Parsley, Sage, Rosemary, and Thyme,
The story of Ariana Rhiannon.
Parsley, Sage, Rosemary, and Thyme,
The story of Ariana Rhiannon.
Are you going to Scarborough Fair?
Parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme,
Remember me to one who lives there,
She once was a true love of mine.
Tell her to make me a cambric shirt,
Parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme,
Without no seam nor needlework.
Then she’ll be a true love of mine.
Tell her find me an acre of land,
Parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme,
Between the salt water and the sea strand,
Then she’ll be a true love of mine.
Tell her reap it in a sickle of leather,
Parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme,
And to gather it all in a bunch of heather.
Then she’ll be a true love of mine.
Ariana Rhiannon flew over the rolling green hills on white-feathered wings. Unlike the countryside where she’d grown up, this land was lush and long cultivated. The hills below were a patchwork of different shades of green, divided by piled stone walls and rough wooden fences. Sheep or cattle grazed contentedly in some, while neat rows of crops grew in others. Here and there a modest farmhouse stood, and narrow, winding dirt roads led between them.
It was quiet country, and just then it looked like something near to heaven to her. She was on her way home from the southern desert where she and her fellow adventurers had been tracking a murderous mage. She had seen her fill of bleak, barren land, and had had more than enough of darkness, death, despair and violence. Of course she would return when she was next called upon to right some wrong, she knew that, but for the moment she was very glad that the whole affair was over and done with.
She was still passing over farmland when the sun dipped down near the horizon. Best start looking for somewhere to spend the night, she thought to herself. She selected a farmhouse below at random and dropped down out of the sky. She landed in the road in front of the neatly kept yard and entered through the gate, not wanting to startle anyone who might be inside by landing on their very doorstep. She made her way up a paved walk to the door and knocked. When no one answered she waited a few minutes and knocked again, but there was still no response. She shrugged and turned to go when a voice said, “Oh! Hello! Sorry I didn’t hear you knock.”
She turned to see a sandy-haired man with cheerful blue eyes standing by the corner of the house. “I was just finishing up a bit of work in the garden,” he said. “How can I help you?” She noticed him sizing her up, his eyes darting from her fire-orange hair, to her white wings, and taking as well the sword at her hip and the light coat of mail she wore.
“I’m looking for somewhere to stay the night. I don’t know the area well enough to be sure of finding someplace with an inn before dark, so I was hoping someone around here might put me up.”
“You’d be welcome to stay here,” the man said. “We’ve several spare rooms since all my siblings moved out.”
“Thank you very much. I’m Ariana, by the way.”
“Jonathan,” he replied. “Quite pleased to meet you.” And he stepped forward, holding out a big, calloused hand. Ariana took it, her own grip firm and her hands just as rough as his, though her calluses came from sword work rather than farm work. “My mother’s about to put on dinner, and if you don’t mind plain country fare I’m sure there’s room for one more.” He winked cheerfully as he ushered her inside. “Mother still forgets sometimes she doesn’t have all my hungry brothers here to feed these days.”
“Thank you again,” said Ariana. “I have to admit a real meal would be quite welcome. I’ve been eating my own cooking for the last few days, and I’m afraid it leaves something to be desired.” Especially since half the time I don’t bother to actually cook my dinner, she thought to herself with a smile. There are advantages to being half firecat after all. But I think I’d just “weird out” this farmer, as Dad puts it, if I told him that I frequently have my dinner raw.
She followed Jonathan inside the house. It was all bright and cheery, with whitewashed walls decorated with colorful stenciled borders of plants, flowers, fruit, and animals. The scent of cooking wafted through the house, and Ariana inhaled appreciatively. “Whatever that is, it smells marvelous,” said Ariana, “and I’m hungry enough to eat a horse.” The kitchen was at the very back, with an open door letting out on a neatly ordered garden of herbs and vegetables.
A plump little woman was puttering around the kitchen, whistling cheerfully. She looked up as they came in and said, “Hello Johnny. I thought I heard someone at the door, but I thought you’d get it, as I’m minding the stove. Have we a guest for dinner then?”
“Yes mum,” he said. “This is Ariana. Is it all right if she stays the night?”
“Certainly, we’ve more than enough room these days. But it looks like dinner’s ready, so seat yourselves.”
Ariana took off her sword and propped it against one wall before sitting down at the table. Jonathan gave the sword a curious look, but made no comment.
Dinner tasted as wonderful as it smelled, and Ariana dug in with a hearty appetite. Jonathan almost didn’t remember to start in on his own food, he was so busy staring at her. He’d never seen anyone like her. She was beautiful, almost delicate, and yet clearly strong and capable. Her clear green eyes seemed to send a shock through him every time he met their gaze. She gave him a little smile and he realized he’d been staring at her with his fork half lifted for more than a minute. He blushed and looked down at his plate. He should keep his eyes to himself and the wild, ridiculous thoughts he kept thinking out of his mind. She was only passing through. And besides, what interest would somebody who was obviously a warrior and adventurer have in a farm lout like him?
