“You made this for me?” I whispered, overcome.
He nodded and I rushed to hug him, forgetting my earlier outburst. Somehow hehadknown everything that would delight me. He’d carefully filled the cottage, stocking it with luxurious practicalities. No detail was too small, no need overlooked.
I could feel every thought he’d put into this space, and my heart swelled, overwhelmed by it all.
This showed he cared for me, I reasoned. No one would go to such pains for a ward they only tolerated. He might have left me on my own for all that time, but he’d also done this. And ifthatwasn’t proof of his affection, what was?
“And you’ll stay here? With me?” I asked, pulling him back down the hall toward the kitchen, hope clattering painfully high in my chest. “There’s more than one set of plates this time.”
Merrick glanced toward the shelf, counting the plates and cups as though he doubted what I’d seen. “Yes. Often.”
I could feel the rush of wind leave my sails. “But not always?”
He shook his great head, seemingly regretful.
“Your work,” I guessed.
“And yours,” he pointed out, evading my gentle prod. “Now that you’ve completed all your studies, you’re ready for your nextgift.”
“You’ve already given me so much.”
Merrick smiled widely. “Yes, Hazel. But this is the most important gift of all.”
And then, for the second time, Merrick told me my birthday story. And on this sunny afternoon, he told me every bit of it.
When Merrick had finished, I collapsed back into one of the overstuffed chairs in my new sitting room, gazing off into the forest out the windows as I mulled over everything he’d said.
“I’ll be able to cure anything?” I asked, feeling as if I were repeating him once again but needing absolute clarification.
In the periphery of my vision, I saw him nod. “Anything that can be cured.”
“Just by…” I raised my hand and mimed touching someone’sface.
Merrick nodded once more.
My head swam with dozens of questions demanding to be asked. “Why did you have me spend the last year reading all those books? I didn’t need to learn any of it. Not with this…gift.” It didn’t feel like the right word, not exactly.
Merrick was still for a long moment, considering my words. “Do you remember our talk about magic and power?”
I thought back to that day in the orchard so many months before and nodded.
“The cure…your vision of it…is the magic. It’s there, out in the world, waiting to be revealed. My gift to you, the seeing of it, is nothing but sleight of hand. It’s pulling back a curtain, showing what was there all along. The power, the true power, comes from knowinghowto use it. What good is knowing that someone needs stitches if you can’t sew them? Knowing you need to set a fracture and being able to do it are two very different things. You can see the tonic needed, but if you don’t know how to make it, your patient dies. You needed time to obtain your knowledge, to gather your powers. This gift is the confidence to know that what you’re doing is right.”
It made a degree of sense. I wanted to ask him more, but a great clatter of noise sounded from the front door. Someone was rapping frantically and calling for help. “Hello? Hello? Is the healer here?” The raps mellowed to thuds as the visitor switched to the palms of their hands, striking the door over and over. “Oh, please be home!”
“The healer?” I froze.
Merrick’s eyes sparkled in amusement. “He means you.”
“But how does he know I live here? We only just arrived.”
“This has always been the cottage of Alletois’s healer. When I came across its former resident”—he paused as if wishing to restructure the thought—“I knew that with a few changes here and there it would be the perfect place for you to begin practicing your new skills.”
“You ‘came across the former resident,’ ” I echoed, then blanched with realization. “They’re dead?”
Merrick let out a sigh of annoyance. “It’s not as though I left the body here.” He gestured to the door. “Yourfirst patient is waiting for you. Aren’t you going to let them in?”
I stood, then looked back to my godfather, panic rising within me. “But what about you?”
