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The kiss ended, gently, and Terlu stared into his eyes, their lips still so close that she was breathing his breath, as sweet as honey. She felt as if she were floating.

“Why?” Yarrow asked.

She stared at his lips and thought the question made zero sense. Because a kiss couldn’t last forever, even if she wanted it to? Because you eventually had to take a full breath? She repeated the word, “Why?”

“I am not someone that anyone would choose,” Yarrow said, as if it were objective fact.

Oh, by the sea. Did he think she just kissed anyone who wandered by? Terlu rolled her eyes so hard that they nearly hurt. “Stop it. I like you. It’s not any more complicated than that.”

“I know I’m the one who woke you, and I know you feel sorry that I’ve been alone—”

“It’s not pity. Or gratitude.” Stepping back from him, she poked his shoulder, hard.

“Is that what you think?” Yes, that was what he thought.

She could see it in his face. He was perfectly willing to walk away from…

whatever this was, if she said she didn’t want him.

“Maybe just accept that I wanted to kiss you.”

He took a deep breath. “Everyone I have ever cared about left.”

“And I got turned into a statue,” Terlu replied. Ugh, this was ab surd. She started to climb down the ladder. “We both have issues,” she shot up at him. “It doesn’t mean we’re doomed to be lonely and unhappy forever. Unless that’s what you want.”

“Obviously not,” Yarrow said, starting down after her.

There was nothing obvious about it. He’d chosen a hermit’s life.

“Your sister said you never wrote back to her.” Perhaps she should take that as a warning.

Was that how he handled all his relationships?

Just let them wither away? You could only have a relationship of any kind, be it family or friends or lovers, if both people were willing to reach toward each other.

It wasn’t, as some said, hard work in the sense of being unpleasant or tedious or painful—that was a myth perpetuated by people with a vested interest in telling you to stay in a terrible relationship—but it did require effort. You had to try.

“I didn’t know what to say.”

“You could have said that . It’s better than silence.

” She hadn’t meant to start an argument, especially after the swim with the sea turtle and the kiss.

Halfway down, she twisted to see the aquarium behind her.

The turtle drifted by, his flippers propelling him sideways through the water. She continued to climb down.

Above her, Yarrow said, “What about your family? What have you said to them?”

Oh? That was where he wanted to go with this? “That’s different,” Terlu said.

“Is it?”

Yes, it absolutely was. If she wrote to them, it could endanger them.

Or her. Or both… though maybe since Alyssium had fallen, no one would care that she’d been de-statued?

Okay, fine, perhaps he had a point. She shouldn’t be so afraid that they’d be disappointed in her. They loved her. “Maybe I will.”

“And maybe I’ll talk to my family. When I’m ready.”

“Good!” Terlu reached the bottom of the ladder, and she realized they’d just both agreed to do exactly what she wanted—to reach out to their loved ones, to choose to connect—and every bit of annoyance faded away.

It wasn’t a compromise; it was a victory.

“I’ll write to them and tell them I’m alive and well.

” How they felt about that would be up to them.

He reached the bottom of the ladder too.

She studied his face as if it would tell her what he was thinking and feeling.

She hadn’t meant to harp on his family, especially when she just wanted to talk about her and him.

The swim with the sea turtle had been a lovely gift, and the kiss…

lovelier still. She didn’t know how to step back into that moment and the way they’d both felt when she’d climbed out of the water.

They both stood in silence, looking at each other awkwardly, with the slice of sea above them.

As a peace offering, Terlu said, “Do you want to try the bubble spell again?”

He softened but said, “Are you sure? You don’t need to, if you aren’t comfortable. My family… I know them well enough to know they won’t betray you, not if you’re helping the greenhouse, but you don’t know them yet…”

“There are a few more variations that I’d like to try. And I do need to. Greenhouses are still dying.”

“You’re more important than any greenhouse,” Yarrow said.

Terlu forgot how to breathe.

