The next morning, Gideon asked Grimsby, Clonk, Ondine, and Uncle Kelvan to meet him in the dining hall for an important announcement. His Uncle was the last one to float in, already looking bored. Grimsby and Sir Clonk sat at one of the large circular dining tables, still covered in dust, while Kelvan’s mirror and Ondine’s ghostly form floated nearby.

Gideon realized it was not too different from the staff meetings he’d once attended in his former life as a spellmonkey at EnviroCharm. But now he was making decisions rather than just hearing about them. He swallowed nervously.

“I have important matters to attend to, Nephew,” Uncle Kelvan said. However, Gideon had no idea what those important matters were—his Uncle was cagey about what he actually did with his time down in the lab. “Need I remind you, your training isn’t for a couple more hours. How’s the aether lilium doing, anyway?”

“Uh, her few remaining leaves were looking very black this morning,” Gideon said, feeling his face grow hot with shame. “But I spent most of yesterday practicing.” Without success, he thought. “And I still have two days left, right?”

“Two days, give or take. You realize death isn’t an exact science, right?” Kelvan said, frowning. “You shouldn’t leave it to the last minute. In any event, why am I here? I told you to run things.”

“Of course,” Gideon said, “but in light of what I’m about to say, I thought you’d want to be in the loop.”

Uncle Kelvan considered this from within his mirror, stroking his beard. “Now, Nephew, I couldn’t care less what floral pattern you use for the dining arrangements or whatever. Just try not to spend any more of my money than you need to.”

“It’s about the rats.”

Kelvan’s hand fell, his red eyes narrowing slightly. “What about them?”

“I’m planning to hire them,” Gideon answered. At once, both Kelvan and Ondine frowned, then looked at each other. Grimsby grunted. “And possibly one orc, if she agrees. I’m not sure she will.”

“We could use more players for Dinner Adventures,” Sir Clonk said. “Are there any aspiring thespians among the new hires?”

“I was thinking mostly concierge, front desk, record keeping, passing messages, some housekeeping, those kind of things, at least to start with. But I could ask if any of them are interested,” Gideon said. “Good idea.”

“Are you sure about this?” Ondine asked. “Do you think people will want to stay at an inn filled with rats?”

“Our inn is already filled with rats,” Gideon said. “But now the rats will be working for us, which is entirely different.”

“They’ve kept to themselves for centuries,” Ondine said. “What changed their mind?”

He paused for a moment, unsure of how much he should say. “They’re starting to get desperately low on supplies. I saw that well enough while I was downstairs.” He felt movement in the pocket of his robes and patted it reassuringly. He looked at Ondine and thought he could see the guilt in the lines of her ghostly face. “And you owe them, don’t you? You told me an apology would be quite meaningless. But helping them is not. Certainly, it’s the least you can do.” Gideon turned to his Uncle, who was still floating there, stroking his beard. “What say you, Lord Kelvan?”

It was rare for him to address his Uncle by his title, and Kelvan looked surprised. “Well, Nephew, I said all staffing decisions would be your prerogative, and I don’t intend to rescind that. I acknowledge that I bear some responsibility for the state of all those living within the castle. Or underneath it.”

“It’s not your fault, Lord Kelvan. I was the one who—” Ondine began.

Kelvan raised a hand and cut her off. “Though they may have been your test subjects, I never attempted to stop you. On the contrary, I pushed for results farther and faster than prudence dictated, eager as I was for a breakthrough. There is plenty of blame to go around. And need I remind you of the origins of the orc Gideon mentioned.” He shook his head slowly. Yet there was a glint in his red eyes that Gideon found unsettling. “I didn’t know she was still alive… It means your experiment worked in the end, Lady Ondine. The rat trials were successfully translated to a humanoid subject. She must be two hundred and fifty years old by now.”

“Those results are hardly reproducible,” Ondine replied, frowning. She looked to Gideon. “I believe we’re missing the point. They’ll be welcome here, if they wish to come upstairs.”

