fairies that had been with Terry were now flanking the royal couple. Cold rolled ahead of them in waves, washing over me and cementing my fear.

“Just chatting with the Arsenals’ guest,” said Terry cheerfully. She could switch gears so fast it made my head spin. One second she was an evil, sniveling fairy and the next she was simpering and attentive. I could never be that superficial, not to say totally dishonest and manipulative, for which I was glad. I guess that’s why I was a Summer Fairy.

“Ah, Susan,” said Rout. I noticed he had a viselike grip on his wife’s arm; she flinched a little as they came closer. She looked pale and drawn, about the same as she had at the party.

“Out examining the Arsenal land, are you?” His eyes looked hard, and I wondered if he had noticed the damage along the property line.

“Just taking a walk,” I said.

“You couldn’t change and shower before you did?” one of the female Fairies smirked.

“Didn’t think I had to,” I muttered. “I thought I was among friends.”

“Oh, come now,” said Rout jovially. “Of course you are! Seth isn’t taking very good care of the place, is he.” It was a statement, not a question. “It’s interesting that you’re being so helpful to him; I myself am rather worried that it’s a lost cause.”

“What’s a lost cause?” I asked.

Rout looked at me like I was simple. I wondered how Teegan could stand it here and I wished he was around, just to add some balance to the situation. Then again, with the Prince of his Court setting the tone there might not have been much he could do.

“Without his father, the place is falling into disrepair. It really isn’t going to last much longer unless they open it up to the outside world again. I have petitioned the Supreme Council to take over for the Arsenals, since they’re so obviously in over their heads.”

“You can’t take over for the Arsenals,” I cried without thinking. “You’re a Winter Fairy!”

Rout smiled indulgently and I felt my body turn cold. Under the façade of condescending indulgence, that smile said that he hated the Arsenals and he hated Seth. If nothing else was clear, that was.

“So, you want his land to consolidate more power for yourself?”

Cressa’s eyes widened a little. She clearly wasn’t used to anyone speaking against her husband, but in the Fairy Courts I came from we could speak our own minds! That’s how Lydia and Leslie managed to be so obnoxious without ever having gotten punched in the face. I smiled a little at the memory, astonishingly enough.

“My dear,” he said, “look at the land. It’s struggling in the extreme, and we must do something about it. This is the best way, really. Do not fear. Seth is in far over his head and he needs help. I’m going to give it to him, and I’m only doing what’s right for all Fairies. His pathetic weakness puts us all at risk. You yourself should realize that you’re not safe there. The land itself isn’t safe at this point. Once the Supreme Council grants my petition, everything will be much better.”

“Much better according to you,” I shot back.

“Naturally,” he said. “My parents agree with me.”

“Three times the crazy doesn’t make sane,” I spat back.

The smile disappeared from Rout’s face as he let go of Cressa’s arm and took a menacing step forward. I saw his wife and Terry shrink back a little. They were afraid of him, even Terry. So much for her blustering pretense of strength.

“You listen to me, you stupid little Summer Fairy,” he hissed. “I will have the Arsenal land to rule over. Seth could have made it easy. He could have just given it to me, or he could have married Terry here in order to make our land stronger from being united, but NO. He had to be stubborn. There are consequences for being stubborn, and once the Supreme Council’s ruling comes down he will be forced to see that.” Rout’s eyes bulged and his hands were clenched into fists at his sides.

In my own mind there was a little mantra playing: Never, never again walk so close to the Marchell property line alone. Never, never again.

Out loud I said exactly nothing, but neither did I back away. For once—a new feeling lately—I kept my temper and just held my gaze until it was Rout who had to back down.

His smile returned as he did, though, and it wasn’t pleasant. “Enjoy your walk,” he said. “It’s unlikely you’ll have many more of them.”

I watched them walk away for a long time. I told myself it was because I was deep in thought, but really it was because I didn’t want to turn my back on Rout. He was dangerous, and it was clear that his anger at Seth and his greed for the Arsenal land wouldn’t distinguish between the Arsenals themselves and any guests who might be foolish enough to wander around the property.

I was lying on a couch in the library, examining a book Katie had made for Seth that was full of pictures of flowers from his garden, with descriptions. What I was most interested in was how closely the stems intertwined with each other, because it didn’t look like the twining together was hurting the flowers at all. I would have thought they’d collide and die, but the sharing was good. Instead of becoming brown and withering away, they were thriving.

