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Terlu glanced up at the sky. The sun had dipped behind the tips of the pine trees, and the snow was layered with shadows. She was never going to get the chimney cleaned out and the hearth prepared for a fire before it was fully dark. She should ask Yarrow for a lantern. “Yarrow…”

“Aren’t you coming?”

“I… What? Where?” He wasn’t just walking away again?

“You can’t stay there tonight,” Yarrow said over his shoulder. “It’ll take a few days of work before the place is livable. Maybe weeks, if there are any leaks in the roof, unless you’re good with roofs?”

She’d never fixed a roof in her life. Catching up to him, she said, “I can try.”

He grunted.

Terlu realized after a few minutes of walking in silence that they were headed back to his cottage. She ran through the questions in her head and settled on the most recent: “Whose cottage was that, the blue one?”

“My sister’s,” Yarrow said.

“Oh. Is she…”

“Gone.”

“I’m sorry.”

He shook his head. “She’s not… I mean, she left, with the others. She used to send letters… She’s fine.” Reaching his own cottage, he opened the door and held it for Terlu as she went inside.

She halted just inside the doorway and gawked.

It was immediately obvious what was different.

He’d moved in a second bed, wedged it in between the first bed and his desk, and piled it high with blankets and pillows.

Curled in the center of the new bed was the winged cat, his emerald-green wings tucked around him.

He opened one eye as they entered and then tucked his head closer, his nose under his paw.

Behind her, Yarrow closed the door and was hanging his coat on the hook. “I know it isn’t luxurious, but the bedding is clean. Or it was, before Emeral shed fur and feathers all over it.”

He sounded embarrassed, but she was amazed.

Despite brushing her off before, he’d taken the time to haul in a new bed and made it so inviting that Emeral had already settled in.

She’d thought Yarrow only wanted her off this island and out of his (gloriously streaked-with-gold) hair, or at least as far from him as possible, but this…

This was kindness. She swallowed hard. It had been a while since someone was kind to her, she realized, even before the whole statue debacle.

She’d tried so hard for so long to be friendly, to make friends, to be useful, to please, and she’d been told so often: Stop trying so hard.

You try too hard. Just… relax. Be yourself.

It was advice that she could never seem to take.

Most recently, or recently six years ago, there’d been a librarian, a woman about her age on the third floor, who had agreed to meet her for tea once.

Eilia. She’d had white-and-purple hair and a fondness for ginger cookies.

But Terlu had pushed too hard to be friends and had ended up pushing her away.

You’re a lot, Eilia had told her, after she’d asked to meet up for the third time in the same week and baked her a tray of ginger cookies with orange zest. It’s nothing personal, Eilia had said, but at this point in my life, I don’t have the time and energy for a lot.

It had felt quite personal. Shortly after, Terlu had stumbled across the spell to create an alive and aware plant… Anyway, this was nice. “Thank you.”

He shrugged and looked away. “If you aren’t comfortable, I can also stay in the greenhouse. I’ve done that before. It wouldn’t be a problem.”

“Oh no! I’d never kick you out of your cottage.”

“I know I’m a stranger.”

Cheerfully, she said, “A stranger is just a friend you haven’t yet met.” And then she winced. Had those words actually come out of her mouth? That was the kind of saying you said to four-year-olds, not to grown men who you’d be sleeping next to.

Wait. Sleeping next to?

With this configuration, she really would be sleeping inches away from him.

She felt heat rising into her cheeks. “In winter when I was a kid, all the children in my home village used to sleep in a big pile in the same room around the stove. I thought it was so we could be together, but in retrospect, I think it was so the adults only had to feed a few fires instead of heating lots of separate houses. Those nights are some of my best memories.”

“Hmm.” It was a noncommittal noise, but better than silence.

Encouraged, Terlu asked, “You mentioned you have a sister?” He could try thinking of her like a sister, unless he didn’t like her. Did he have fond memories of her?

“Mmm.” He crossed to the kitchen. “Do you like zucchini?”

“What?”

“Zucchini.” He glanced over his shoulder at her hopefully. “Also called courgette or baby marrow. It’s a kind of summer squash that’s edible if you harvest them when the seeds are immature. I like them roasted with black pepper.”

She’d never had zucchini before. She’d also never encountered such an abrupt subject change. But if he didn’t want to talk about his sister, that was fine. She wasn’t going to push. “Sounds delicious. Can you grow vegetables year-round here?”

He brightened at the question. “There are four greenhouses devoted to edible plants, and they’re each kept in a different season so that there is always one ready to harvest.” He talked as he sliced zucchini, which looked like matte-green cucumbers to her.

“There’s also one greenhouse devoted exclusively to tomatoes, which are technically classified as fruit, despite their treatment in recipes. ”

“A whole greenhouse of only tomatoes?” It wasn’t what she wanted to talk about, but she was happy that he was talking. He grew twice as animated when he was talking about his garden, his normally deep and gruff voice growing more excited. It was, frankly, adorable.