“Wait,” Grimsby cried. “I’ve gotta cook for a bunch of rodents, now?”

“They can mostly cook for themselves, but they’ll need ingredients,” Gideon said. “You could cook for them sometimes? They loved your apple pie.”

“So that’s where it went,” Grimsby muttered. “I thought I’d miscounted my inventory.”

“Sorry,” Gideon said. “I took it last night. It was a last minute decision. Anyway, now that we’ve all agreed…” He paused, waiting for anyone to object. But no one did. He reached into his pocket and felt Juniper hop into his palm. He took her out and let her scamper onto the dusty table. “Juniper, meet Lord Kelvan, Lady Ondine, Grimsby, and Sir Clonk. Everybody, meet Juniper.”

“Hi, everyone,” Juniper answered, her thoughts echoing through their minds.

Ondine gasped.

Grimsby reached across the table with his bony hand, chuckling as he clasped her paw and shook it. “Grimsby Harrington. So you enjoyed the pie, did you?”

“Wow, Mr. Harrington, we all agreed it was the best we’d ever had. A few of us wanted some baking tips if you wouldn’t mind.”

“I could share the recipe and show you how it’s done,” Grimsby said. “They say teaching is good practice.”

“Do you like the theatre, Miss Juniper?” Clonk asked, leaning across the table and staring down at her intensely.

“I’m not so sure,” Juniper said hesitantly. “I never been to one.”

“Ah, well, we must fix that,” Clonk declared. “Have you read many books? I personally quite enjoy—”

“Don’t badger her, Clonk,” Ondine said, then floated down until she was level with the little rat. “Juniper, I must confess, I don’t remember you from … before.”

“That’s because we’ve never met, Miss Ashewood,” Juniper said. “I’m Rathe’s daughter.”

At this admission, Ondine looked pained and drifted backward. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I didn’t realize.” She glanced at Gideon, and he saw her eyes glimmering. But ghosts didn’t cry, did they? “Well, if we’re all done here, I’m afraid I’d better check my plants. It was a pleasure to meet you, Juniper.” She folded her hands neatly in front of her, then turned around and floated through the wall.

Uncle Kelvan nodded at the rat. “Welcome,” he said. “I hope you’ll enjoy your time here as our newest minion-associate. Please inform me if my Nephew does anything terribly stupid or disastrous. Otherwise, I prefer not to be involved in the mundanity of all this.” As if to demonstrate, he waved his hands around the room. His eyes focused on her for a moment, and then he grinned. Gideon realized he had just appraised her. “But I am impressed by your aptitude for such a tiny creature. Your father must have taught you well. Keep up with your training.”

Gideon hadn’t appraised Juniper or Rathe, because he thought it would be rude. But in light of Kelvan’s compliment, he felt the urge to check.

If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. Please report it.

Status Name: Juniper Level: 4 Attributes Might: 2 Brilliance: 12 Fortitude: 4 Willpower: 14 Finesse: 10 Skills Hydromancy: Copper, A Grade Vitamancy: Copper, C Grade Meditation: Stone, D Grade

“Thank you, Lord Kelvan. I’ll work real hard!” Juniper said, bowing forward until her nose touched the tabletop. When she looked up again, the mirror had already floated out of the dining hall.

A distant wail, unmistakably from Ondine, sounded throughout the castle. Gideon felt the hairs on his neck stand straight. He pulled out a chair, disturbing a cloud of dust that sent him into a coughing fit.

Despite her distance, Ondine’s melodious crying somehow still filled the room.

“I thought that went well,” Gideon said after he collected himself.

“It could have gone much worse,” Grimsby agreed, then looked down at Juniper. “I have an important question for you. If you could only eat one kind of pie for the rest of your life, what would it be?”

----------------------------------------

Later that morning, Gideon brought Juniper upstairs to see Chloe. He hoped the young vitamancer could offer him some advice, something new he hadn’t tried.

