Page 51 of Dragon Cursed
"I will be in the trees.I will see her.I will seeyou.If anything feels wrong —anything—put your hand to the pendant.Do you hear me?You put your hand to the pendant."
"Yes."
"Swear it."
"I swear."
He pushed the curtain aside.He was gone before the second knock landed.
Poppy set the honey jar down.Crossed her kitchen on legs that had remembered, finally, that they were tired.Before she reached the door, her beautiful dragon-riding apparel disappeared, and in its place were a clean pair of jeans and a fresh sweater.She would have to thank Alsander for remembering that small detail later.
Sighing, Poppy opened the door.
Briíd O'Malley stood on her doorstep with a covered basket on her arm and little Finn beside her — his hand fisted in his mother's skirt, his cheeks pink and round and entirely free of the fever that had dimmed them.
He grinned up at Poppy.
He grinned the way only a child grins when they have decided you aretheirs.
"Miss Poppy!"
"Oh."Her voice cracked."Oh, Finn."
She crouched down.She had to.The boy let go of his mother's skirt and threw his small warm body against her, and she caught him.He smelled of soap and sunshine, and his eyes shone with the kind of innocence and joy only a child who knows he is safe and loved can have.
Poppy pressed her face into the top of his head and shut her eyes.
"He wanted to come," Briíd said softly."He wanted to thank you himself.I told him your medicine fixed him and he insisted, Poppy.He has talked of nothing else since yesterday morning."
"Finn."She said it into his hair."Oh, Finn, look at you."
"We made you cookies," Finn announced into her shoulder."With butter.The yellow ones.I helped."
"You helped."
"I stirred.I stirredso hard."
A sound that was almost a laugh moved through her.She let him go.Straightened.
Briíd was looking at her.
Poppy watched the woman's face change — the way faces always changed when people looked at her closely.The polite distance went out of it.The small wary respect the village kept for her went out of it.
What replaced them was concern.
"Poppy."
"It's nothing."
"You're white as a sheet.Are you eating?"
"I'm fine."
Briíd reached out — slowly, the way a person reaches for a bird that might startle — and laid the back of her hand against Poppy's forehead.
Her fingers were warm.
They weretoowarm.