Ariana noticed the young man's glances. She was not entirely unused to such looks, of course. She was old enough and, she knew, pretty enough to have gotten quite a few such looks. But I don't mind getting more, she thought to herself with a little smile. And he's rather cute himself!
"So where are you bound?" Jonathan's mother asked.
"I'm on my way home," she said.
"From where?" asked Jonathan, curiously.
"From the badlands," she said.
"My, that's quite a trip!" said Jonathan's mother.
Ariana chuckled. "And I've much further left to go. 'Home' is north of Snowcap. But I'm in no hurry. I've been taking my time and enjoying the journey. The countryside around here is very beautiful."
"You've probably seen much more interesting places than this, though," said Jonathan.
Ariana shrugged. "I suppose I might have seen places more interesting, and I do have to admit that the badlands are beautiful in their own bleak sort of way, but most of the places I've been aren't places I could imagine living. I could imagine living here. It would be nice..." she trailed off, with a sort of sigh. She could almost picture herself with a little farm somewhere. The idea was tempting. But she didn't know that much about farming, really. With a mental shrug she returned to her dinner, polishing the plate clean.
She slept that night in a comfortable bed in an attic room, deeply and without dreams. When she rose in the morning, she had a sudden impulse, and seeing no reason not to give in to it, she dressed herself, but left the mail and the sword in the attic, and came down stairs.
"Good morning." Jonathan greeted her with a smile, and then a blush.
She smiled back. "Morning. Is there breakfast?"
"Yep. Almost done. Just porridge though, we didn't have anything else," he sounded very apologetic.
"Porridge is fine. Perverse as it may sound, I actually like the stuff," she said with a grin. "At least provided you have honey, or sugar for it."
"Your choice of both, actually. And molasses too."
"Wonderful!"
After she had cleaned her bowl, Jonathan said, sounding a little regretful, "I suppose you'll be moving on now."
"Oh, eventually," she said, "But I thought I should repay you for your hospitality. Is there anything I can do to help out? I'm quite used to household chores and chopping wood and that sort of thing."
He looked a little surprised. "Well... there's always work that needs doing around here. It's the tag end of planting now, and I was going to spend the day out putting in some late vegetables in the kitchen garden. You could help with that, I suppose."
"Terrific!"
She spent the morning with him, making mounds for the seeds, or holes, or occasionally just sprinkling them carefully on top of the soil, depending on the plant. Her back was sore from all the bending over, but she had to admit it was rather satisfying to plant things. There was something about putting seeds in, about knowing that they were going to sprout and produce plants that would eventually be food, that was deep and rewarding. With both of them working they got the entire garden done before noon.
Ariana stood and stretched after she reached the end of her last row. "Man, I'm going to be stiff in the morning," she said. "And I'm staving again. Is there lunch?"
Jonathan laughed. "You sound like my brothers. Yes, there should be lunch, Mum should have made us something by now."
They ate a modest lunch of bread and cheese, and when it was done, Ariana said, somewhat thoughtfully, "There's really no point in my flying further on today, it's too late for me to get far. Would it be all right if I stayed here another day? I can lend a hand again this afternoon, if you like."
Jonathan hesitated, then shrugged. He had enjoyed her company this morning. She was a cheerful conversationalist, and was certainly easy on the eyes. And she had worked hard too, every bit as hard as he had. "Sure. Since the garden got done in half the time I'd planned, I was thinking of mending some things in the stable, I've been putting that off for too long. I don't know if you know leatherwork..."
She laughed. "I know it quite well. I learned how to keep my own gear in shape when I was in training, and that included fixing the leather if it got worn or broken. I've got a whole random assortment of mending skills. I can even do a little very basic blacksmithing."
"Do you know how to shoe a horse?"
"Oh yes. All too well. And I have mastered the fine skill of managing to get kicked by pretty much every horse I ever tried to shoe!" she said with a grin.
"Well, ours is a somewhat elderly and very placid fellow, so you have an even chance of escaping it this time. Could you? I was going to take him down to be shod again next week, but if you could do it here... We have a few tools, my uncle used to do a little smithing, but I don't know how to use them."
"Let me have a look at what you have."
The setup was indeed basic. The anvil had seen better days, and the forge was tiny. You couldn't forge a sword here, or even a plowshare, but it would be possible to shoe a horse. "Yeah, I think I can work with this."
She knew a good farrier could have had it done in an hour's time. It took her most of the afternoon. But she got it done properly, and didn't even manage to get kicked once. The big brown draft horse was indeed a very placid and patient animal.