“Yes! They’re sorted by shape: globe, beefsteak, cherry, grape, plum, and oxheart, as well as whether they’re bush tomatoes or vining.

We have every variety in the Crescent Islands Empire, which is three thousand seven hundred six.

One of my cousins used to be able to identify the exact type of tomato by taste alone. ”

He had the most soothing voice she’d ever heard.

Combined with the soft crackle of the fire and the warmth seeping into her, she felt all the muscles that had knotted up begin to unwind.

She had to remind herself there was still a plethora of questions she needed him to answer.

Otherwise, Terlu could have listened to him talk about tomatoes for hours.

“Did that cousin live in one of the cottages too?”

“The round toadstool-like one, with his parents.” He fell silent. He continued to slice zucchini, then laid out the medallions in a dish with a dollop of oil. Over on the bed, Emeral stretched, pushing at the pillows with his paws and arching his back.

Terlu waited to see if Yarrow would say more.

He didn’t.

She pushed a little more. “When did they leave? Your family?”

“I was a kid when the sorcerer dismissed my cousin’s family,” Yarrow said.

Okay. So, a while ago. “And where did they go, after they left?”

“I heard they settled in Alyssium eventually, and Aunt Rin opened a florist shop that caters to nobles—my aunt wrote to my father a few times.” He didn’t look at her while he spoke. He focused only on the food, slicing tomatoes to lay on top of the zucchini.

“A florist shop sounds lovely.”

He grunted and glanced at her. His eyes, she noticed, were as green as the zucchini.

And he’d shaved, which made his cheeks look soft.

His black-and-gold hair was tied back with a gold ribbon, and it occurred to her to wonder if he’d made an effort for her.

No, she thought, he’s just a neat and orderly person.

“What about the others?” she asked. “From the other cottages?”

He returned to his tomatoes before he answered. “A season later, Laiken dismissed Uncle Rorick, Finnel, and Percik, and they joined Aunt Rin’s family in Alyssium.”

Laiken—that was the name of the sorcerer who the rose was looking for.

I shouldn’t have left her. “Why did he do it?” Terlu asked.

“The sorcerer, I mean. Why did he send your family away?” She kept her voice soft and gentle, so as not to startle him back into silence again.

It felt like trying to lure a feral cat to her hand.

She was grateful for every tidbit of himself he shared with her.

He slid the dish of zucchini into the brick oven. “Said we didn’t need so many gardeners running around the place. By the time he died, it was just my father and me.”

She hadn’t seen his father or any hint he was still here. Had he died too? How did she ask that? How long ago? “Your father…”

“He left too.” Returning to the kitchen counter, he began to make a salad, chopping a fresh head of lettuce and dumping the leaves into a bowl.

At least his father hadn’t died. She breathed easier. Still, though… “He left you? When? Why?” She knew she was being too nosy. Any second now, he was going to clam up and quit answering. But she wanted to know more about him, her rescuer.

“He was sick.” Yarrow shrugged. He added a handful of red berries to the salad, followed by a handful of shelled sunflower seeds. “No doctors here.”

That must have been incredibly hard, both for Yarrow and his father. She tried to imagine what it was like, to send your sick father away not knowing if he’d recover and to stay behind on an abandoned island not knowing if you’d survive. How long had Yarrow been alone? “When was that?”

He was quiet for a moment, and she wasn’t sure he was going to answer. While the silence stretched, he mixed herbs with oil before pouring the freshly made dressing onto the salad. “About two years ago.”

That was too long to live alone. Even with the company of a winged cat. Her heart went out to him, and she wished she dared reach out and hug him. “None of them came back to check on you? Or just to visit?”

He shrugged and set the salad on the table. He did it all with such smoothness that until it was on the table in front of her, she didn’t realize it was the fanciest and freshest salad she’d ever been served.

“But you can’t care for this many greenhouses on your own.” She didn’t have to know about gardening to know it was too much work for one person, especially if the magic that kept the greenhouses intact was failing. “Have you told them—”

“Can we…” He ducked his head so he wouldn’t meet her eyes. “… not talk?”

Terlu felt her face flush. She shouldn’t have pushed. It wasn’t any of her business, and she barely knew him. She began to apologize. “I’m—”

A thwack sounded against the door.

The cat’s ears twitched forward, but otherwise he didn’t move.

“What was that?” Terlu asked.

He shrugged. He does that a lot, she thought.

Shrugs and grunts seemed to be his favorite form of communication.

It was a minor miracle she’d gotten so many words out of him.

Not a miracle. A mistake. She should have waited until he was ready to open up to her.

Her curiosity wasn’t more important than his comfort. She needed to be more patient and not—

Another thwack .

“Snow falling off the roof,” Yarrow said.

From outside, a voice screeched, “Let me in!”

Who was— Oh.

“I can explain,” Terlu began as Yarrow opened the door.

On the step, in the snow, the resurrection rose shivered. “Finally.”