In the Land of Fae 2: Return to Ice ♔ (gxg)

10. pumpkins

"Oi, pumpkin time!"

Abitha had burst into Al and Nyx's room at the crack of dawn that morning without knocking. Nyx woke up with a shriek, pulling the covers over her body which was only covered by her undergarments. Al jumped up with a start and yelled, "Get out!" to Abitha who snickered and walked away, leaving the door wide open. The fire fae stumbled out of bed and clumsily slammed the door shut so that she could get some clothes on in peace.

The morning sun had only begun to rise over the distant hills by the time Abitha and Al had made it out to the gardens. A handful of earth fae were already out there, crouched over pumpkins double the size of watermelons and plucking them from their vines. Morning fog crowded over the grassy field that was littered with giant orange beasts waiting to be harvested.

Al held an axe over her shoulder as she followed Abitha to a corner of the garden that no one had worked yet.

"You know the drill," Abitha told her, swinging her axe loosely around as they approached a group of about three dozen pumpkins. "Make sure the rind is hard and ripe." She leaned over a pumpkin and slapped it, a bit of dirt falling from the pumpkin as she did.

Sighing, Al kneeled down and assessed a different pumpkin, turning it over to be sure it hadn't rotted.

"We'll be harvesting the radishes next, mind you," Abitha said as she began plucking the pumpkin stem from the vine, finding a bit of resistance. She stood up and held her foot over the pumpkin, raising her axe up before swinging it down, finally disconnecting the stem from the vine.

They worked together in silence for several minutes as the sun rose a bit higher, casting light over the foggy garden. Al, while her back began to ache after a few too many swings of the axe, was grateful that she was distracted. Her mind could rest while her body worked.

Abitha, on the other hand, kept looking over at Al and making an expression as if she was about to speak, but kept closing her mouth and turning her attention back to harvesting before she said anything. Finally, after feeling Abitha look over at her for the twentieth time, Al dropped the axe and put her hands on her hips.

"Bloody hell, what do you have to say to me, Abitha?"

Sighing, the earth fae leaned back on her knees in front of a particularly large pumpkin. "Nothing, Al, I just..." Looking up at the fire fae, she stood up and plopped her bum down on the pumpkin, holding onto her axe by the handle. "I just wanted to tell ya—ya know—I don't blame you."

Al watched the fae, out of breath from all the manual labor. She looked down to the ground and wiped sweat from her cheek.

"Out of the lot of us," Abitha continued, gesturing to everyone in the field and back towards the castle where only the point of the highest turret could be seen. "It was only statistical that one or two of us would come out of everything all screwed up." She looked back to Al, her hazel eyes shining as the sun finally cast its first stroke of light across her face. "I just hate it had to be you."

Al chewed the inside of her cheek and nodded, leaning on the handle of her axe as the sounds of the nearby earth fae talking filled the silence. "I know, Abitha," she whispered, fog steaming from her mouth as she spoke into the cold air.

"It won't be forever," Abitha said, her voice straining with emotion, as if she was pleading. "This will pass, Al. I promise you." She shook her head and sighed deeply, the tips of her ears twitching as her brown wings nestled around herself, the cold getting to her now that she wasn't keeping herself warm with movement.

Al watched Abitha as she opened her mouth and closed it again, obviously struggling to find the words she wanted to say.

"Ya know, when everything first happened," she began slowly, leaning down to pick a little purple flower from the ground, twirling it in her dirt-covered fingers. "I was gone." Her eyes met Al's. "I lost my parents, and my brother," her voice cracked, and her eyes fell away from the fire fae. "I thought it was all over and done with, ya know. I thought that was it for me, and for us." Her eyes returned to Al's suddenly. "Then I found you again. Caspian, Catori, Aerwyn..." She winced when she said Aerwyn's name, and a shudder found itself in her wings as the cold seeped through her. "And I realized that nothing was over like I thought it was."