"Whew," she said, stepping into the house. "Can I get a bath, or something? That was quite a workout."
"We don't have a proper bath house here," said Jonathan's mother, "but there's a good deep basin. I'll curtain it off so you can have privacy. And I've got soft soap, not lye."
"Oh good." She wrinkled her nose. "I hate lye soap."
Standing in a basin and soaping herself down wasn't quite as good as a bath, but she felt much better for the wash when she was done. She helped carry out the bath water, and then helped with the last of fixing dinner.
The next day she helped weed out the garden, insisting that she still owed them for all the meals and for two night's sleep now, while Jonathan went out to the fields. When she asked what he grew, he said "A bit of this and a bit of that, really. We grow for our own use as much as for selling, so there's a patchwork of different things. Some wheat, some potatoes. Some hay, of course, I'll do three harvests of hay this year, we had an early spring. Which means I may have the third harvest to sell, if it all goes well. And I grow pumpkins. They sell well, and keep well too, we'll eat them half the winter. And we've a little orchard. Mostly apples."
"I bet it keeps you busy," she said.
"That it does."
"Well, lending a hand is the least I can do. It's not as though I have anywhere to be, yet."
And so she stayed. There was never any shortage of work for her to do, and she didn't mind working. She'd been as tired after fights, and after the endless rounds of training that had prepared her for them. And as satisfying as battle and adventure could be, somehow the farm work was even more satisfying. The kingdom had to be defended, yes, and she was proud to be one of the defenders, but it felt now as though she were countering the death she'd dealt by dealing in life. Her sword and her chain mail stayed in the corner of her attic room, gathering dust, as the summer passed into fall. She was definitely needed during the frenzy of harvest time, and worked harder then than she'd ever worked in her life. But that deep satisfaction stayed with her. Stayed until the late autumn day when a white dove came down from the sky while she was helping prepare the kitchen garden for winter. She sighed to see it, but raised her arm for it all the same. The tiny slip of parchment it carried was magical, and as she unfolded it, it grew to a sheet she could read without squinting.
Jonathan gaped at her as she read it.
She folded it up, and it didn't shrink again. "Tell her I come," she said to the dove, and threw it back up into the sky with a whir of feathers.
"You're one of the Queen's Own," said Jonathan, as the dove vanished into the sky.
Ariana nodded. "Yes. And I've been summoned. I'm sorry. I would have liked to stay longer, it's been... very nice, being here, doing something other than fighting. But my queen needs me."
Jonathan just nodded mutely, shocked. That he had been living with, had been using as a farm hand, even! one of the elite adventurers that served Queen Tara directly was impossible, unthinkable, and yet undeniably true. He was still standing, stunned, when Ariana came out of the farm house. Her mail coat looked bright in the sun, and she rested her hand on the sword at her belt for a moment, re-accustoming herself to its presence there. She walked down the path to the road that led to the village and eventually to the river and the route to the Queen's Tower. She turned, though, as she passed through the gate.
"Jonathan... I truly have been happy here. Would I be welcome if I returned, when this is done?"
He blinked. "Of course!"
She smiled. "Then expect me back to help with spring planting, at the latest," she said, and with a leap and a thunder of wings far larger than the dove's, though they were just as white, she vanished into the sky.
Winter was not yet half gone when she soared once more over the patchwork countryside. The landmarks were all much changed by their deep blanket of snow, but she eventually found the right farm. She noticed Jonathan out in the yard, and was unable to resist the impish urge to land right next to him. He jumped at the sound of her wings, and then jumped again to see her.
"Hi! Hope it's all right that I'm a little early," she said. "Thankfully this little adventure didn't take me long."
"I, uh... no, that's fine! It's good to see you!" said Jonathan. He was nearly as stunned as he'd been on the day she left. Even though she'd said she would return, he hadn't really expected her to. What could there possibly be to draw somebody like her to a place like his farm, to a person like him? He had gotten used to the idea that a warrior might want to learn farming, but one of the Queen's Own? She could be living in the royal castle right now, in comfort and splendor, why would she want to come back here? But she had, and he found himself very glad to see her again.
She took her attic room again, and once more leaned her sword in the corner and folded her mail shirt next to it.
Winter was a slower time on the farm. There was still work to be done, but there were no plantings, no harvests, no crops to tend, and so there was more time for leisure. There were snowball fights, in which Ariana cheated outrageously by taking to the air to bombard Jonathan from above, and trips into the village, and even the occasional party or gathering at one of the other farmhouses in the area. Ariana enjoyed herself thoroughly. The winter here was mild indeed compared to the weather she was used to, and the company was very enjoyable. She had admitted to herself some time ago that as much as the work filled some strange inner desire, the real attraction of the farm was the young man who owned it. And so during those winter months she made the first few tentative advances in that direction. They got no further than occasionally holding hands while the snow still lay on the ground, but Ariana was content to take it slow.