Can things that aren’t supposed to grow together really come together and thrive? I had hoped it was going to be possible with Holt and Autumn, but that wasn’t what had come to pass. I wondered what Holt would think of what was going on now if he had lived to see it.

“Are you all right?” Seth’s soft voice came from the doorway. As usual, I hadn’t heard him coming.

“Sorry,” he said, grinning. I could tell he wasn’t sorry at all. He was becoming a master at coming up so quietly I didn’t hear him. “I didn’t mean to startle you.”

“I’m fine,” I said, glancing at the book. “Just thinking.”

“About?”

“What is going on here?” I said. “Why is Rout so evil?”

Seth sighed. “Some of it I can’t tell you—Rout, for example, I can’t explain—but I can tell you something about my own family, and I will need to start with what happened to my mother. It’s not . . . it’s not something I’ve told anyone before.” He fidgeted. It was no surprise that this was difficult for him.

“It’s good to have friends, Seth,” I said. “You need people in your life who care about you and can help you. I don’t know what the Marchells are after, but if they attack you, you’re going to need all the help you can get, and closing yourself off isn’t the best idea.”

Seth’s face instantly clouded; he had tried to steer me away from that topic and I had gone right back to it. I wondered if he would just shut down again, but instead he came closer and sat by my side on the couch. Once he had arranged himself there he stared off into the distance, his face still closed off, his body tense. I wanted to scoot over and wipe the frown off his face, but I didn’t dare.

“My mother died in an accident. We—my sister, me, my mother—we were outside, and she died. My dad wasn’t home. He didn’t have a chance to say goodbye. The reason people don’t know the real story i-is be-because—well, my dad thought it was my fault.”

Seth paused for so long I thought he wouldn’t continue. He was fighting some strong emotion, something he had fought and lost to in the past.

“So, he thought it was my fault,” he tried to continue, then stopped again.

Now I rested my hand on his arm. It was cold. It barely registered in his awareness, but I felt a slight prickling of his skin. “Seth, I’m so sorry. That’s awful.”

I was totally present with him in that moment, giving him my closest attention, but a small part of me thought of Logan. The same thing had happened to him. In a way, I guess I did blame him for Holt’s death. If he could just have minded his own business, Holt might still be alive. Yes, Logan was a teenage guy; he didn’t care about family politics, and he wasn’t supposed to care yet, and yet he had, even though Autumn had been nothing but kind to him. It was the sort of disappointment I felt in my gut and my bones.

“So, my dad thought it was my fault,” Seth continued, so quietly I had to lean forward to hear him. “But it wasn’t.”

The terrible thought that his mother had committed suicide entered my head. But I had never heard that she was unhappy; in fact, I had always heard, from the Roths, from my own parents, how incredibly happy the Arsenals were, and that their peace and contentment were what made their court so strong: it was because their leaders, their King and their Queen, were united.

Seth read the horror on my face and shook his head. “No, that wasn’t my mother. She wanted to take care of us and be here for us. I guess you never really know what’s going on with people, and that could have been true of my parents. Maybe they had problems they hid from me, and from everyone, but I think they were happy.”

He moved his arm. At first I was startled and thought he was sliding away from me, which would have been devastating. But he wasn’t. Instead he slid his arm up so that our hands collided and our fingers held fast. I fought the urge not to smile, and lost. I was relieved that he took as much comfort from our touch as I did.

I had never been a big hand-holder. I guess with the right person anything is possible.

Seth kept looking away, but a little color returned to his face with our reinforced connection.

“My mother was working on the hill, and remember, my sister was young. She thought it would be funny when it started to rain if we slid down the hill. I mean, it was basically a massive mud slide and she loved it, thought it was hilarious to play on it. I don’t know how, because now she hates to get dirty and won’t even come out in the garden.”

I had noticed as much. Katie hadn’t come out back with me and had never offered to bring Mae out either. Now I knew that it had something to do with her mother and that Seth really was taking care of everything around the house.

“So, she started sliding while my mom and I worked. She was loving it, and we could hear her whooping and laughing.” Seth smiled at the memory. “But . . . one time she started to slide backward and my mom wasn’t paying attention. My mom walked in front of her and Katie hit her, hard. My mom toppled down the hill, and you’ve seen the hill.”

He pointed off vaguely in the direction of that hill. It was true; I had seen it. It sloped down toward a lake so steeply that I hadn’t dared to try and climb down. I had a feeling Seth knew a special way down, and I had been waiting to ask him about it.

