“Looks like it’s time for more of your magic dirt, Kirchel,” Anthony said, peering into the bucket on the table in front of him.

“Again?” Kirchel frowned at him, looking suspicious. “I only gave you that bucket a few minutes ago. You’re not just saying that because you like seeing me up to my elbows in compost, are you?”

“Would I do a thing like that?” Anthony said, looking deceptively innocent.

“Yes,” Erin and Sarah said in unison.

Anthony glared at them and held up the bucket so that they could see the inside, which was indeed empty. “Here I am, the model of hard-working efficiency,” he said with an injured air. “And you three accuse me of playing childish pranks….”

“All right, all right....” Kirchel rolled her eyes and reached out to take the bucket from him.

She carried it over to the row of metal bins against the wall and started dumping in handfuls of composted manure, dirt, and cream-colored bits that looked like vermiculite but were really ground up scales from a maku—a Silmarith animal that Kirchel said looked like a cross between a pig and an iguana. Mixing it into the dirt apparently helped seeds sprout faster.

The four of them were in the back section of the greenhouse, planting various flower seeds in trays. The trays would then be placed on racks to wait until the seeds sprouted, at which point they would be transferred into the enclosed growing beds that filled most of this part of the greenhouse. Add some liberal doses of Kirchel's Nirayl plant-growing magic, and the whole lot would be ready to sell as fresh-cut flowers in the shop within a week or two.

Kirchel said she preferred to use the standard, non-magic method of ordering flowers from farms when she could. But with the way the summer had been going so far, she was having to rely on magic shortcuts to stay on top of things.

Anthony finding out about magic and the other world had actually been a huge help, since it meant she didn't have to hide the process from him anymore. Nathan still didn't know, since Anthony had decided not to tell his family what had really happened the day Kirchel was kidnapped, and the rest of them had respected his choice. But Nathan was quieter and more bookish than his older brother, so he preferred staying inside and managing the counter instead of working out in the greenhouse anyway.

Sarah being gone for almost two weeks had contributed to the work piling up. And even though she'd finally been allowed to return to her gate, she was on probation for the next three months, which meant she couldn't spend as much time away from the portal caves as usual.

The situation between her and Anthony was currently...awkward. They weren't exactly avoiding each other, but their interactions were stiff and almost completely limited to work-related conversation and activities. Even Erin had enough sense to know that they really just needed to sit down and have a long, honest talk about everything that had happened and where they wanted to take their relationship from here. But apparently neither of them had quite felt up to the task yet.

Kirchel had said to just leave them alone and let them work things out at their own pace, and Erin had been following her advice. But it did make working together with the two of them a little uncomfortable at times.

And speaking of Kirchel.... Erin snuck a glance at her cousin as Kirchel carried the bucket of freshly-mixed potting soil back over to the long table they were working at. It had been several days since Erin had spoken to Seiyan, and they still hadn't heard anything yet.

Jechrin had told her not to worry and said it would take some time for Seiyan to find the readoption statement, verify its authenticity, and process all the related paperwork. But remembering what he'd said earlier about Seiyan possibly ignoring or even destroying the statement, she couldn't help feeling a little anxious.

And it was hard not to say anything about it to Kirchel, especially whenever Erin saw her staring off into space with that sad, faraway look in her eyes.

“Not again!” Sarah growled suddenly, yanking her gardening gloves off and throwing them down on the table. “Can’t they wait until after working hours for once?”

“Dhaikar again?” Kirchel frowned. “I thought their investigation was over already.”

“It is,” Sarah said sourly. “But until I get off probation, they’re coming up with any excuse they can think of to harass me. They’re probably summoning me back to tell me that the cave needs sweeping out.” She pulled her apron off over her head and tossed it on top of the gloves. “Whatever it is, I’d better go get it over with. I’ll be back as soon as I can,” she added over her shoulder as she headed out the greenhouse door.

The other three looked after her silently for a few seconds. Then Kirchel sighed and shook her head.

“I hope it isn’t anything too bad,” she said with concern. “They’re driving her crazy with all these summons, day and night. If they keep it up, I'm afraid she's going to want to quit working here and go back to being a cave hermit, like she was before I started the shop.”

Anthony made a face at that but didn't say anything.

“Why do they have to be so hard on her?” Erin asked, reluctantly pulling Sarah’s pile of seed trays over and adding it to her own. “None of what happened with Wraith or Teral was her fault—surely they know that.”

Kirchel sighed again. “Yes, they know. But gatekeeping is a very serious responsibility, and the Dhaikar have to be strict in enforcing their rules. Sarah broke protocol, and they have to give her some kind of punishment for that, even though she probably did the best thing she could have under the circumstances. I think they’re being as lenient with her as their rules will allow them to be. If she’d been at all at fault, or if she hadn’t had such a clean record before all this happened, she probably would have been removed from her position straight out instead of just being put on probation.”

The author's narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

“I still don’t think it’s fair....”

“Life just isn't always fair, Erin.” Kirchel said gently. “And sometimes there’s nothing we can do about it but just accept things and move on.”

Erin scowled at her stack of seed trays. Kirchel was thinking about Arturyn again, wasn't she? Keeping a secret like this was so frustrating....

The three of them lapsed into silence. Even Anthony, who had been keeping up his usual playful banter earlier, didn't seem to feel like talking anymore. Was he thinking about Sarah going off to be a cave hermit? Erin had a hard time figuring out how he really felt about her by now. For how talkative he usually was, he was awfully quiet when it came to discussing his own feelings....