Jonathan was still more than a little shocked. It seemed obvious that she liked him, but he knew it was very much impossible. Still... he wasn't going to stop holding her hand and enjoying her company until she told him to!
The budding romance, however, was pushed aside when the snow began to melt. Planting was not quite as frenetic as harvest, but it was still a very busy time, and they were both often too tired at the end of the day for anything other than dinner and bed.
Ariana loved planting. Putting the seeds in the soil and contemplating the miracle that turned little hard specks into green plants gave her endless pleasure. So she worked happily through the spring and into the summer. And one day she was helping plant late vegetables in the garden, and realized that it had been a whole year since she had first landed at the farm. She thought then of her family. She had sent word to them, not long after she first arrived here, so they wouldn't be worried. And she was long since old enough to not have them fret over her being away. She did miss them, just a little. But she still wasn't ready to leave here. She was starting to have thoughts of never leaving, in fact. All the same, I should probably write again, and reassure them, she thought. Well, the village isn't that far away, by wing. I could go today, and be back by sundown.
"Jonathan!" She just yelled, no point wandering the farm looking for him, he could be anywhere.
His head poked out of the hay barn. "What is it?"
"I'm done here, and I just thought of an errand I need to run. I'd like to take off and head into town this afternoon. I'll probably be back by sundown, though I might stay there overnight if it takes too long."
"Sure, go ahead. I'll manage."
"Thanks!" She took wing immediately, no point hanging around, and soared off over the green fields. She never tired of looking down at that patchwork of a thousands shades of green.
The village was small, but large enough to have a post station. She landed there, and was actually in the middle of writing out her letter when a voice called from behind her.
"Ariana!"
She blinked in surprise, then spun around to see a very familiar face. She flung herself at the tall, redheaded form of her younger brother. "Alan! What on earth are you doing here?"
"Roaming. And I thought I'd look for you while I was at it. Tara said you were staying near here."
"I am. I'm sort of a farm hand, I suppose! Working at a farm not far from here. I was just about to write home. Are you going to be headed back soon? You could get word there a lot faster than the post service can, if you are."
"Oh, probably. I hadn't planned on going very far. So tell me about this farm, and everything else you've been up to."
They sat together at the one modest inn and talked for a long time, catching each other up on their lives. Then Ariana glanced up at the darkening sky. "Guess I won't be making it home tonight after all," she said.
"So that's 'home' now, is it?"
She smiled. "It's starting to feel that way. I'm not ready to throw away my sword just yet, but... there's nothing that says I can't farm the rest of the time, you know I don't get called in all that often."
He chuckled. "True, true. I don't think I could be a farmer, too much work! But it sounds like you're very happy with it."
"Yes. Very happy indeed," she said.
Jonathan was a bit disappointed when Ariana didn't come back that night, but she'd said she might not, so he didn't worry. In the morning, however, he realized that he needed to go into town himself. He could put it off a bit, but... why not go meet her half way? So he hitched his solitary horse to the cart and set off. "Morning" was very early indeed on a farm, and the sky was only just lightening when he set out. The sun had risen by the time he was half way to the village, with no sign of Ariana. He shrugged and continued on. He reached the small hamlet and was just pulling his cart into the village square when he saw her. She was coming out of the inn with a young man. Tall, redheaded, he was obviously a fellow adventurer, or something of the sort. He wore no armor, but his clothing was not the clothing of a farmer, and he had a jewel-hilted dagger belted at his waist. He and Ariana were talking, and she smiled at him, and then hugged him. Jonathan felt like his heart had shattered, to see it. The man hugged her back, warmly. Then they parted, he going north, to the road out of town, Ariana heading south, towards the road where Jonathan had just emerged.
He almost tried to turn the cart around, and just go home. He had known that she couldn't possibly love him, and here now he saw it. This man would be her lover, no doubt, and she had only been staying on the farm with him for some inexplicable reason all her own. But he couldn't turn the cart fast enough, and she'd seen him already anyhow.
"Hi!" she called out.
He just looked at her.
She slowed, looking puzzled. "What's wrong?"
And then his heartbreak suddenly flashed over into anger, to see her so careless of him that she would not even know what was wrong. "What's wrong? You come stay at my farm, you give me smiles and you hold my hand and you make me think that maybe you might love me, when you obviously don't, and won't stay! I wish you'd never come!"
"I..." she looked stunned. "What?"
"I saw you with your fellow there, your adventurer. He's more your type than I, I know, but it was cruel of you to make me think, to hope..." he had to hold back tears. He would not cry!
