The Pillars Of The World

each evening. Now he saw just how alone she was out there, and he didn’t like it. If someone did choose to cause trouble for her, there was no one close by who would notice, no one who might help her. That was something he would have to think about.
    He eased back. “I should let you get on with your work.”
    “Thank you for stopping by, Lucian.” She sounded distracted—too distracted to realize she had just dismissed him with no more thought than she would have had for an insignificant human male.
    He kissed her cheek and walked around the side of the cottage. Shifting to his other form, he galloped over the meadow toward the forest trail that would take him to the road through the Veil. At the edge of the meadow, he stopped, looked back. He couldn’t see her. Was she watching him? Or had she even noticed he was gone?
    He trotted along the forest trail until he saw the shining road that led to Tir Alainn.
    Nothing was as simple as it should have been where she was concerned. This wasn’t even the challenge of seduction, which at least would have given spice to the frustration.
    It stung that she would refuse him to spare a human male’s feelings.
    It also troubled him that he cared enough that he was getting tangled up in aspects of her life that had nothing to do with their pleasuring each other. Such things were dangerous for a Fae male when he indulged himself in the human world.
    But even if he kept his distance, he could still find out what was happening at Brightwood.
    He’d just send Falco out to catch another rabbit.
    Ari fetched the buckets she’d left outside the cow shed, then filled them at the well. The garden needed watering, and after that there was plenty of work to do.

    There was always work to do. And with every day that passed, it gave her less pleasure.
    Already tired, she looked around, studying the cottage, the meadow, the woods.
    She’d been born here, had grown up here, as had her mother and grandmother and generations of witches before her. Why had her family stayed at Brightwood? To provide a home for the Small Folk?
    To look after and cherish an Old Place? Were witches as much gentry as the other landowners, or were they nothing more than unpaid groundskeepers? And if that was so, who really had claim to the Old Places?
    Neall was right. She had no chance of a life here. She couldn’t sell her weaving in Ridgeley for anything near what it was worth. The last time she’d gone into the village for a few supplies, the only shopkeeper who would sell anything to her was Granny Gwynn, and Granny had tried to charge so much over the usual price, she had left the supplies on the counter and walked out—which is why her larder had been so empty of things like sugar and flour before Neall had bartered the salmon to Ahern.
    The land was rich because it had always been cared for. Even so, she felt as if she were doing little more than surviving. When Neall left, it would be harder to do even that.
    Neall.
    She would have to give him an answer soon. After the Solstice. That would be enough time to hear what her heart had to tell her.
    That decision made, she picked up the buckets and went to water the garden.
    “Blessings of the day to you, Ari,” Dianna said.
    Ari looked up from the flower bed she was weeding. “If visitors are the blessings for the day, I could use fewer blessings.”
    Taken aback by the words, and the temper behind them, Dianna wasn’t sure how to respond—and regretted her impatience. She should have waited a couple more days before coming back to the cottage.
    “I—I just wanted to see how you and the pup were getting along.”
    Ari sat back on her heels and sighed. “I’m being rude. I’m sorry, Dianna. Merle is doing fine.”
    Dismounting but still uncertain of her welcome, Dianna said, “That sounds like a good name for a puppy.”
    At that moment, the puppy trotted around the cottage, saw Dianna, and started yapping.
    “Hush, Merle,” Ari said. The smile she gave Dianna was considerably warmer than the initial greeting. “
    He’s my protector. He protects me from butterflies, bugs, twigs, leaves, and anything else that moves—
    as long as it’s smaller than he is. Or close enough in size.”
    “And if it’s bigger?” Dianna asked.
    Laughing, Ari got to her feet and brushed dirt off her trousers. “Then he bravely stands behind me and tries to warn off the intruder.”
    In a few months, he won’t stand behind you , Dianna thought,