The Poison Season(96)

Tate glanced at Leelo. She didn’t want to interfere in their relationship, but she could see that her brother was uncomfortable with these kinds of questions. If she was ever going to get to know him, she needed to talk to Nigel alone.

“Tate, why don’t you go and get us some of that fresh lemonade I saw on sale,” Leelo said, handing him a few coins that Jaren had given her. “Take your time.”

He nodded, looking relieved, and hurried away.

“I’m sorry,” Nigel said almost immediately after he was gone. “I shouldn’t have brought up your mother.”

Leelo tossed some of the crust of her sandwich to a pair of ducks swimming in the creek. “It’s all right. I haven’t told Tate everything yet. There are things I’m not sure he’s ready to know.” Things she wasn’t ready to talk about.

“Does your father know?” he asked after a long silence.

Saints, he thought Kellan was still alive. Why wouldn’t he? The last thing he knew, Fiona was married with one young daughter. “My father died,” Leelo said. “When Tate was just a baby.”

All the color drained from Nigel’s face. “How? When?”

Leelo explained about her father and Uncle Hugo, stressing again that Tate didn’t know any of this and she wasn’t ready to tell him. He had been through enough already.

When she was finished, Nigel blinked and cleared his throat. “I’m so sorry. I had no idea. Your poor mother. She must have had a very difficult time after your father passed, raising two children on her own.”

“She did. She’s had a hard life.”

“I hate to think I made it harder.”

Leelo swallowed down the lump rising in her throat. “She misses you.”

Nigel looked up at her in surprise. “She spoke about me?”

Leelo nodded. “Yes. Just before I left.”

He inhaled a deep breath and released it slowly. “This is a lot to take in.”

“I know.”

“It seems as though you have friends here in Bricklebury. And I know we’ve only just met. But I want you to know that if you and Tate would like to live with me, you have a home. Always. Sir Percival and I would love to have you.”

Leelo ran her fingers through the grass, avoiding his gaze. “Thank you. That’s very generous.” She was grateful for the offer, though she couldn’t imagine going to live with Nigel now. “You know, Tate was just his nickname,” she said, desperate for a change in subject.

“Oh?”

“Our aunt came up with Tate. His real name is Ilu.”

“Ilu. What does that mean?”

“Precious one.”

He smiled. “That’s a lovely name.”

“It is,” Leelo said, glancing up to see her brother walking toward them, struggling to hold three jars of lemonade. She rose to help him, thinking of all the things that she’d once held dear—a lace-trimmed dress, a striped feather, a wooden box engraved with swans—and knew in her soul that nothing was more precious than this.



Chapter Fifty-Seven


Over the next few months, the Rebanes, the Kasks, and Nigel helped build a small cottage for Leelo and Tate, close to the Kasks’. It was hardly bigger than the shack Jaren had stayed in on Endla, but it was far sturdier, and more importantly, it was theirs. Leelo hadn’t been ready to move to Nigel’s house, to be so far away from Jaren and, if she was being honest, Fiona. She was always in Leelo’s thoughts, helping to guide her when she felt lost and afraid, which happened more than she wanted to admit now. Before, she’d known her place in the world, even if she hadn’t always agreed with it. She didn’t feel prepared to run her own household, to make all the decisions for herself and Tate. Still, Nigel was a part of their lives now, and Leelo was grateful for it.

Tate helped Lupin with the bees and often spent time at her house with the Rebanes, who still thought of him as their foster son. Leelo had gotten to know Lupin a little—as much as she could, anyway. There was something that separated them, probably the fact that Leelo had chosen to leave Endla, where Lupin had been forced to. Leelo and Jaren were the first Endlans ever to leave by choice and survive, as far as she could tell. And she was the only one who knew the songs.

But she had soon discovered that she didn’t have to sing. Or, if she wanted to, she could sing the sorts of songs that Jaren taught her. Sometimes they sang together, and the harmony of their voices would remind her of being home, and she would feel an ache in her chest that she knew was homesickness, even if she didn’t want to admit to missing Endla. Here, when she ran her fingers through the grass, there was no answering vibration. When the trees rustled overhead, they weren’t speaking to each other. There was no hum of magic in the air, and though she knew that the Forest’s magic had been evil in many ways, she missed it.

She missed helping Sage with the lambs and gathering berries and herbs in the Forest. She missed swimming in the spring-fed pools. She even missed Watcher duty sometimes, sitting on the shore as the sun rose across the water, hearing the wild swans trumpet in the sky, praying that they would land somewhere else. She missed the festivals, the way Endlan voices would join together so perfectly that it was almost as if they were one voice, the voice of Endla itself, releasing its cry into the universe. She missed feeling like she was a part of something.