"He... you... he's not 'my fellow', he's my brother! I haven't been leading you on here, I've been as sincere in my feelings as you!"
"Ha!" Jonathan couldn't believe that. "There's no way one of the Queen's Own would care for a farm lout like me. I knew that from the beginning, and I should have remembered it."
"You, you...!" her green eyes snapped with fire then. "You haven't been a farm lout to me, but you're acting like one now! What do I have to do to make you believe that I'm sincere here?"
"Get the lost jewels of Irdua," he snapped, naming something long known as an impossible quest. "But no, that's what people like you do," he said then, "Is go on quests. You'd have to give up your sword and live as a farmer for real, before I'd believe you, but there's no way you're going to do that!" And with unnecessary force he snapped the reins, startling the old horse into a trot, and drove away from her.
She could have run after him, but what was she going to say? He was convinced, had been convinced all along, that she was somehow above him. She muttered a curse at stubborn, stupid farm louts in his direction.
"I couldn't help but hear that, sister mine," said Alan, coming up beside her. "He only snaps at you because he was hurting. He'll calm down eventually."
She sighed. "Sure. But he's not going to stop thinking of himself as a farm lout and me as some kind of high and mighty I don't even know what, even when he has calmed down."
"And that matters, does it?" said Alan with a smile.
"You know it matters. I was picturing staying here, maybe building a life with him. Maybe even giving up the sword, or at least being in the reserve rather than active, if Tara can spare me. But that's not going to happen if he's so convinced we're not equals."
"You love him then?"
She sighed again. "Yes, I think I do."
"Well, I guess we just need to convince him that his notions about his place and your place in the world are wrong."
"And how do you suggest we do that, brother mine?" she asked.
"Well, he's probably right that getting the lost jewels of Irdua won't do it," he said with a grin. "But I'm pretty sure there's something that will."
Jonathan didn't see the road as he drove home. His horse knew he way, after all the years it had walked it, and brought him to his own gate, where he sat for a long time, blinking back tears. Life goes on, he told himself, and drove the cart into the yard. Life goes on.
And life did. The work was harder, having just the two sets of hands again. His mother was in good enough health, but wasn't as strong as Ariana had been. But he'd managed before she came, and he somehow managed after she had gone. She never came back to the farm at all. He'd gone up to her attic room just once, to see her sword and mail shirt still sitting there. He'd left them, and hadn't looked into the room again since.
Summer turned towards autumn, and then the winter's snows fell. He didn't go, this year, to any of the parties or socials. He would remember her too strongly, and somebody else might ask after her. So he didn't know that during the last weeks of winter somebody had bought the Oldson farm.
The Oldsons had been his neighbors, when he'd been a child. But they had both died, taken sick of a fever in the winter, and hadn't had the strength to keep their fire going. They had been old, and they had no children. There was a cousin, somewhere, who ended up inheriting, but he was a city man, from Queensford, and never even came to look at it. It was a very small farm, not the sort that somebody would buy to make money from, it had never really produced cash crops, only just enough to keep the Oldsons fed, with a tiny bit in good years to sell and buy what little they didn't make or grow themselves.
He did see the new owner arrive, however. He was out in front one late winter afternoon, when the snow was already more than half melted, taking a moment of rest in the yard between tasks, when he saw the cart pass along the muddy road. It wasn't a particularly large or nice cart, the word best applied to it would probably be "rickety." It was pulled, however, by a truly magnificent chestnut draft horse, with brilliant white feathering on its feet and a long flowing mane and tail. Behind the cart trailed a string of goats, and driving it was a figure too muffled in winter clothes to be clearly made out at a distance, but as the cart drew nearer, he could see that it was a woman. Brown hair and brown eyes, and little else visible under her coat. He gave her a nod as she passed his farm. She nodded back genially. The cart continued on down the road a half mile or so, and then to his surprise it turned in at the next gate.
He kept an eye on the farm next door after that, curious. He saw the woman, the girl, really, going about the process of getting the farm ready for spring planting. She had a heroic task ahead of her, because it had been left to run wild for years. But her horse was more than equal to plowing under the hard soil, it seemed, and she was obviously no stranger to hard work. Every day he saw something new. The farm house was cleaned out, the smaller of the two barns made habitable for the goats, the larger left for now. The garden plot was dug up, and though she didn't get all the fields plowed and ready for planting, she got a fair amount of them done. Spring was well underway now, and he was soon too busy with his own planting to pay that much attention to his neighbor, but he noticed, whenever he was in the fields near the fence that separated them, that the little farm was looking less and less like a derelict, and the fields were greening with growing things.
On one warm spring afternoon he happened to be working near the fence when he heard a cheerful voice call out "Hello there!" He turned and saw the girl, standing by the somewhat weathered stone wall that separated their farms. "I thought I'd come say hi," she said, "Since we're neighbors now."