About half an hour later, Erin was starting to get sick of the gloomy silence and was just considering asking Kirchel if she could take a break and go out to the fish pond to play with Snapdragon for a few minutes, when she heard the greenhouse door sliding open.

She looked up and saw Sarah coming in, with a good-humored but slightly confused expression on her face, as though something had just happened that she liked but couldn’t quite understand. A man followed her in through the door. He was dressed in slacks and a tie and looked so ordinarily human that it took a second for Erin to recognize him.

“Arturyn?” she said, her eyes widening in surprise.

There was a crash behind her. Erin jumped and looked around. Kirchel, who had been mixing another batch of dirt, had dropped the bucket she was using, sending dirt and compost flying all over the front of her clothes and across the cement floor. But she seemed not to notice. She was staring at Arturyn, looking stunned.

“Arturyn? Why…? What are you doing here?”

He chuckled a little at her reaction. “I came to see you, of course,” he said with a smile, walking past Sarah to where Kirchel was standing, covered in dirt and looking completely bewildered.

“To see me?” she repeated. “But…why?”

“I have something to give you,” Arturyn said simply, still smiling.

In spite of his human attire, he was still wearing his leather pouch on his belt. He reached into it and carefully pulled out something green and leafy.

A gleeful smile spread over Erin’s face, and she heard a gasp from Sarah behind her.

Arturyn was holding out a gorgeous red rose, offering it to Kirchel. A traditional Silmarith marriage proposal.

Kirchel looked like she had forgotten how to breathe. Her face had gone pale, and she was staring from the rose to Arturyn and back again, as though she couldn’t believe she was really seeing them both in the same place together.

“I don’t understand,” she finally said in a hoarse whisper.

“Well, I guess I should explain,” Arturyn said, reaching into his bag again and pulling out a folded sheet of paper. “You see, I got a call from Raylmiyr yesterday. It seems that your Uncle Seiyan received a very interesting piece of information from someone not long ago….”

He turned and gave Erin an appreciative wink. She grinned and tapped her forehead lightly in response.

"That information led him to discover an old document, signed and sealed by the former king, which stated that he was officially readopting his daughter, Kiari, as a full member of the royal family." Arturyn unfolded the paper to reveal an official-looking document, which he handed to Kirchel. “That’s a translated copy of the public statement that the government of Raylmiyr issued this morning, saying that they'd verified that the readoption statement was legitimate and that Kiari and her husband and daughter are hereby accepted as members of the royal family of Aieryl-Raylmiyr, with all accompanying privileges and responsibilities.”

Kirchel stared down at the paper in her hands, her eyes flying back and forth over the words printed on it.

"Seiyan said he would contact you himself soon," Arturyn went on, watching her with a gentle smile. "But I asked him for the privilege of giving you the news first."

Kirchel raised her head. She stared at him for a moment, a glow of wonder and hope growing slowly on her face.

Then suddenly, she blinked. The glow faded, and she went pale again. “But...I can’t marry you!”

Arturyn raised an eyebrow. “Why not?”

“Because you’re the emperor of Silmar!” Kirchel sounded slightly panicky. “And I’m…I’m….” She faltered, looking down at her stained work apron and dirty arms and legs. “I’m covered in manure!” she ended on a despairing howl.

“'Soil supplement,' Kirchel,” Anthony reminded her with a mischievous grin. “Call it 'soil supplement.'”

Arturyn chuckled and moved forward so that he and Kirchel were standing only inches apart.

“I don’t care what you’re covered in,” he said softly, taking her dirty hands in his and bending down to kiss her on the cheek. “I love you, Kirchel. You’re the smartest, kindest, bravest, most wonderful woman I’ve ever known. And if I had the whole of both worlds to choose a wife and empress from, there’s no one I’d rather have than you.” He paused, smiling down at her, and reached up a hand to gently wipe away the tears that were streaming down her face. “I know it’s a lot to ask,” he whispered, holding up the rose again. “But please...won’t you take it?”

Kirchel touched the rose petals with her fingertips—lightly, hesitantly. Then she looked up into Arturyn’s eyes. For a few seconds, she was silent. Then she smiled, and her hand closed around the rose stem as she nodded wordlessly.

A broad, relieved smile spread over Arturyn’s face. He took the rose and tucked it carefully into Kirchel’s dark hair. When it was secure, she put her arms around his neck and stood on tiptoe to kiss him, both of them laughing and looking jubilant.

Erin and Sarah were also laughing, crying, and hugging each other. Anthony was watching the rest of them, looking a little taken aback by the display. But he was still grinning in an amused and impressed kind of way.

When Kirchel finally let go of Arturyn, Sarah tackled her, swinging her around in a kind of dancing embrace and repeating, “You’re getting married! You’re getting married! I can’t believe it!”

Arturyn laughed at their celebratory twirling. Then he turned to Erin and held out an arm to pull her into a brotherly hug. “Thank you,” he said softly, his eyes and voice full of emotion. “I know you found out through Jechrin, but you were still the one who delivered the message. And...I can't help but suspect that he wouldn't have been nearly so eager to help us out if it hadn't been for you. So thank you, for whatever role you played in this. It means the world to me.”

He let her go and went back to Kirchel, who was just finishing getting all the dirt and compost cleaned off of her by Sarah's magic.

As she watched Kirchel and Arturyn hugging each other tightly again, Erin reached up and surreptitiously touched her Silver mark.

"You're watching right now, aren't you?" she whispered. "Thanks for listening to my request...even if I did call you creepy.... They both look really happy."

She felt a faint warmth on her forehead, and she could have sworn she heard the sound of Jechrin's laughter.