Page 55 of Evergreen

It took a second for that to sink in. “Property taxes?” I said, disbelief filling my voice. “You’re telling me that a dryad family that has lived on the same land for centuries has to pay property taxes to humans?”

“I’m afraid so⁠—”

“Fuck that!” I barked. “Humans can shove their fucking stupid laws right up their⁠—”

“As much as I agree with your sentiment,” Elias interrupted, his voice lower than I expected. “The Elder Council wrote laws over a century ago to help the paranormal world integrate into human society seamlessly. That means we are beholden to their laws as well as our own. And Rose Development is a witch-owned company who bought the property in question fairly and legally according to all records we’ve been able to find.”

“Are you fucking kidding⁠—”

“Mr. Reed,” Elder Briar Hall said, cutting me off. “We aren’t giving up on this. We’re still going to fight. The fact still remains that Linden has lived in the grove and cared for it all these years. Since he has made meaningful contributions to the property, there’s a possibility that we could claw it back for them. Not to mention, the heartwood of his family is there. We have room to argue our case in front of the Elder Council.”

I gave Linden’s hand a squeeze. Maybe there really was hope.

“But it’s going to take some effort,” Elder Briar Hall continued, and I could hear the edge in his voice. “The Elder Council usually doesn’t move quickly on matters like this. In most cases, these proceedings would take weeks or months. But Jackson Rose only agreed to drop the charges against you if we saw the case immediately. He’s confident he’ll win, and he wants to clear-cut as soon as possible. There’s a subdivision going in that apparently has several large investors.”

“We’re gonna fight,” I said, glancing over at Linden, who’d barely spoken a word the entire time. “We’ll fight and we’ll win, Linden. I promise.”

He lifted his gaze, light flickering in those golden eyes, and nodded. “Okay,” he said. He turned to the other two. “When do we start working on this?”

“Immediately,” Elder Briar Hall said. “Our hearing with the Council is in three days.”

Chapter 24

Linden

For three days, there was nothing to do but wait. Elder Briar Hall made it seem like there was a lot of preparation to be done. And maybe there was on his end. But as far as Cass and I, there was nothing to do. At first I thought going back to the grove to assess the damage would be a good idea, to try to heal the wound with my magic. But the Elder Council had forbidden both Rose Development and myself from going to the grove under any circumstances. They claimed they were still conducting their investigation and any interference from either party would render their argument null and void.

So, for the first two days, I sat in the infirmary with Cass, making sure he was recovering from his magical overexertion. As soon as he seemed well enough, the nurses sent us back to my dorm room to recuperate there.

The waiting was agony. I’d never been good at sitting still, and the forced inactivity was driving me up the wall. My dorm room felt smaller with each passing hour, the walls seeming to close in as I paced back and forth, my mind spinning through a thousand different scenarios.

Cass was recovering faster than the healers had predicted. And now he was complaining about being bored, which I took as a good sign. His color was better, and his magic had stopped crackling erratically beneath his skin. But there was a tension in him now that hadn’t been there before, a coiled readiness, like he was bracing for impact.

“Stop pacing,” he said, watching me from where he lay sprawled across my bed. “You’re making me nervous.”

“I can’t help it,” I admitted, running a hand through my hair. “I keep thinking about what happens if we lose. If the Elder Council sides with Rose Development.”

“Then we’ll figure something else out,” Cass said, though I could hear the uncertainty beneath his words. He didn’t believe it any more than I did.

I sat down beside him on the bed, and he immediately pulled me against his chest, his fingers finding their familiar place in my hair. We stayed like that for a while, just breathing together, trying to find some semblance of peace in the chaos.

My anxiety had reached a fever pitch. The hearing was scheduled for tomorrow morning, and Elder Briar Hall had sent word that we should meet him at the teleportation circle outside the school gate an hour before the proceedings began. I wasn’t sure how I was going to survive the night. Or get any sleep for that matter.

“It’s going to be okay, Linden,” Cass said, his hands moving down to the tight knot of muscle that was my shoulders. “We’re gonna get this figured out, one way or another. And Elder Briar Hall seems confident.”

“He’s a fae,” I grumbled. “Have you ever met one that wasn’t confident?”

“Okay,” Cass grinned. “I thought being grumpy was my job?”

“Yeah, well, you’re rubbing off on me,” I said, leaning back into his touch. His fingers worked at the knots in my shoulders with surprising skill, and I felt some of the tension begin to ease. “Besides, fae confidence doesn’t really help when we’re dealing with human property law and Elder Council bureaucracy.”

“True,” Cass conceded. “But at least he seems to know what he’s doing. And Elias seemed pretty sharp too, even if he doesn’t talk much.”

I closed my eyes, trying to let Cass’s touch soothe me. The weight of everything was pressing down on me. All I could see was the destroyed grove, the lost trees, and the possibility that centuries of my family’s legacy could be erased by a piece of paper and a legal transaction. It wasn’t fair. None of it was fair.

“Hey,” Cass said softly, his lips pressing against the back of my neck. “You’re spiraling again. I can feel you tensing back up.”

“Sorry,” I mumbled. “I just... I keep thinking about the heartwood. If they destroy it, I’ll lose my connection to the grove entirely. It’s not just about the land or the trees. It’s my family, Sparks. Part of who I am.”