He paused his work for a bit. It wasn't so urgent he couldn't spare a moment. "Hi. It looks like you're doing a good job of getting your place fixed up."
She laughed. "You only say that because you can't see the unholy mess that's still left from a distance. I'm Spark, by the way. Don't ask, my parents had some peculiar notions" she said.
He chuckled. "Jonathan."
She held out her hand over the fence and he took it and shook it. Her hand was as work-roughened as his own. He had a flash of memory then, of the sword-calloused hand of Ariana, and felt lonely all over again. But he had a sudden thought. "Would you care to come over for dinner some time? It has to be a little lonely there, all by yourself."
She smiled. "I'd like that. My horse is good company, but he isn't good conversation."
"He's quite the animal," said Jonathan.
"And you're almost certainly wondering why somebody who's here, scraping along on a little farm, has a horse like that, aren't you?"
"Well, he's a sight better than my own, we'll put it that way," he said, admittedly quite curious.
"He's my inheritance," she said, "So to speak. I had him, and enough money to buy a little place. I could have sold him, and had the money for a larger farm, or to start a city shop or something, but... I don't really like cities. And there's just me to work the place, and I wouldn't have had a horse! So small is better. And his dignity isn't offended by pulling a plow, thankfully. But I should get back to work, and I'm sure you have lots to do."
"Yeah."
"Maybe I'll take you up on that offer this evening," she said, and smiled.
She did come over for dinner that evening, and for several evenings after. "I have enough to do without having to cook, and then having to eat my own cooking," she had said. "I'm not really all that good at it."
"Well, cooking for three isn't any more work than cooking for two," Jonathan's mother had said, and after that she came over nearly every day.
Jonathan found himself smiling at her a lot. Although sometimes the smiles were a little sad. He thought of Ariana often still, though he tried to put her out of his mind, and he could almost believe sometimes that she had been telling the truth, that she had cared for him. But it didn't matter now, she was gone and wasn't going to come back.
"You're looking rather sad," said Spark one evening as they sat talking after dinner. "Something on your mind?"
He shrugged. "Regrets. We all have them. Enough said, really."
She nodded. "Yes. Well, let's talk about something else then. What about your family? This house is big enough for an army, where did everybody else go?"
He chuckled. "It felt like an army when everyone was still here. I had three brothers and two sisters! Plenty of family. My sisters both married and moved out. One of them lives not far from here. My brothers..." He shrugged. "None of them loved the land. You have to love it, to stay and work it. But they wanted money, or excitement, or whatever else it is you get in towns and cities, and they all went, one by one. So there's just me. It's a small enough farm, and I manage by myself. I.... had help for a while, that was nice, but... I manage by myself."
Spark sighed. "So do I, though I don't envy you the work you have here. And I know what you mean about loving the land. Though with me it's more loving life, and growing things. I never get tired of watching things grow. And I'm fond of animals," she added with a chuckle. "I seem to be better at managing them than I would have thought. I knew what to do about the garden and the fields, but the goats worried me for a while. But they're fine. It's amazing how much personality goats can have. I wouldn't have thought! And how much trouble they can get into."
He laughed. "That's part of why I don't keep them."
She nodded. "You make enough to buy milk and cheese. But I don't think I can. And I'm not sure I could live without milk! I may end up living without cheese, I've never made it before, and I get the feeling that my first attempt may be kind of... interesting."
"We've never done dairy here, or I'd offer to help," he said.
"Heavens no! I know how much work you have to run this place. You don't need to take time off to help me. I do all right. Just getting out of the cooking once a day is plenty help enough! I should probably get going though," she added. "It's getting late, and morning comes early."
"Goodnight then," he said.
"Goodnight."
The seasons turned, and the farm next door greened further and further. Jonathan attempted to help Spark with the harvest when autumn came, but she refused. "Good gods, you have ten times the work at harvest that I do! Go, take care of yourself. I'm just fine."
He did, however, find time to help with a few repairs when the snow started falling. The roof of the farmhouse was creaking dangerously under a relatively light load of snow, and they spent nearly a week reinforcing it. Walls needed patching, cracks needed chinking, but eventually the house and barns were ready for winter.
They went to a few of the various winter social events, at Spark's insistence. Jonathan still hadn't really wanted to go, but with her right there inviting him, he didn't know how to say no. He mostly had fun, but he kept seeing Ariana, remembering the winter she'd returned to the farm, how glad he'd been to see her, how much fun they'd had at the parties that year.
"Jonathan, I can tell your mind is a mile away, at least," said Spark as they drove home from one such event. They were using his cart, but her magnificent horse pulled it.
"I guess."
"Care to tell me where?" she said.
He shrugged. "Just... remembering a girl."
"Ah. I thought it might be something like that."