“My mom fell into the lake. She hit the water wrong.” Seth’s eyes were distant. I felt bad that he even had to remember such a thing, let alone relive it in order to tell me.

“I never saw her move again. When she was falling down the hill Katie was yelling, my mom was screaming. It was this insane freak accident. I was just coming back from grabbing us all lunch, and I was too far away to do anything. I think they both tried to use some sort of magic, and I’ve never understood what happened with that. If the magic collided and failed, if they were both too upset to do a proper spell. . . .”

He said the words as if he knew he had to say them as part of his healing, but he still didn’t want to. I understood that part, for sure.

Tears pricked my eyes as I stared at him. “How could your father blame you?”

Seth shrugged. He didn’t really want to say more and I could understand that. Just the telling had been tiring enough.

“I couldn’t let him blame Katie,” said Seth through gritted teeth. “She wasn’t strong enough to take it.”

The idea that Seth had sacrificed himself, even his father’s love, for his little sister made me sad even as it warmed my heart to see it.

“Katie has never been out to the garden since. When my dad found out what happened, I expected him to grieve and cry and never be the same. Maybe he would never go into the garden—and I guess he didn’t, and that was understandable as far as it went—but he didn’t do
anything
. He just sort of slumped in on himself and disappeared. I have never missed anyone so much.

“We didn’t really have family to turn to. Other members of the Court didn’t know what to do. Some tried to be understanding, but they had never had a King who wouldn’t rule before. Some tried to grab power, which was when I was forced to return from school. My dad has never been the same.”

I remembered Mrs. Roth telling me about the Arsenal Queen’s funeral. She had offered to help Seth’s dad in any way she could, and he had just stared off into the distance and said nothing. She had expressed worry about the Arsenal children, but they said they were fine. Obviously.

“And Katie?”

“I don’t think she really remembers what happened. Maybe she blocked it out, but I didn’t want her to live with the reputation of having accidentally killed her mother. You thought what the Marchells did the night of the dinner party was bad, and it was, but that would be WAY worse.”

Seth grinned at me. “I know the feeling, but don’t worry. You’ll be fine. It’s better in the light of day.”

“Does everything look better in the light of day?” My voice was soft. I knew it was a faulty hope.

“Some things can’t look better,” he said. “If I learned anything, I learned that.”

There wasn’t much else I could say. Seth had explained part of his role in the reclusiveness of the Arsenals, but he hadn’t explained everything. I still wondered why his father had simply run away. It felt irresponsible. Yes, the love of his life had died under gruesome and awful circumstances—I couldn’t imagine anything worse—but he had responsibilities and other people who loved him.

When I thought about that, I thought of myself. I had been so lost in grief over the past few months that I had stopped functioning in any other way. I had retreated into myself, and it wasn’t like I had done it in order to heal. I hadn’t. I had just been trying not to get hurt anymore, which was probably counterproductive, because if you’re alive you’re going to get hurt. It’s what you so with the hurts and the pain that really matters. I was realizing, finally, that I needed to be strong for the Roths, but also for myself. They deserved better than having another zombie in the family to take care of.

I was glad Seth had told me, but I was also frustrated, because I had also wanted to ask him about us, and now certainly didn’t seem like the time.

We sat in silence, each lost in our own thoughts.

~ ~ ~

“I figured out something about the plants,” I said after a long while.

Seth smiled a little. “What is that?”

I think the smile was genuine, because I made him happy, and relieved, and because he didn’t want me to ask the million uncomfortable questions that were running through my mind like, WHERE IS YOUR FATHER?

“So, if you look at those two,” I said, pointing to one of the pictures in Katie’s book, “the white flower and the yellow flower that were intertwining? The thing is, they only have one set of roots now. They’re totally combined, and what I think is, that’s what was always supposed to happen. I think they were connected from the beginning, and whether we could see it or not, this was the only thing that was going to happen. They may look different, but they weren’t going to survive without each other.” I glanced nervously at Seth. I blushed when I realized that he was staring at me. I wasn’t sure what was on his face, but it was something close to wonder. When our eyes met he grinned. His thumb started rubbing the web between my own thumb and finger gently, creating little pockets of heat.

Then he leaned in and kissed me. Right over the picture I was trying to explain. I forgot everything but the feel of his lips on mine.

This summer wasn’t going anything like the one I had planned, and despite all my confusion and uncertainty, I liked it.