Page 17
Story: The Hazelwood Pact
The path to the Heartroot began in loam and shadow, in the breath of the grove’s deep memory, under arching hazel branches that had stood since the Hollow was first named. Rowan stood at the edge of the old grove, the hem of her cloak damp with morning dew and nerves.
The entrance had been hidden, woven into a thicket of brambles and elder leaves, sealed by the kind of spell that smelled like starlight and tasted like old promises.
Elder Thistle had opened it with three drops of blood and a whisper that curled through the roots like smoke.
Then she’d stepped back. "Only the bonded may pass. "
Rowan had expected something more dramatic, possibly with glowing glyphs or a choir of whispering ancestor ghosts. Instead, the ground simply breathed once, like an old sleeper stirring, and parted in silence.
Now, with Linden beside her, Rowan descended.
The tunnel was narrow, carved into earth and root.
The walls glistened faintly, threaded with luminous lichen and ancient runes that pulsed when they walked past, as if recognizing them or warning them.
The air was cool and smelled of petrichor and moss and something sweet beneath it, like the memory of honeysuckle.
Their footsteps echoed in the hush, two heartbeats moving toward something vast.
Rowan’s magic itched beneath her skin. She flexed her fingers, grounding herself in the rhythm of the descent.
Linden’s hand brushed hers.
She looked over, ready to deliver something cutting.
A little deflection, maybe, something about the suspiciously theatrical lighting or how this entire descent into the belly of the world felt like a metaphor the universe was being a bit too on-the-nose about.
She opened her mouth, perfectly prepared to mutter something about overgrown drama caves.
But the words dried up the moment she saw his face.
Because Linden was looking at her the way he always did.
The way he had ten years ago, in the shadow of summer oaks and youthful dreams. The way he had in the greenhouse, hands gentle and reverent as he touched like he was still discovering the shape of her.
Like her soul was an orchard and he had all the time in the world to tend it.
He was looking at her like he would wait forever, if she asked. Like every cracked step in this crumbling spiral path was worth it, because she was beside him.
It was too much.
Too much and not enough.
"You’re quiet," she said instead, softer than she meant it, voice tugged down by the weight of the place and his eyes and the blooming ache in her chest.
"I’m listening," he murmured, words gentle as moss.
She blinked at him. "To what?"
He tilted his head slightly, moonlight in his hair, calm as a sun-warmed stone. "To you. To the magic." His smile tilted just a little, crooked and knowing. "They’re not so different, you know."
Her heart stuttered, her fingers twitched, and her sarcasm rose on reflex like a shield. She looked away sharply, cheeks heating. “Bloody leafboy,” she muttered under her breath.
It wasn’t clever. It wasn’t even particularly insulting.
But he grinned anyway, like it was the best thing he’d heard all day.
They walked on.
Down and deeper still, past arching roots so thick and knotted they might have been carved from old bone, past runes that shimmered as if they remembered names long since forgotten. The air was sweet with damp loam and lavender, laced with the pulse of something living. Ancient. Waiting.
And then, without warning, the path widened.
They stepped into the first chamber. A hollow within the roots, where the earth gave way to a soft golden light, thrumming through gnarled wood and delicate green-veined moss.
The ceiling arched high overhead, a dome of interwoven roots glowing faintly, as if kissed by sunlight from within. It pulsed gently.
And it knew they were here.
Rowan’s breath caught. Something in her chest pinched, tight and fast, like a memory trying to surface.
She stepped forward and stumbled. Her boot caught on a stone. A slight trip, a brief lurch. Her palm smacked into the chamber wall, bracing herself.
And her magic… surged.
It was wild, molten, trembling. A burst of aching heat that hit her low in her belly and all along her spine. A gasp wrenched from her throat as light crackled at her fingertips, her pulse stumbling in kind.
Too much. Too close.
She could feel the Heartroot pulsing back. Responding. Like the ley recognized her, and wasn’t quite sure if it trusted her.
"Rowan?" Linden’s voice was soft, worried.
And then his hands were on her. Steady and warm. One palm at her lower back, the other brushing lightly against her wrist. No pressure. Just presence.
A quiet anchoring.
Rowan swallowed hard. Her heart was doing stupid things. So was her magic. Her whole body was betraying her, leaning toward him like ivy to a sunbeam.