"I thought maybe she loved me. And then I was sure she didn't. And now I don't know at all. But it doesn't matter. I drove her away and she won't be coming back."
Her hands were on the reins, but she held them in just one, and put her other hand over his. "You never know, she might."
"No, I don't think she will," he said. "She didn't belong here anyhow."
"Is that why you drove her away, because she didn't belong?"
"I guess," he said sadly.
Spark shook her head. "Why do you get to decide where somebody else belongs? What if she thought she did belong here?"
"I don't think she could have."
Spark pulled the cart to a stop. "I don't think you get to make up somebody else's mind for them, Jonathan, nor tell them how they have to think. Nobody gets to do that for another."
"I...."
"Sorry," she said, and shook the reins again. The cart started forward. "It's none of my business, and I'll keep it that way. I just think it sounds like you were doing all the deciding, and that never works well. When you're talking about love, you have to let the other person decide too. I'd wager she left more because of that than because of any nonsense about where she 'belonged.'"
"You belong here though," said Jonathan.
Spark laughed. "And how do you know that?"
"You just do. You love the land, like I do."
"And is that what it takes to belong, loving the land?"
"I guess so."
"It hasn't got anything to do with where you came from or what you used to do? You don't know anything about my past. I could be anybody."
He blinked. "I guess I don't. But it's clear enough to me that you're from farming stock."
She laughed again. "Believe that if you want to, Jonathan. I won't tell you otherwise."
"Well then, where do you come from?"
"I just said I wasn't going to tell you. I'm not."
He gaped at her. "But why?"
"Because I'm contrary. If you want to believe that the only way I could love the land is to be raised a farm girl, you believe that. It's your head. I don't tell people what they should think, remember? But if you'll actually use that brain, which I know is in your head somewhere, and start doing some thinking, you'd know where I come from."
He sat there blinking in silence for the rest of the drive home.
As he lay in bed that night he kept turning that over in his mind. If she wouldn't tell him where she came from, how was he supposed to know? And then suddenly he remembered that first day, seeing her driving up, and how he'd been surprised to see her pull into the farm next door, and not just because it was empty, because... Because a person with a horse like that wasn't a farmer. She said it was an inheritance. That means she got it from her family. And no farming family has a horse like that! So she's not a farm girl.
He was tired, and he started dozing off, but that idea kept running through his mind, and the last thing he thought before he fell asleep was, if Spark, who isn't a farm girl, could really love the land, then why couldn't Ariana love it too?
He wanted to talk about it more, but he could never think of a good way to bring it up. And what did it matter anyhow? Ariana was long gone. Spark was here. So he continued to go out with her whenever there was a gathering in the area, and he found that he was thinking less and less of the adventurer and more of the farmer next door.
The winter was late to leave that year, and there was a hard cold snap when spring ought to have been on the way. So it was well below freezing one night as Spark drove the cart into Jonathan's yard and unhitched her horse from it.
"That was pretty fun," she said.
"Yes, it was. Will you be over for dinner tomorrow?"
"You know I will, I...." she was cut off by a loud whinny from the horse. It was looking towards her farm. Spark spun around. She could only just make out her farmhouse through the fields and trees, but it was immediately obvious that it was on fire. "Oh no!" She started as if to run towards it. Then she froze. "Oh no." Jonathan looked, and realized that there were dark shapes moving in front of the fire. Unfamiliar shapes, shapes that weren't human.
"Get inside," snapped Spark. "Now!" she added when he didn't move immediately. He shook himself and ran for the farmhouse door, but even as he reached it, he could see some of those shapes in the road in front of the house. Ariana's horse squealed, and it spun around nimbly, in a move he'd never seen a horse do in his life, and its hind hooves lashed out at the dark creatures. Spark nearly plowed into him running into the house. He scrambled inside and shut the door behind them. Then he blinked. Spark had vanished up the stairs to where the attic rooms lay. From outside came a confusion of thuds, inhuman screams, and the cries of an enraged horse. Then Spark came racing down the stairs, and she had Ariana's sword in her hand. Even as she reached the bottom, there was a crash, and one of the creatures broke the door in.
It was big, bigger than Jonathan, with an almost canine snout full of scraggly teeth. Large ears notched with scars and pierced with earrings framed a crest of stiff hair. It was covered in matted fur and dressed in patched armor, half leather, half rusted chain. And it held a sword, a big sword. And there were more just like it coming in behind it.
With a yell Spark lunged at it, and as Jonathan stumbled back against the far wall, he watched in stunned amazement. She moved with smooth, almost graceful speed among the creatures, and every time they swung at her, she simply wasn't there. But her own swings and thrusts hit home each time, and it was only seconds later that four of the creatures lay dead on the floor. She didn't pause though, she pelted out the door at full speed. The noise outside increased, more screams adding to the clamor, and then suddenly it fell silent.