“Grimsby made some good arguments,” Juniper said from where she perched on Gideon’s shoulder. “But I still think cheesecake counts as a pie.”

“It’s debatable,” Gideon said as he entered his room. “I think it’s a pie-cake hybrid.”

“You should have said that downstairs,” Juniper cried. “You were no help at all during the debate.”

“I was trying to decide if a hot dog was a sandwich. It’s a similar dilemma. Anyway, I’m not going to argue with Grimsby about food.” Gideon smiled. “You realize you didn’t help any stereotypes by picking cheesecake, right?”

He sat at the foot of his bed facing Chloe’s flower pot, which sat atop his small bookshelf. He’d done everything he could in terms of water and sunlight, following Ondine’s care instructions. But the plant was not doing well.

“A rat wants what a rat wants,” Juniper said. “Anyway, is this the … lily or whatever?”

“Yes,” Gideon said, gesturing to where the aether lilium was sitting on the shelf. “What do you think? My Uncle’s blight has been doing a number on her.”

“I ain’t a plant scientist, but I thought they were supposed to be green,” Juniper said. “Is this some special kind?”

The black, fuzzy spots had slowly spread across Chloe, growing worse each day. “Chloe is special,” Gideon said. “Very rare, or so I’ve been told. But yes, she is supposed to be green.”

“Poor thing,” Juniper said. “You want me to give her a little surge of mana?” She raised her tiny paw towards the plant.

Gideon shook his head. “That feels like cheating on my homework. If it would save the plant for Ondine, I’m tempted… But I was hoping you could advise me on how to do this myself.”

“Oh, so I’m like your teacher?” Her nose twitched excitedly, and she clapped. “Professor Junie!”

“Okay, Professor, what do you focus on when you channel life mana?”

“I don’t focus,” Juniper said. “I just feel, you know, the energy, like a wave crashin’ outta me.” She raised her paw and waved it, leaving a green streak in the air that quickly dissipated.

Gideon sighed. That didn’t help him any more than his Aunt’s book had. He wished Harmony Kastorus had still been alive. But perhaps she couldn’t have told him anything other than what she’d written. It’s hard to explain something that comes naturally to you.

“Well, what did you focus on when you first learned to channel life mana? Back when you started…”

“Oh, I never practiced,” Juniper said. “Just one day, I was thinking of Ma, of…” Her voice trailed off for a moment. “Of how I never got a chance to know her.”

“I’m sorry,” Gideon said. “She didn’t make it, did she? The night you all escaped.”

“My beginning was her end,” Juniper said. “Pa doesn’t like to talk about it. I think that’s why he asked me to come upstairs with you today. He’ll need a little working up to it, you understand, and so will Silvari.”

“Ondine seemed pretty upset when you mentioned your father,” Gideon said. “I think she feels some guilt towards him especially.” He pointed at his Aunt’s book, The Vital Art, sitting on his bedside table. “My Aunt wrote a whole book on vitamancy. It says channeling life mana is about joy, but I’m not so sure, if you thought about your mother…” He shook his head sadly. “Doesn’t seem too joyful to me.”

“What about your family, Giddy?” Juniper asked. “Are they still around?”

Gideon thought for a moment before answering. “My mother passed away when I was young.” He didn’t say anything for a while. “She got sick. If we’d had money, if we’d been some fancy wizarding family, then we might have been able—” He stopped himself. It did no good now to think of it. “And my father, well, I disappointed him. For a while, he thought I would become a wizard.”

“Um,” Juniper said, looking at him like he was nuts. “You are a wizard.”

Gideon laughed. “Funny how that worked out, huh? But no, not really. Not in the way that counts.” He pulled at the hem of his robes absentmindedly. “He wanted me to be a proper, academy-trained wizard—someone who would rub shoulders with the best and brightest. After my mom passed, he pinned all his hopes on me. In the end, I disappointed him.”

