Page 58 of Harnessed in Gold

Reluctant as I am to let his ring go, I open my hand and offer it back to him. “Will you tell me about the hawthorn tree?” I watch him slide the band back on his finger. “Like, how you knew it wanted to weave with you.”

“You want my weaving story?”

“Yes.”

He hesitates, fidgeting with his ring as though he’s not sure where to start.

I prompt him, “How old were you?”

“Fourteen. But I’d been visiting the tree almost every day for a year.”

To make him more comfortable, I break the intense eye contact and take another bite of my sandwich.

He adds, “And the days I didn’t, it felt like there was a piece of me missing.”

“Whereisthe tree? I mean, is it in your backyard or in a park or what?”

He shakes his head. “It’s one of thousands of trees in the Reed River valley where my clan lives. About a half mile from my home.”

Okay, so it sounds like the fae don’t live in neighborhoods with cookie-cutter, split-level houses and quarter-acre yards. At least the Stag clan doesn’t. “So how did you know?”

“Well, hawthorn berries don’t usually arrive until summer and they don’t turn red until the fall, but one day in April, my tree had grown a cluster of bright red berries, right there among all the blossoms. All I did was touch them gently—” He turns up a hand and points to his palm. “—And the whole cluster dropped right into my hand.”

I stare at him, unable to conceal my fascination.

He smiles shyly and adds, “I had my weaving ritual two weeks later.”

For the moment, I’ve given up on eating. I push my plate aside and rest my chin in my hand. “What does the ritual involve?”

“It’s fairly simple, really?—”

Nope, he’s not allowed to gloss over it. “Rime said it’s the biggest moment in a faerie’s life.”

“It is.” He laughs softly. “But you don’t do much other than stand there. It’s the priestesses who do all the work.”

Holy crap, priestesses? Nàdar has priestesses? I tamp down my excitement and ignore the sugar plums dancing in my head. I’ve read way too many fantasy books. “They make the rings?”

“No, a silversmith does that. The priestesses’ job is to seal the bond. They ‘tie,’ so to speak, what we call the snáithe, or thread; it’s the universal energy that connects all of nature—all of the elements combined.”

“The Force,” I whisper, completely serious.

Leo chuckles. “Kind of, yeah. But we’re not Jedi.”

Wanna bet?

He takes a sip of his drink, picks up his sandwich, then sets it back down again. “So, in my ritual, for example, the priestesses wove the snáithe that runs through me with the snáithe that runs through the hawthorn tree—” he interweaves his fingers, “—and then also with the snáithe in the berry, binding us together.”

“And that’s why you call itweaving.”

“That’s why.”

“That’s—” There are no words. “That’s incredible,” I say lamely. But it’s accurate. I can hardly wrap my brain around any of it, it’s so beautiful and mystical and unreal. “And now you can heal people and talk to plants.”

He shrugs. “Well, not talk in words, only through energy, but yes.”

“How do trees feel about fall?” I ask, then drop my eyes to my plate. Silly question.

“You mean because they’re losing their leaves?”