“I’m fine,” she said, too quickly. Her voice brittle around the edges.
Linden didn’t argue.
Didn’t ask her to be more than she could.
He just waited. Holding her hand like it wasn’t trembling. Letting her magic shiver without fear. Giving her that impossibly gentle patience that made her want to scream or cry or melt into the curve of his neck and beg him to never stop.
She hated how much she needed it. Hated how good it felt to be… allowed.
Allowed to lean. To falter. To rest.
“Stop looking at me like that,” she muttered, still not meeting his eyes.
“Like what?” he asked, thumb brushing along the inside of her wrist.
“Like I’m some soft thing you want to wrap in silk and keep in your pocket,” she mumbled.
His smile was slow and warm and utterly unrepentant. “You’d be a very grumpy pocket witch.”
“You’re not wrong.”
They moved on. Hand in hand, breath and bone.
A rhythm born not just of footsteps, but of something deeper, like roots slowly threading together beneath the soil.
No need to speak now. Not with magic whispering along the walls, in the silver-veined stone, in the hush between heartbeats.
The deeper they went, the quieter the world became.
Even their thoughts seemed muffled, wrapped in moss and stillness and time older than names.
The stone beneath their feet had changed. No longer rough-hewn or broken, but smooth as water-worn riverbed, veined with the lifeblood of the land, silver like moonlight on skin, green like fresh sap, and red like a wound that would not close. Like the memory of pain. Like promise.
Rowan’s breath began to fog in front of her lips, though the air was not cold. Not exactly. It was more like the atmosphere of the deep ocean, thick and pressed close around them, expectant. Every step down vibrated in her teeth.
Her magic thrummed low and hot in her belly. A warning, or maybe a welcome. A kettle just below the boil, ready to sing.
And then they reached the edge.
The final descent was a spiral of old stone worn smooth by time and reverence. It bore no marks of chisel or tool, just the silent authority of something meant to be .
Rowan stepped onto the first stair, and the glow around them brightened. From forest green to gold… and then deeper still, to something older. Root-deep. Heart-true. The color of blood and honey and everything buried.
At the bottom, the chamber waited. It was intimate.
A circle of standing stones, their faces weathered and vine-kissed, ringed a shallow basin of rich earth.
Soft and fragrant with loam, moss, and the hum of growing things.
Twining ivy glowed faintly, curling like lazy serpents over the stones in ancient spirals, their leaves lit from within.
The ceiling above shimmered with memory , an aurora of half-seen things that brushed the edges of Rowan’s senses: a mother’s lullaby, the ache of her first spell, the exact sound Linden made when he laughed too hard and forgot to be careful.
At the center stood a low stone platform, shaped not for display but devotion. It bore no throne, no altar. Just a place to kneel, or lie, or open yourself to something larger. The carved symbols along its edge pulsed in rhythm with Rowan’s heart.
Which was when she realized: so did the vines. So did the stone. So did Linden.
Everything in this place was attuned to her and it terrified her.
She stopped.
Magic snapped taut in her chest like a bowstring, her skin too hot, her stomach turning. Her mouth was dry. Her bones too full of electricity. Of choice.
Linden’s hand was still in hers.
He paused when she did. Didn’t speak right away. Just turned to her fully. The way he always did, like she was the axis around which the world spun.
“It’s all right to be afraid,” he said, quiet as a vow.
Rowan laughed, and the sound cracked. Brittle. Barely held together. “I’m not afraid. I’m just…”
“Yes, you are,” he said. Gently. Not accusing. Just truth, soft and terrible. Then he reached out and cupped her cheek.
“This will change us,” she whispered, like a confession. “If I let it. If I let you. ”
Linden’s thumb traced the edge of her jaw. His eyes, green as spring rain, never left hers. “If all that I am — my essence, my power — is to be bound to someone,” he murmured, “I’m glad it’s you.”
Rowan made a sound and crashed into his chest. Her fingers curled into the soft linen of his tunic like claws, holding on like she might fall through the earth if she let go.
And Linden held her. She let herself stay there for one breath. Then another. Then one more, for courage. And then she stepped back.
She looked at him. Really looked. Saw the man who’d carried her pain without asking. Who never once reached for her power like it was owed. Who had waited at the edge of her walls and never demanded to be let in.
Her voice trembled. But her eyes did not.
“Take me,” she said. “All of me.”