She stared at him for what felt like an extraordinarily long moment before she inhaled again.

Wordless, she held out her hand, feeling a bit as if she were trying to coax a deer to come close enough for her to pet.

He’d been left behind over and over by the people who were always supposed to stay by his side.

Whether he should have gone with them or not, whether he should have tried to stay connected or not… it still left scars.

Yarrow took her hand.

While the sea turtle swam through the water above them, they walked together through the tunnel.

Neither of them spoke, but the quiet felt like the silence within the water, peaceful and natural.

She thought about the turtle and wondered if he was lonely.

He’d returned to the greenhouse on his own, Yarrow had said, but did he miss the sea?

Other turtles? She resolved to return and swim with him as often as she could.

She’d abandoned the spell ingredients in the greenhouse they’d been practicing in when Yarrow’s relatives had descended, and she was pleased to see they were all exactly where she remembered.

None of his relatives had found this place, which meant it was unlikely they’d interrupt the spellcasting.

Maybe I can do this without them noticing at all.

“Let me prepare them,” he offered. “You focus on the words.”

“Thanks.” She picked up the pages of her notes.

Now, which variation should she try first?

She had theories about the third line… It could be that the parameters of the bubble were fixed by a piece of spell that she’d excluded.

So if she took the measurements from the prior section, which focused on growing the pillars and support beams…

They worked side by side.

After a bit, Yarrow wordlessly handed her a slice of honey cake on an embroidered napkin.

She munched on it while she ran through the words of the spell, adjusting them in her mind.

The key was to focus the spell on its purpose while also defining its size.

As near as she’d been able to tell, the protective bubble lived a hair’s distance away from the glass.

She didn’t know which had failed first in the dead greenhouses—the bubble or the glass—but if the shield ruptured first, it could have caused the cracks in the glass by expanding against it.

Of course other spells failing too didn’t help, like the sun going out and the temperature regulation spell going haywire…

She wished she knew what exactly had caused the failure.

Regardless, this bit was key to restoring the greenhouses.

If she could master this spell, then they could cast it on the greenhouses after the talking plants fixed the cracks.

Once that was done, she’d then work to master the other spells that made the environments extraordinary.

Step by step, she thought. I can do this.

Yarrow will stand by me. She was certain of that. Whether the spell worked or not, whether she was able to restore the greenhouses or not, she wasn’t alone.

Terlu stood up. “All right. I think I’m ready to try.”

“Good,” Yarrow said.

He’d mashed the ingredients into a paste. She turned in a circle, surveying the dead greenhouse. Sunlight pierced the snow-laden ceiling, and it fell in patches, making the bare soil and withered plants look dappled. “I think we should spread the paste out, to define where we want the bubble.”

“You want the full perimeter of the greenhouse?”

“A smaller circle, for the first test.” Showing him, she walked in a circle that incorporated a few of the flower beds as well as the central junction of the paths, where they stood, approximately a twelve-foot diameter.

He smeared the paste in a thin line behind her until he completed the ring. “Ready.”

Coming to the center of the circle, Terlu spoke the words, careful to pronounce each syllable the way she’d rehearsed in her head.

She focused on the ring of ingredients as she rolled through the lines.

As she reached the end, she held the last syllable as if it were a final note in a song before she let it die into silence.

For a moment, nothing happened.

She was about to apologize to Yarrow. It might take a lot more trial and error before she made any real progress. After all, Laiken had been a master sorcerer with extensive training and decades of experience, while she was trying to eke out bits of spells from left-behind notes and—

The bubble rose from the circle, a shimmering veil. It spread up, curving to connect above them, sealing into a dome. Like a soap bubble, it shimmered with colors as the sunlight through the greenhouse glass hit it.

“It worked,” Yarrow said, awe in his voice.

“Wow.” She hadn’t expected it to just… work. Like that. She’d thought she’d have to try out several more variations of the spell be fore it resulted in a dome this perfect. Walking toward the bubble, Terlu examined it.