“Is that why you feel guilty?” Juniper asked.

“What?” Gideon said. “I don’t feel guilty about him. It wasn’t my responsibility to fulfill my father’s dream.”

“That’s not what I meant,” Juniper said. She scampered off his shoulder and hopped to the shelf next to Chloe, her beady eyes considering him. “I meant, are you guilty because you couldn’t save your mom? If you’d known vitamancy, you might have been able to cure her.”

“I was twelve,” Gideon said, a wave of anger passing through his chest as he remembered. “I never would have been able to…” He closed his eyes and rubbed his forehead. Suddenly, he had a throbbing headache. “I’m not Archmage Ariston or something. I’m not some prodigy. No one could have expected me to do anything.”

“I know,” Juniper said. “But it sounds like you still need some convincing.”

Gideon shook his head, pushing his feelings away for a moment lest they overwhelm him. He didn’t want to cry in front of her. “I don’t think so.” He sighed. “I don’t know.” He looked to Chloe, watching as another darkened leaf fell to the wet soil, and he cursed under his breath. “None of that is going to help me now.”

“It isn’t?” Juniper asked. “You said it already—your Aunt painted a rosy picture in her book, but you’ll have to figure out what’s hidden underneath it.”

He remembered Clonk’s words from a few days earlier. When we’re honest with ourselves, we often find that joy and sadness are hard to separate. Gideon hadn’t been paying much attention at the time—he’d been too distracted by the rat trying to steal his salvage. But now, as he mulled it over, a strange feeling settled in his chest.

“Ah, hell,” Gideon muttered. He smiled at Juniper. “You’re pretty savvy, you know that? Maybe I do feel guilty. And angry. And sad. And happy, too. Maybe I can be all of those things.” He looked down at his hands. “You’re right. If I knew then what I know now, perhaps I could have saved her. But I’ll never get the chance. It’s terribly unfair, isn’t it?”

“It sure is,” Juniper replied. “It doesn’t make it okay, but I try my best to appreciate the family I do have—my Pa, my friends.”

Gideon smiled. He thought of everyone at the castle, everyone back in Prospera, everyone down in Emberly. “You’re right. Is that who you think about when you channel?”

Juniper’s nose twitched, and her eyes glittered in amusement like tiny fragments of Moonstone. “You didn’t quite understand,” Juniper said. “It’s not in my control, Giddy. It never was. All I can do is push it down, or let it flow.”

“Let it flow,” Gideon echoed. He’d never really done that, had he? He’d been trying to direct his mana all this time, keeping it as confined and rigid as stone.

That might have worked for geomancy, but it wouldn’t work now.

“Thanks, Juniper,” he said. “I see your point. I think I’m ready to try again.”

Juniper jumped back to his shoulder and placed her paws together. “Don’t forget to breathe,” she said.

He stood and faced Chloe, placing his hands on either side of the plant.

“Once more, with feeling,” he said and closed his eyes.

Gently, he coaxed the mana from up within his core and let it radiate down his arms and into his fingertips.

When images flashed through his mind, he watched them come and go—his mother’s sad smile, his father shaking his head in disappointment.

You’ll never amount to anything, he heard.

And, I’m so proud of you.

And, I can’t believe you haven’t been fired.

And, I’ll miss you.

He saw the family he’d lost and the one he’d gained. His old friends and his new ones. For a moment, he felt the strands of mana within him weaving into a new form, utterly different from anything he’d experienced before. He took a deep breath, then exhaled, trying to stay calm.

Excitedly, he almost pushed forward, willing his mana to go faster until Juniper squeaked and poked him with her paw. “Let it flow,” she said.

So he did.

His eyes opened in shock as an emerald radiance shone from his hands. Chloe’s leaves drank it in like sunlight. He watched with joy and relief as the darkness burned away before his eyes.

When the light faded, she was green again.