Spark appeared in the doorway. The sword was red with blood, and there was a gash across her collarbone and partway down her chest. "Are you all right?" she asked.
"I..." he just gaped at her.
She walked over and shook his shoulder. "Come on, back to earth. Are you all right?"
"I should be asking you that," he finally said. "You're hurt..."
She glanced down and winced. "It's just a scrape. Though I wish I'd had time to put on the mail."
Then he realized something. "You knew where the sword was. You went straight for it."
She smiled, a bit ruefully. "Yes I did."
"How? And..." he looked at the sprawled forms, each one half again as big as he, and easily twice the size of the slender girl. "How could you... do that?"
She looked at him for a moment, then shrugged. "I fought them because that's what I've been trained to do. Gnolls are vicious, and smarter than goblins, but they're slow. And I knew where the sword was because I'd left it there myself."
"...what?"
She chuckled softly. Then she seemed to blur, and suddenly brown hair and brown eyes were replaced with fire orange hair and sparkling green eyes. Her features shifted, her nose a little shorter, her chin a little more pointed, her skin tone a little lighter, and at her back were the white wings of an aerian.
Jonathan could not have been more shocked. "Ariana?" he said disbelievingly.
"You said that if I could give up my sword and live as a farmer, you'd believe me. I'm afraid I wasn't able to keep away from the sword as long as I'd hoped, but given that we'd probably be dead if I hadn't taken it up again, I hope you'll forgive me." She looked behind her then. "We'll talk more later. I need to go take care of my horse. He's mostly okay, but he got a few scrapes."
"He's a war horse, isn't he?" said Jonathan, with sudden realization.
"Something like that, yes," said Ariana. She sighed then. "It's probably too late to save the farmhouse. I don't know how on earth I'll manage to rebuild it."
He gaped at her again. "You're staying here?"
She gave him a flat look. "Of course I am. I didn't do this just for a lark. I love the land, you said it yourself. I may have to pick up my sword now and then when my duty calls me, but I don't love the land any less because of that." Then she stalked out the door, leaving him even more stunned, which he wouldn't have thought possible.
Half an hour or so later he walked down the road to her farm. The farmhouse was a gutted ruin. The goats were all dead, and the large barn had been half wrecked; the hay and grain stored there were scattered across the snow. Ariana was sitting next to one of the dead goats in the center of the yard. She was stroking it and he realized she was crying. Her horse was nuzzling her as if to comfort her. Warriors don't cry over dead goats, he thought. But I guess they do, because she is... And that final thought sank in, on top of everything else, and made him realize exactly how foolish he'd been. He had told himself that she was above him, but he was the one who'd been acting superior, judging her, insisting that she fit into his view of the world. She didn't, and she never would, and that didn't matter one bit.
"Ariana," he said, and she looked up, her cheeks streaked with tears. "Come back to my farm. I've been an idiot several times over, and I won't blame you if you don't want to have anything else to do with me, but you can't stay here tonight, and... and you're always welcome there. Always." He held out his hand to her.
She took it and stood. She wiped her eyes. "Thank you."
She had lived with him for a year as Ariana, and next to him for a year as Spark, and now, just over a year later, they stood together and surveyed their farm. The fields were beginning to green with the first planting. The further fields where a smaller farm house had once stood were now a pasture for a whole herd of goats, which Ariana grumbled about milking daily.
"It looks pretty good," said Jonathan.
"So it does," said Ariana. "But there's still planting left to do, and tending, and mending. There's always more than enough work."
He chuckled. "Yes there is, love. And I'm glad you're here to share it with me. I..." he stopped then as a whir of wings overhead made him look up.
"Oh bother. If I miss the rest of planting, I'll be really miffed!" said Ariana as she raised her arm for the dove to land. He put his arm around her as she read the summons, and squeezed comfortingly when she sighed. "Well, duty calls. Though the stipend for my absence should be enough to hire a little help while I'm gone. You'll need somebody else to milk the goats, and least."
"I still don't do dairy," he said with a grin, "So yes." He kissed her, and then they walked together back to the farmhouse. She took her sword down from where it hung over the mantle of the main room. The mail shirt was in a chest against one wall.
Armed and armored she stepped out into the yard. Jonathan hugged her again, not minding the mail coat at all. "Come back safe and soon, love," he said.
"I will," she promised, and then with a leap and a flash of wings she was aloft. He watched as she vanished into the sky, and he smiled. Then he turned and went back to the fields. There was always more work to be done. He still loved his farm, loved the land, and the work was rewarding, though it was hard. And when she returned, it would be more rewarding yet, for he'd found that the one thing better than working the land he loved was working it beside the woman who loved it just as much as he.
The End.