He gave me another shake to shut me up. “She’s so modest. If your daughter hadn’t intervened, some very bad things would have happened to the people I care about. I know if she’s that special, you must be something special, too.”
My mother giggled. “I like this one. You can keep him.”
“Mom, I’m not keeping anyone—”
“Mother knows best,” Berron said, patting my shoulder before releasing me. “Now, shall we enter the garden?” He unlatched the gate and held it open.
“Don’t mind if I do,” Mom said. She took quick and dainty steps down the pathway.
I leaned close to Berron’s ear. “Stop buttering her up.”
“It’s not butter if it’s sincere,” he murmured.
I rolled my eyes and let Jester drag me further in.
Berron looked up and down the pathway adjacent to the garden, making sure no one was in sight, before hurrying after us. “It’s all clear,”he said.
The garden was laid out in a simple rectangle surrounded by a low black fence. A brick path, straight as the Manhattan grid but only wide enough for a single person, cut the space down the middle. The path led to an open space, square-shaped, like a patio. Everything growing in the garden was no taller than shoulder height, making it easy to see in and out.
“Are we supposed to disappear from here?” my mother asked. “Wouldn’t that be a little suspicious to the people walking past?”
“That’s what Berron was checking,” I said.
Berron caught up and held out his hand to my mom. She took it, bouncing slightly in anticipation.
I took her free hand, forming a chain—Berron, Mom, me, and Jester—and looked around one last time. “We’re clear. Go.”
Berron continued along the path. It felt less like a path and more like a runway now, though we weren’t running. The plants seemed to pass us by quicker than we were walking, blurring like an Impressionist painting in the Met. Colors merged and melted. The air sang with golden magic. Our shoes struck the brick path until suddenly they didn’t, going soft and quiet over a springier surface. Only then did new surroundings rise up around us, replacing the low garden plots with towering trees, a soaring leafy canopy, and unfamiliar birdsong.
“Oh, my,” Mom said, coming to a stop and gazing around with wonder and a touch of bewilderment.
“Welcome,” Berron said, “to the Forest of Emeralds.”
Jester immediately set about sniffing the ground like it was his job.
Mom gripped my shoulder, steadying herself. “Where are we, exactly?”
“In the Forest of Emeralds, like Berron said.”
She let go and shot me a look. “I know that, Zelda, but wherearewe? Did we walk right off a map?”
Berron jumped in. “More like we’re on another map, underneath a map of Manhattan. Or on top of it. I’ve never been quite sure about the positioning.” He beckoned her forward and guided her to the top of a low rise.
Mom stood straight, listening carefully and surveying the land as Berron pointed out the relative locations of familiar tourist landmarks to their counterparts in the realm of the Gentry.
“Remarkable,” Mom said. “All my life, I never imagined…” She swept her hand to indicate the landscape.
All of it green and rich, a far cry from what it had been on my first trip. If only she could have seen what it took to restore it. All of us, in our own ways, bending the magic to bring an enchanted forest back to life. I was proud of what we’d done. “Still want to get rid of your magic?” I asked.
“Of course I do,” she replied quickly. “I was just remarking on howimpressivethis was.”
I nodded, unwilling—for once—to argue. Magic was nothing to take lightly, I’d learned.
As beautiful as it was, if you let it into your life, it might never let you go.
7
Wewalkeddownfromthe grassy ridge toward the Fortress of Apples, which rose like a stone wedding cake from the great apple orchard that surrounded it. A hushed wind ruffled the leaves and made the apples sway, filling the air with the scent of fruit.
