Page 31 of Wings of Starlight

“Oh?” Clarion pressed, unable to keep the interest out of her voice now. “What for?”

“Before I go home, I do my own sweep for Nightmares.”

Clarion nodded. “Did you find any in her house?”

“No, I…” Artemis looked flustered now. She raked a hand through her roughly shorn hair. “I suppose I was curious about what she was making. It’s something that would make scouts’ jobs much easier.”

Satisfied, Clarion smiled innocently and folded up the letter. “I see. Well, we can take another look later today.”

“As you wish, Your Highness.” She gave her a sour look, which nearly made Clarion laugh. Perhaps she should tease her more often. She was far too easy a target. “We can go after your meeting with the Minister of Spring, which is in an hour, in case you’ve forgotten.”

She groaned. Shehadnearly forgotten. Hopefully, Iris would not keep her fortoolong. Only she stood between Clarion and Winter.

When Clarion had gotten ready, she and Artemis made their way to Spring Valley. Although she always felt the most at home in Summer, Spring never failed to delight her. It was the domain of Pixie Hollow’s garden-talents, fairies capable of making flowers bloom. Clarion could see their handiwork everywhere she looked: trees dripping with citrus fruits, golden forsythia, delicate sprays of wisteria, wild strawberries ripening in warm patches of sunlight. As they flitted through the woods, Clarion caught glimpses of their houses cradled in the branches, all of them with roofs of fuchsia and trumpet flowers.

They arrived in Springtime Square, the heart of Spring Valley. At this early hour, gauzy skeins of fog drifted off the Never Sea and filled the clearing. Two massive cherry trees framed a view of the water—and a moss-covered stone from which a single flower bloomed: the Evergreen. Its soft white petals were folded around itself like a slumbering fairy’s wings. It bloomed only on the spring equinox, when spring was due to arrive on the Mainland. Each year, every fairy poured into this clearing for the queen’s final review of Spring’s preparations. Despite the long days of work ahead, some stayed up until dawn to watch its petals unfurl with the sunrise.

One day, Clarion hoped to see it herself.

Iris waited for them beside the Evergreen, limned in the sunlight. Today, she wore a gown of crocuses, with long bell-like sleeves that enveloped all but the tips of her fingers. Her hair flowed down her back like a sheet of dark water. Her face—uncharacteristically pensive—brightened upon seeing them.

After the three of them exchanged pleasantries, Iris sighed. “I’d hoped to have more to show you today. Thank you for coming anyway.”

Clarion frowned. “What do you mean?”

Iris’s lips parted in surprise. “Did Her Majesty not tell you?”

Clarion’s heart sank. “Tell me what?”

Iris hesitated. “It might be easier to show you. Come see.”

With a flutter of her wings and a shower of pixie dust, Iris took flight. She led them deeper into Spring Valley until they came to an open field. What Clarion saw made a shiver of horror run through her. A line of decay carved through the meadow—and headed straight toward Winter. Or perhaps more accurately:fromWinter. Whatever had passed through here seemed to have drained the very color from the foliage. Wilting, desiccated blooms and the shattered remains of what looked to be a trellis were scattered among the trampled grass. The faint scent of rot reached her even from here.

“By the second star,” Clarion muttered.

“The scouts came by this morning to assess the damage.” Iris wrung her hands together fretfully. “No one was hurt. No one besides the flowers, anyway.”

Clarion could tell even the flowers’ deaths pained her. Most spring fairies, after all, could commune with them. She glanced at Artemis and hoped her meaning was clear:Did you know about this?

Artemis shook her head.

Yet another thing Elvina hadn’t seen fit to inform her of. And yet another reminder how urgently she and Milori needed to figure out how to destroy the Nightmares.

“I’m very relieved to hear that no one was hurt,” Clarion said softly. “I’m sorry about the field.”

“You’re very sweet to say that, Your Highness,” Iris said, clearly trying to sound more chipper than she felt. “I’msorry that some of the work we did for your coronation was ruined. But Her Majesty will take care of the Nightmares, and we’ll have everything fixed in no time. In the meantime, let me show you what my water-talents have been up to. You’re going toloveit.”

Clarion scarcely had time to reply before Iris shot off in another direction. Clarion followed as quickly as she could. If only she had so much energy at this hour.

Iris guided her a short distance before diving back through the canopy. They landed on the banks of a river just as a group of dragonflies darted by in a flash of iridescent wings. When Clarion regained her bearings, she drank in the sound of the water-talents’ domain: burbling water, the croak of frog-song and the drone of insects, and her subjects’ laughter, as sparkling as a brook flowing over stones.

Clarion had always loved to watch the water-talents at work. Some of them drifted on the current on boats made of birch bark and lily pads, encouraging the golden fish drifting just beneath them. Others lounged on half-submerged logs, shrouded by curtains of cattail and fern. Others still skipped across the surface, leaving the barest ripples in their wake. It made Clarion’s breath catch with equal measures of wonder and nerves. As a rule, fairies could not swim; waterlogged wings were too heavy. But the water-talents were fearless and joyous—and perfectly at ease.

At least, until they noticed her. When she passed by, they fell abruptly silent. Clarion was torn between the impulse to smile encouragingly and look away so that they didn’t feel scrutinized.

“Here we are,” Iris said brightly.

It took a moment for Clarion to register what she was looking at. They stood before a vast spiderweb strung on a frame of branches. It was beaded with more dewdrops than Clarion could fathom, each of them stained with dye. It was, she realized, a mosaic—one fashioned to look like her. When the sun struck it, the water refracted the light and scattered multicolored patterns on the forest floor.