When I draw near, he turns his head slightly to look down at me, and I’m pretty sure I don’t imagine how he shifts aside so my arm won’t brush his.
Not a people person, clearly. Maybe I just learned a new way to annoy him.Yay me.
“What are you working on?” I ask, crossing my arms against the morning chill as I look down at the soil and tools spread across the garden bench.
“Transplanting sniffleblooms.”
I arch a brow. “Sniffleblooms?”
With careful hands—which is impressive given how huge his fingers are—he delicately separates one of the young flowers from its siblings, then moves it into its own small square of soil. After adding a bit more dark brown earth, he packs it down and says, “If you agitate the blossoms, they’ll release spores that’ll make you sneeze pink for a week.” His eyes meet mine, and healmostsmiles. “Come to think of it, you can finish this up.”
Next thing I know, he’s pushing the tray toward me, and I’m fumbling for words. “W-wait, I don’t know the first thing about—”
“Just go slow and be careful. Intentional.” He points at the tray of soil squares. “One plant per square. Once they grow into these, we’ll plant them outside.”
“Why would anyone want to plant these?” I ask, feeling like I need to hold my breath. Things are going crazy enough as is; I don’t need to be plagued with pink sneezes.
There’s a hint of joy in Mr. Axton’s voice as he say, “Keeps meddlesome students out of places where they don’t belong.”
And just like that, without any further instruction, he treads off, leaving me with the blossoms and their villainous pink petals. I glare down at the young flowers, really wishing I were back in bed.
“How long can you hold your breath?” Juniper asks from my pocket. I notice she’snotsticking her head out this time. Smart.
I hold my breath as a light autumn breeze tickles my skin. Then I grumble, “Not long enough.”
THE WORK IS SLOW. PAINSTAKING. Tedious. The first couple of sniffleblooms take a damn lifetime to transplant, and a few times I hold my breath for so long that my head starts to feel woozy. But after the first three, miraculously, I’m actually getting the hang of it.
Slowly, I remove one flower from its companions, then ease its root system into a prepared square of soil and pack a bit more over the top, like Mr. Axton did. I hold my breath whenever a breeze comes to play, and there’s something oddly calming about it—despite knowing one wrong move could leave me a sniffly pink mess for the next seven days.
Somehow, I get caught up in the work, so I’m surprised when I feel a tingle go down my back and glance up to find the minotaur watching me. He’s holding a big basket full of fresh produce: thick heads of lettuce, soil-spotted potatoes, and a bunch of carrots with frilly green tops. His gaze feels heavy, like a big cloak draped over my shoulders, and I wrinkle my nose up at him.
“What? You waiting to see if I’m sneezing yet?”
It takes him a long while to respond—I’m starting to think these prolonged pauses are normal for him. When he finally speaks, it’s accompanied by a subtle shrug from those massive shoulders of his. “Something like that.”
I don’t take my eyes off him—almost thinking he’s trying to sabotage me and make me send the sneezy spores everywhere—until he passes behind me and then into his hut. The door closes, making my garden table wobble a bit. The sniffleblooms sway. Immediately, I hold my breath.
When I finally let it out and gasp in a lungful of the crisp autumn air, Juniper whispers from my pocket, “You think he did that on purpose?”
I shake my head and glare at the closed door. “Don’t know.”
But if he did, I think as I resume transplanting the pink flowers,he’s got another thing coming. I’ll show him I’m not nearly so big a screwup as everyone thinks.
Chapter 7
Cairn
I GRAB MY THICK OVEN mitts and pull the cake tray from the oven, then set it on a heat mat to cool in the light breeze coming through the open window. It smells so good, I want to dive into it now, but it needs to cool before I frost it. And that’ll take a while yet.
Removing my oven mitts, I realize I left the fire witch working on the sniffleblooms. I got so distracted getting the fresh produce put away and whipping up a carrot cake that I completely forgot she was out there working.
And now I feel a bit like an asshole. There’s a reason I’m a groundskeeper and not a professor. I don’t do well with babysitting.
Shit. She probably got bored and wandered off. Hopefully Lysandra doesn’t see her and—
I yank open the door to my hut and come face-to-face—or rather, chest to face, seeing as how small she is—with the witch. Her messy red curls are knottedatop her head, her fingers are stained with soil, and the look on her face is more victorious than it has any reason to be.
“I’m done,” she announces, more than a hint of pride coloring her tone.
